Details
WALPOLE, Horace, 4th Earl of Orford (1717-97). Autograph letter signed ('Orford') a draft to 'Bertie Greatheed', Berkeley Square, 22 February 1796, 2 pages, 4to, with engraved portrait
Walpole writes to the dramatist Bertie Greatheed extravagantly praising four drawings made by the latter's son (and namesake) to illustrate scenes in Walpole's The Castle of Otranto and asks whether he would allow copies to be made. 'My extreme surprise at your Son's Drawings ... prevented my expressing half of what I felt ... I have seen many Drawings & prints made from my idle -- I don't know what to call it, novel or Romance -- not one of them approached to any one of yr Son's Four'. Walpole refers to the portrayal of the ghost in the chapel and to Manfred in the last scene, 'Such delineation of passions ... are indubitably indications of real Genius.'
Bertie Greatheed (1759-1826) was a dramatist and friend of members of Walpole's intimate circle such as Mrs Damer and the Berry sisters. Bertie Greatheed Junior (c.1781-1804) was an amateur artist. The original autograph letter sent to Greatheed was acquired by Wilmarth Sheldon Lewis in 1971. According to Lewis the autograph draft now offered for sale was bequeathed by Mrs Damer to Sir Jonathan Wathen Waller, 1st Baronet, in 1828. See The Yale Edition of Horace Walpole's Correspondence, ed. W.S.Lewis, Vol 42, Oxford, 1980, pp.429-31.
Walpole writes to the dramatist Bertie Greatheed extravagantly praising four drawings made by the latter's son (and namesake) to illustrate scenes in Walpole's The Castle of Otranto and asks whether he would allow copies to be made. 'My extreme surprise at your Son's Drawings ... prevented my expressing half of what I felt ... I have seen many Drawings & prints made from my idle -- I don't know what to call it, novel or Romance -- not one of them approached to any one of yr Son's Four'. Walpole refers to the portrayal of the ghost in the chapel and to Manfred in the last scene, 'Such delineation of passions ... are indubitably indications of real Genius.'
Bertie Greatheed (1759-1826) was a dramatist and friend of members of Walpole's intimate circle such as Mrs Damer and the Berry sisters. Bertie Greatheed Junior (c.1781-1804) was an amateur artist. The original autograph letter sent to Greatheed was acquired by Wilmarth Sheldon Lewis in 1971. According to Lewis the autograph draft now offered for sale was bequeathed by Mrs Damer to Sir Jonathan Wathen Waller, 1st Baronet, in 1828. See The Yale Edition of Horace Walpole's Correspondence, ed. W.S.Lewis, Vol 42, Oxford, 1980, pp.429-31.
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