Book contents
- Frontmatter
- CONTENTS
- Acknowledgements
- List of Illustrations
- Introduction
- 1 Defining Eccentricity in Early Nineteenth-Century Britain
- 2 Performers, Audiences and Eccentric Identities: William Martin and the World turned Upside Down
- 3 ‘Beyond the Pale of Ordinary Criticism’: Literary Eccentricity and the Fossil Books of Thomas Hawkins
- 4 Eccentricity on Display: Visiting Charles Waterton, Traveller, Naturalist and Celebrity
- Conclusion
- Notes
- Works Cited
- Index
4 - Eccentricity on Display: Visiting Charles Waterton, Traveller, Naturalist and Celebrity
- Frontmatter
- CONTENTS
- Acknowledgements
- List of Illustrations
- Introduction
- 1 Defining Eccentricity in Early Nineteenth-Century Britain
- 2 Performers, Audiences and Eccentric Identities: William Martin and the World turned Upside Down
- 3 ‘Beyond the Pale of Ordinary Criticism’: Literary Eccentricity and the Fossil Books of Thomas Hawkins
- 4 Eccentricity on Display: Visiting Charles Waterton, Traveller, Naturalist and Celebrity
- Conclusion
- Notes
- Works Cited
- Index
Summary
The early nineteenth century witnessed an explosion of possibilities for amassing new kinds of experience: through books, magazines and newspapers, which reached out to ever wider audiences in this period; through travel, which became faster, more comfortable and more affordable; and through displays of the world's treasures and novelties at museums, exhibition halls, galleries, theatres, gardens and menageries. In the midst of all these possibilities, individuals expanded their range of experiences vicariously, collecting portraits and biographies of the eminent and privileged and devouring images and descriptive accounts of far-flung corners of the world. They also acquired new experiences in person, setting out to confront the strange, the new, the exotic, the famous and the eccentric face to face.
In September 1847, William Kinsey, Rector of Rotherfield Greys in Oxford-shire, set out to do just this. In a published account of his visit to Walton Hall, home of the naturalist Charles Waterton (1782–1865), he explained:
I had long entertained an earnest wish to become personally acquainted with the benevolent and distinguished proprietor of the far-famed Walton Hall, near Sandall, in the west riding of the county of York. I had learned to revere the character of the amiable and learned author, from frequent perusal of his admirable ‘Essays on Natural History’, as likewise the captivating account of his ‘Wanderings in South America’. I was equally desirous to visit the house and museum of Mr. Waterton.
Kinsey had the pleasure of joining ‘an intellectual party’ in paying a visit to Waterton at his home and, he assured readers of the Gentleman's Magazine, ‘it was ever after a “red letter day” in my remembrance’. In fact, Kinsey was just one of many thousands of people to visit Walton Hall during Waterton's lifetime. Visitors from all walks of life recorded the intense anticipation of setting foot into the picturesque park, where birds and animals were protected against poachers and other predators; of viewing the ‘museum’ in the hallway, with its shimmering, lifelike specimens and satirical taxidermic monstrosities; and, most of all, of coming face to face with the ‘singular and eccentric naturalist’ himself.
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- Science and EccentricityCollecting, Writing and Performing Science for Early Nineteenth-Century Audiences, pp. 125 - 162Publisher: Pickering & ChattoFirst published in: 2014