writers that lived in extreme solitude from day one

[Distant Dreams]

kind of freaks like Lovecraft, but more literary ones. list them here please.

[Panglossian]

Julien Gracq

Arthur Schopenhauer was a bit of a hermit ... apart from his beloved poodles.

[G L Wilson]

All scholars need their solitude.

[G L Wilson]

Saint Jerome.

[PeterL]

Lovecraft did not live in solitude. So what do you mean by solitude, if your example ddid not live in solitude?

[G L Wilson]

Lovecraft did not live in solitude. So what do you mean by solitude, if your example ddid not live in solitude?

Fair point. Bypass it, Distant Dreams.

[ChicagoReader]

Thoreau wasn't completely secluded, he was fairly close to a small town but I think he's a good example of a writer living in solitude.

[G L Wilson]

Thoreau wasn't completely secluded, he was fairly close to a small town but I think he's a good example of a writer living in solitude.

There's your pass, Distant Dreams. Lovecraft was a definite hillbilly bumpkin.

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

Emily Dickinson lived in relative solitude. J.D. Sallinger became a recluse later in life.

[Desolation]

Nietzsche was pretty hermetic. Proust is also said to have cut himself off from the world pretty heavily after his mother died.

[OrphanPip]

Emily Dickinson lived in relative solitude.

The quintessential weirdo recluse. Apparently, she used to lower cookies to children from the windows of her house. If anyone ever gets a chance to read her personal letters, they're absolutely bonkers.

She wrote this to a her pen pall T. W. Higginson:

"I went to school - but in your manner of phrase - had no education. When a little Girl, I had a friend, who taught me Immortality - but venturing too near, himself - he never returned - Soon after, my Tutor, died - and for several years, my Lexicon - was my only companion - Then I found one more - but he was not contented I be his scholar - so he left the Land.

You ask of my Companions Hills - Sir - and the Sundown - and a Dog - large as myself, that my father bought me - they are better than Beings - because they know - but do not tell - and the noise in the Pool, at Noon - excels my Piano. I have a Brother and Sister - My Mother does not care for thought - and Father, too busy with his Briefs - to notice what we do - He buys me many Books - but begs me not to read them - because he fears they joggle the Mind. They are religious - except me - and address an Ecipse, every morning - whom they call their "Father." But I fear my story fatigues you - I would like to learn - Could you tell me how to grow - or is it unconveyed - like Melody - or Witchcraft?"

She wrote this in 1862 before she became a recluse, but I feel like her letters are strikingly bizarre and revealing of a troubled mind. It's also nuts that she uses dashes instead of periods, just like in her poems.

[G L Wilson]

The quintessential weirdo recluse. Apparently, she used to lower cookies to children from the windows of her house. If anyone ever gets a chance to read her personal letters, they're absolutely bonkers.

She wrote this to a her pen pall T. W. Higginson:

"I went to school - but in your manner of phrase - had no education. When a little Girl, I had a friend, who taught me Immortality - but venturing too near, himself - he never returned - Soon after, my Tutor, died - and for several years, my Lexicon - was my only companion - Then I found one more - but he was not contented I be his scholar - so he left the Land.

You ask of my Companions Hills - Sir - and the Sundown - and a Dog - large as myself, that my father bought me - they are better than Beings - because they know - but do not tell - and the noise in the Pool, at Noon - excels my Piano. I have a Brother and Sister - My Mother does not care for thought - and Father, too busy with his Briefs - to notice what we do - He buys me many Books - but begs me not to read them - because he fears they joggle the Mind. They are religious - except me - and address an Ecipse, every morning - whom they call their "Father." But I fear my story fatigues you - I would like to learn - Could you tell me how to grow - or is it unconveyed - like Melody - or Witchcraft?"

She wrote this in 1862 before she became a recluse, but I feel like her letters are strikingly bizarre and revealing of a troubled mind. It's also nuts that she uses dashes instead of periods, just like in her poems.

The Marquis de Sade was bonkers, but even he showed sparks of brilliance. The letter shows wholesale genius, not madness.

[Alexander III]

The Marquis de Sade was bonkers, but even he showed sparks of brilliance. The letter shows wholesale genius, not madness.

How does the letter show genius? It shows to me, like it shows to pip also I suppose, a socially awkward recluse, whom unfortunately lives in solitude half by her choice and half by choice of others.

If anything this letter evokes in me a deep sense of pity for the girl.

I dont see why some younger people think that, socially awkward= genius

Genius is not formed by personality it is something independent, just look at the great writers of the past whom we deem Geniuses, some were socially awkward solitary creatures, and others make Mick Jagger look like an steady headed and calm school boy.

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

She wrote this in 1862 before she became a recluse, but I feel like her letters are strikingly bizarre and revealing of a troubled mind. It's also nuts that she uses dashes instead of periods, just like in her poems.
Wasn't using a lot of dashes pretty common for the time, at least when it came to letter writing? I looked over some letters written by Harriet Beecher Stowe, and they are full of them, and she was definitely not insane.

[PeterL]

Thoreau wasn't completely secluded, he was fairly close to a small town but I think he's a good example of a writer living in solitude.

Thoreau spent most of most days in town with his friends. The on;y times when he didn't hang out with people were on camping trips.

[PeterL]

There's your pass, Distant Dreams. Lovecraft was a definite hillbilly bumpkin.

