Philip Henry Gosse was born in Worcester in 1810, second of four children of Thomas Gosse (1765-1844), a mezzotint … See more

Returning to England in 1839, Gosse was hard pressed to make a living, subsisting on eightpence a day ("one herring eaten as slowly as possible, and a little bread"). His fortunes began to improve when John Van Voorst, the … See more

Back in England, Gosse wrote books both in his field and out; a quick volume he produced for the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge (SPCK) was Monuments of Ancient Egypt, a land he had never visite… See more

In the months following Emily's death, Gosse worked with remarkable diligence on a book that he may have viewed as the most important of his career. Although a failure both financially and intellectually, it is the book b… See more

According to Edmund Gosse, his father's career was destroyed by his "strange act of wilfulness" in publishing Omphalos; Edmund claimed his father had "closed the doors upon himself forever." But, during the next three … See more