James Thomson (1700-1748)
Autograph letter signed (‘James Thomson’) to [George Bubb Dodington], n.p., 24 October 1730
Four pages, 183 x 229mm, bifolium. Provenance: Miss M. Eyre-Matcham, 1909; Christie’s, 11 & 12 June 1980, lot 511.

‘What you observe concerning the pursuit of poetry when one is so far engaged in it as I am, is certainly just’. Thomson poetically thanks Dodington for his previous letter ‘the kind advice and encouragement it gives me … have made an impression on my heart which I shall always feel with a particular delight’. Referencing the skill of a poet (‘something as great a true genius, like light, must be beaming forth’) and likening them to birds, which ‘surely sing the sweetest amidst the luxuriant woods, while the full spring blows around them’, he disagrees with a comment made by his doctor in Bath that poets must remain poor. ‘Travelling has long been my fondest wish’, he continues, discussing the benefits for the poet of experiencing new environments, ‘at my times of leisure abroad, I think of attempting another tragedy, and on a story more addressed to common passions than that of Sophonsiba. People now-a-days must have something like themselves’. Promising ‘Should the senses and climates thro’ which I pass inspire me with any poetry, it will naturally have recourse to you’, and that he will meet Dodington in London soon.

George Bubb Dodington (1691-1762) was an English Whig politician and a keen patron of the arts, in particular of Thomson, E. Young, and H. Fielding. Thomson dedicated his 'Summer', part of The Seasons series, to Doddington.