Introduction

Hello, my name is Alexander Taylor, and I have been cataloguing the archive of literary scholar, cultural historian and poet John Addington Symonds (1840-1893) since September 2024, with completion expected by July 2025. The archive records Symonds’ multifaceted and complex life through manuscript correspondence that comprises the single largest category of material in the collection. His correspondents included, among others, Janet Ann Ross (historian and biographer), Havelock Ellis (social reformer and physician), Thomas Hardy (novelist and poet), Andrew Lang (novelist and poet) and Vernon Lee (pseudonym for writer Violet Paget). The archive would appeal to a diverse range of audiences interested in late nineteenth-century sexuality and gender and Symonds’ literary career. Extensive correspondence tracks Symonds’ intellectual development and relationship with his family, from adolescence at Harrow School to his final years living and writing in Switzerland. He published prolifically throughout his lifetime, spanning various genres, including literary criticism, travel writing and cultural history, with a specific focus on Renaissance studies.

The Symonds family and the City of Bristol 

Dr John Addington Symonds (John Addington Symonds’ father) moved to Bristol in 1831 and began practicing as a physician at Bristol General Hospital. In 1851 he purchased the Palladian villa Clifton Hill House, which his son inherited in 1871. In 1909 the house became the first university hall of residence for women in south-west England through successful lobbying by May Staveley, a lecturer in history. The house remains in the possession of the University of Bristol and accommodates approximately 226 students. The Symonds archive came to Bristol through a series of deposits dispersed throughout the twentieth century. An overwhelming majority of the extant material came to Special Collections from a donation by Dame Janet Vaughan, Symonds’ granddaughter through his daughter Margaret Vaughan. Other papers were given to Special Collections by Dame Katharine Furse (née Symonds) and her executor, Dame Rachel Crowdy, between 1946 and 1953, and further papers have been purchased by the University from various sources. In 2001 a substantial collection of literary manuscripts, including some of Symonds’ seminal histories of the Renaissance in Italy and the Memoirs of Carlo Gozzi, was transferred to Special Collections from Bristol Central Library, where they had been deposited by Symonds’ daughter, Margaret Vaughan, in 1915.

Structuring and cataloguing the archive

Because of the numerous and drawn-out depositing, the collection has been scattered across multiple reference numbers and sometimes remained packaged in it its original envelopes, rather than specialist archive folders designed to ensure long-term preservation. The aim of re-cataloguing the archive has been to aggregate the many accession and reference numbers into one overarching reference number (DM3271) to aid in accessibility for researchers and library staff alike. The intellectual arrangement follows a series level chronology tracking Symonds’ life from his education at Harrow School (1854-1858) to life convalescing and writing in Switzerland (1878-1893). Additional series allow space for literary papers, printed material, photographs and family material, including the papers of Symonds’ wife Janet Catherine Symonds and their daughter Margaret Vaughan.

Favourites from the archive

My favourite item from the collection is a scrapbook compiled by Margaret Vaughan consisting of photographs, poems and an account of the life of the Symonds family dog, named Beppo. This intimate and emotive document is bound in a silk cover and includes several fine sketches depicting their adored pet alongside photographs of family members and Angelo Fusato, John Addington Symonds’ romantic partner and personal gondolier. A sketch of Beppo’s memorial reveals that he was born in Venice, September 1894, and died at Davos (Switzerland) in September 1903.

An album of photographs compiled by Margaret Symonds (later Vaughan), dated Silvester Abend (31 December in German), depicts daily life at the Symonds family home in Davos and includes studio and amateur photographs of John Addington Symonds from adolescence to later life. Several photographs depict Symonds writing in his study and enjoying recreation in the snow with labouring men. The contrast between his erudition and beguilement by athleticism and masculinity was a defining characteristic of Symonds during his life in Davos. Retained in the archive is an envelope dated 1904 containing dried ivy leaves from Rome. Photographs from the album show Symonds’ grave at the Non-Catholic Cemetery in Rome consumed by ivy and other shrubbery. It may be tentative to say that Margaret Vaughan took clippings from a visit to her father’s final resting place.

An inconspicuous and rudimentary document provides a fascinating insight into the precarious situation John Addington Symonds and his family encountered as his health continued to deteriorate. The damp English climate exacerbated Symonds’ pulmonary disorder and specialists recommended convalescing abroad in either the high-altitude mountains of Switzerland or the arid environment of Egypt. The document lists Symonds’ pros and cons for each country.

Pros for Davos included rest, the presence of a doctor (particularly pulmonologist Dr Carl Rüedi) and being part of a community; Davos became a popular convalescence hub for wealthy expatriates in the second half of the nineteenth century. Cons included monotony and the lack of intellectual stimulation, fear of catching a bad cold, and general misery towards the weather.

Pros for Egypt included the relative warmth and dryness, while the cons (which patently outweighed the pros) stressed the absence of a doctor, fear of catching fevers, possible war and famine, and the presence of insects and flies.

Symonds visited Davos for the first time in 1877, a then isolated and underdeveloped rural community in the Swiss Alps. For several months a year he resided at various hotels including Hotel Belvédère and Hotel & Pension Buol before settling in Davos permanently in 1880. The family home, named Am Hof, was built in 1881 and became a cultural hub for visiting literary scholars and friends including Henry Sidgwick (philosopher), Benjamin Jowett (scholar) and Robert Louis Stevenson (writer).

I hope you have enjoyed this short introduction to the John Addington Symonds archive. If you have any questions regarding the collection, please do not hesitate to contact me on hz24494@bristol.ac.uk.

Alexander Taylor
Project Archivist

This cataloguing project was made possible thanks to a generous bequest from the estate of Pricilla Makepeace.