John Gibson Lockhart (1794–1854)

One of the best biographies of the Scottish poet Robert Burns, combining candor with a sincere appreciation of the subject.

"It's a sad book... it leaves gloom in the mind. The sight of this weary giant, staggering along, burdened with debt, overladen with work, his wife dead, his nerves broken, and nothing intact but his honor, is one of the most moving in the history of literature. But they pass, these clouds, and all that is left is the memory of the supremely noble man, who would not be bent, but faced Fate to the last, and died in his tracks without a whimper..." -- Through the Magic Door, p. 49

When young, I loved the ballads of Bernardo del Carpio, the Spanish anti-Roland

I bought this as a high-school student at a little used book store in Ann Arbor, Michigan, when I was visiting my friend Cholley Kuhanick. She'd moved away from my hometown, and this book was one of my only purchases on the day her dad took us into Ann Arbor to hang out.