My Study Fire

by Hamilton Wright Mabie

Hamilton Wright Mabie (December 13, 1846 - December 31, 1916) was an American essayist, editor, critic, and lecturer. *Biography* He was born at Cold Spring, N. Y. in 1846. Mabie was the youngest child of Sarah Colwell Mabie who was from a wealthy Scottish-English family and Levi Jeremiah Mabie, whose ancestors were Scots-Dutch. They were early immigrants to New Amsterdam, New Netherland about 1647. Due to business opportunities with the opening of the Erie Canal his family moved to Buffalo, New York when he was approaching school age. At the young age of 16 he passed his college entrance examination, but waited a year before he attended Williams College (1867) and the Columbia Law School (1869). While at Williams, Mabie was a member of Alpha Delta Phi fraternity and would serve as the first president of the North-American Interfraternity Conference (formally known as the National Interfraternity Conference He received honorary degrees from his own alma mater, from Union College, and from Western Reserve and Washington and Lee universities. Although he passed his bar exams in 1869 he hated both the study and practice of law. In 1876 he married Jeanette Trivett. In the summer of 1879 he was hired to work at the weekly magazine, Christian Union (renamed The Outlook in 1893), an association that lasted until his death. In 1884, Mabie was promoted to associate editor of the Christian Union and then elected to the Author's Club, whose members included such men of established reputation as George Cary Eggleston, Richard Watson Gilder, Brander Matthews, and Edmund Clarence Stedman. In 1890, a small collection of Mabie's essays which reflected upon life, literature and nature were published as a volume entitled My Study Fire." Many of Mabie's books are available at Project Gutenberg.Mabie was a resident of Summit, New Jersey.

82 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1890

About the author

Hamilton Wright Mabie, A.M., L.H.D., LL.D. (1846–1916) was an American essayist, editor, critic, and lecturer.

Reviews

[Dan · Rating 4 out of 5]

There are some books that are best read aloud, and I found this collection of essays to be one of them. The author was a scholar and makes allusions to works that were considered masterpieces when this was published in 1890 as he provides commentary on life and literature, and the change of seasons. Common threads through each of the essays: the state of the fire on his hearth and the presence of Rosalind, presumably his wife and kindred spirit.

The style is somewhat dated and dense, but the work overall is profound and gentle. Worth a re-read for better appreciation, it will stay on my night table for a while yet.