Lovecraft was a city boy. He spent most of his life in Providence, Rhode Island. Where ihe lived was not a collection of three deckers, but it was far from rural, very far from rural. He also spent time in the City of Salem, Massachusetts. While Salem is a small area it is densely inhabited, and it is surrounded on three sides byt other densely developed municipalities. Peabody, Danvers, and Beverly have been densely developed for more than a century.

[G L Wilson]

Lovecraft was a city boy. He spent most of his life in Providence, Rhode Island. Where ihe lived was not a collection of three deckers, but it was far from rural, very far from rural. He also spent time in the City of Salem, Massachusetts. While Salem is a small area it is densely inhabited, and it is surrounded on three sides byt other densely developed municipalities. Peabody, Danvers, and Beverly have been densely developed for more than a century.

Lovecraft found the city alien.

[tonywalt]

Salinger was incredibly reclusive. There are probably less than a dozen pictures of him after he wrote Catcher.

According to all sources he continued to write after his last published work in 1965. After his estate is settled, which is quite a task, we shall see what exactly he was writing - on day.

[OrphanPip]

Wasn't using a lot of dashes pretty common for the time, at least when it came to letter writing? I looked over some letters written by Harriet Beecher Stowe, and they are full of them, and she was definitely not insane.

It was common to use them in place of where you would find a semi-colon today, not in the way Emily uses them, not to mention her irregular capitalization. You could cut her letters up in stanzas and they'd read like one of her poems. If you read more of her letters you also notice that she has a way with words that is highly figurative. However, that is just quirky. Her writing is compressed and evasive, which maybe reveals a level of social awkwardness. What is revealing of deeper problems are statements like she's only had 3 friends, that she prefers her dog and the hills to real people, and how isolated she feels from her family.

Honestly, can we say that someone who spent the last 35 years of her life pretty much refusing to leave her house mentally stable?

[Hopfrog]

kind of freaks like Lovecraft, but more literary ones. list them here please.

It is a complete and utter myth that Lovecraft lived in extreme solitude--he did nothing of the kind. He had many friends during his active and normal childhood. Once he became active in amateur journalism he met with many others who were so inclined and often journeyed to Boston to attend conventions. His greatest joy was to travel, and he explored America whenever he had the funds with which to do so. His life in New York was amazingly social, attending parties where he met the likes of Hart Crane. He spent extended visits with Frank Long in New York and Robert Barlow in Florida, staying with both young men and their parents. The absurd myth that Lovecraft never left his home, was an eccentric recluse, shunned daylight (he did much of his writing in New England parks because he loved heat and sunlight), is fully exploded in recent biographies and editions of Lovecraft's published letters. He was, in fact, just a regular joe, as normal as anyone else--but with an extraordinary imagination. For an excellent book-length depiction of Lovecraft as social creature, I recommend Lovecraft Remembered, edited for Arkham House by Peter Cannon. It is a book of some 480 pages that reproduces articles and essays by Lovecraft's friends retelling their social activities with him and their delight in his company.

[G L Wilson]

There are different kinds of solitude, some are this and some are that and some are both and all are hell.

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

It was common to use them in place of where you would find a semi-colon today, not in the way Emily uses them, not to mention her irregular capitalization. You could cut her letters up in stanzas and they'd read like one of her poems. If you read more of her letters you also notice that she has a way with words that is highly figurative. However, that is just quirky. Her writing is compressed and evasive, which maybe reveals a level of social awkwardness. What is revealing of deeper problems are statements like she's only had 3 friends, that she prefers her dog and the hills to real people, and how isolated she feels from her family.

Honestly, can we say that someone who spent the last 35 years of her life pretty much refusing to leave her house mentally stable?
Probably not, but I don't think she was "insane" like some make her out to be. If she were alive today, I'm sure she'd be on some drug that would make her more sociable, and maybe stifle her creativity.

And I must say I often prefer the company of my dogs to people. Though, I am a bit reclusive myself, compared to the average person.

[Alexander III]

Probably not, but I don't think she was "insane" like some make her out to be. If she were alive today, I'm sure she'd be on some drug that would make her more sociable, and maybe stifle her creativity.

And I must say I often prefer the company of my dogs to people. Though, I am a bit reclusive myself, compared to the average person.

I don't think they have drugs to fix social awkwardness, as a major factor of social awkwardness is that other people take a look and know that one is missing something and thus they ignore.

[PeterL]

Lovecraft found the city alien.

Which is why he enjoyed living in cities and visiting people in cities. That he found something "alien" does suggest that he might have been in solitude.

[Buh4Bee]

I don't think they have drugs to fix social awkwardness, as a major factor of social awkwardness is that other people take a look and know that one is missing something and thus they ignore.

:cheers2::rofl:

[PeterL]

:cheers2::rofl:

Amen.

[mal4mac]

Schopenhauer was rather solitary - in his early years his mother complained when he shunned her and everyone else for several months. His work didn't take off until he was old, so he suffered intellectual solitude - he gave up lecturing when not one person turned up for his lectures - he had timed them to clash with Hegel at the height of his fame! From then on he was a reclusive scholar. Then again he did end up living in Frankfurt, dined at a communal table in a hotel some evenings, and was quite chatty by most accounts. But his days were very solitary. He didn't marry, and was rich enough never to work; he spent most of his days in solitary study, playing his flute, walking alone... Magee's biography of Schopenhauer will give you the big picture.