George Crabbe ( KRAB; 24 December 1754 – 3 February 1832) was an English poet and clergyman. He is best known for his early use of the realistic narrative form and his descriptions of middle and working-class life and people.
Aged 14, Crabbe was apprenticed to a farmer–apothecary at Wickhambrook, which he resented, spending more time as a farm-hand than training as an apothecary. He returned to work in his father's warehouse, and was then sent to John Page, a surgeon in Woodbridge, who employed him in filling prescriptions and compounding medicines.
At the end of four years with Page, Crabbe returned to Aldeburgh. After serving as his assistant, he took over the apothecary of James Maskill. Crabbe read, studied, and learnt anatomy by dissecting dogs. A year later, he put his apothecary shop in the hands of a neighbouring surgeon and went to London to acquire medical knowledge, where he heard the lectures of the Scottish midwives Orme and Lowder, who followed Dr William Smellie's obstetrical tradition.
In 1780, Crabbe abandoned his unsuccessful labours as an apothecary. He travelled to London to make a living as a poet. After encountering serious financial difficulty and being unable to have his work published, he wrote to the statesman and author Edmund Burke for assistance. Burke was impressed enough by Crabbe's poems to promise to help him in any way he could. The two became close friends and Burke helped Crabbe greatly, both in his literary career and in building a role within the church.
Burke introduced Crabbe to the literary and artistic society of London, including Sir Joshua Reynolds and Samuel Johnson, who read The Village before its publication and made some minor changes. Burke secured Crabbe the important position of Chaplain to the Duke of Rutland. Crabbe served as a clergyman in various capacities for the rest of his life, with Burke's continued help in securing these positions. He developed friendships with many of the great literary men of his day, including Sir Walter Scott, whom he visited in Edinburgh, and William Wordsworth and some of his fellow Lake Poets, who frequently visited Crabbe as his guests.
Lord Byron described him as "nature's sternest painter, yet the best." Crabbe's poetry was predominantly in the form of heroic couplets, and has been described as unsentimental in its depiction of provincial life and society. The modern critic Frank Whitehead wrote that "Crabbe, in his verse tales in particular, is an important—indeed, a major—poet whose work has been and still is seriously undervalued." Crabbe's works include The Village (1783), Poems (1807), The Borough (1810), and his poetry collections Tales (1812) and Tales of the Hall (1819).
Crabbe was born in Aldeburgh, Suffolk, the eldest child of George Crabbe Sr. The elder George Crabbe had been a schoolmaster at a village school in Orford, Suffolk, and later in Norton, near Loddon, Norfolk. Later, he had become a tax collector for salt duties, a position his own father had held. As a young man, he had married an older widow named Craddock, who became the mother of his six children: George Jr; Robert; John; William; Mary; and a sister who died in infancy.
George Jr. spent his first 25 years close to his birthplace. He showed an aptitude for books and learning at an early age. He was sent to school while still very young, and developed an interest in the stories and ballads that were popular among his neighbours. His father owned a few books, and used to read passages from John Milton and from various 18th-century poets to his family. He also subscribed to Benjamin Martin's Philosophical Magazine, giving the "poet's corner" section to George. The senior Crabbe had interests in the local fishing industry, and owned a fishing boat; he had contemplated raising his son George to be a seaman, but soon found that the boy was unsuited to such a career.
George's father respected his son's interest in literature, and George was sent first to a boarding-school at Bungay near his home, and a few years later to a more important school at Stowmarket, where he gained an understanding of mathematics and Latin, and a familiarity with the Latin classics. His early reading included the works of William Shakespeare, Alexander Pope, who had a great influence on George's future works, Abraham Cowley, Sir Walter Raleigh and Edmund Spenser. He spent three years at Stowmarket before leaving school to find a medical apprenticeship.
In 1768 Crabbe was apprenticed to an apothecary at Wickhambrook, near Bury St Edmunds; the apothecary also kept a small farm, and he ended up doing farm labour and errands, rather than medical work. In 1771 he changed masters and moved to Woodbridge. There he was under the surgeon John Page. He remained until 1775.
While at Woodbridge, Crabbe joined a small club of young men who met at an inn for evening discussions. Through his contacts there he met his future wife, Sarah Elmy. Crabbe called her "Mira", later referring to her by this name in some of his poems. During this time he began writing poetry. In 1772, a ladies' magazine offered a prize for the best poem on the subject of hope, which Crabbe won. The same magazine printed other short pieces of Crabbe's throughout 1772. They were signed "G. C., Woodbridge," and included some of his lyrics addressed to Mira. Other known verses written while he was at Woodbridge show that he made experiments in stanza form modelled on the works of earlier English poets, but only showed some slight imitative skill.
His first major work, a satirical poem of nearly 400 lines in Pope's couplet form entitled Inebriety, was self-published in 1775. Crabbe later said of the poem, which received little or no attention at the time, "Pray let not this be seen ... there is very little of it that I'm not heartily ashamed of." By this time he had completed his medical training and had returned home to Aldeburgh. He had intended to go on to London to study at a hospital, but he was forced through low finances to work for some time as a local warehouseman. He eventually travelled to London in 1777 to practise medicine, returning home in financial difficulty after a year. He continued to practise as a surgeon after returning to Aldeburgh, but as his surgical skills remained deficient, he attracted only the poorest patients, and his fees were small and undependable. This hurt his chances of an early marriage, but Sarah stayed devoted to him.
In late 1779 he decided to move to London and see if he could make it as a poet, or, if that failed, as a doctor. He moved to London in April 1780, where he had little success, and by the end of May he had been forced to pawn some of his possessions, including his surgical instruments. He composed a number of works but was refused publication. He wrote several letters seeking patronage, but these were also refused. In June Crabbe witnessed instances of mob violence during the Gordon Riots, and recorded them in his journal.
He was able to publish a poem at this time entitled The Candidate, but it was badly received by critics.
He continued to rack up debts that he had no way of paying, and his creditors pressed him. He later told Walter Scott and John Gibson Lockhart that "during many months when he was toiling in
early life in London he hardly ever tasted butchermeat except on a Sunday, when he dined usually with
a tradesman's family, and thought their leg of mutton, baked in the pan, the perfection of luxury." In early 1781 he wrote a letter to Edmund Burke asking for help, in which he included samples of his poetry. Burke was swayed by Crabbe's letter and a subsequent meeting with him, giving him money to relieve his immediate wants, and assuring him that he would do all in his power to further Crabbe's literary career. Among the samples that Crabbe had sent to Burke were pieces of his poems The Library and The Village.
A short time after their first meeting Burke told his friend Sir Joshua Reynolds that Crabbe had "the mind and feelings of a gentleman." Burke gave Crabbe the footing of a friend, admitting him to his family circle at Beaconsfield. There he was given an apartment, supplied with books, and made a member of the family. The time he spent with Burke and his family helped by enlarging his knowledge and ideas, and introducing him to many new and valuable friends including Charles James Fox and Samuel Johnson. He completed his unfinished poems and revised others with the help of Burke's criticism. Burke helped him have his poem, The Library, published anonymously in June 1781, by a publisher that had previously refused some of his work. The Library was greeted with modest praise from critics, and slight public appreciation.