Oliver Goldsmith

Oliver Goldsmith was born about 1728 in County Longford, Ireland, the son of an Anglican clergyman, and grew up in the village of Lissoy. He studied at Trinity College, Dublin, then medicine at Edinburgh and Leiden, and wandered through Europe on foot, reportedly paying his way with his flute. In London from 1756 he worked as an usher, a doctor and a hack writer of reviews, histories and children's books. His essays in The Citizen of the World and the poem The Traveller (1764) made his name, and he became a founding member of Samuel Johnson's Club. The Vicar of Wakefield appeared in 1766, The Deserted Village in 1770 and the comedy She Stoops to Conquer in 1773. Generous to a fault and always in debt, he died in London on 4 April 1774. Johnson wrote the Latin epitaph for his monument in Westminster Abbey.

Oliver Goldsmith is also an author in the library: author page and works.

Faith: Son of a Church of Ireland clergyman and an Anglican all his life; the village preacher of The Deserted Village and the patient Dr Primrose of The Vicar of Wakefield are affectionate portraits of Christian pastors. Source: Encyclopaedia Britannica

See also: William Cowper · Robert Burns · Walter Scott