Life
1786-1820 [pseud. ‘Polypus’; ‘Cervantès Hogg’;
‘Scrutator’]; b. Cork, ed. TCD; studied law, Middle Temple,
London; his anonymous verse satire on the Whig administration, All
the Talents (1807), which bestowed the name on the cabinet in question,
was facetiously dedicated to the Emperor of China and went into many editions;
incls. satirical lines R. B. Sheridan, Cherry and Moore, amplified in
later editions; founded the satirical newspaper Comet, 1808; issued
Woman and Other Poems (1810), which includes the celebrated lines,
‘She, while apostles shrank, could danger brave/Last at His cross
and earliest at His grave’; also a comedy, My Wife, What Wife?
(1815), and The Heroine (1822, rep. 1909), a burlesque novel
parodying popular fiction; d. of tuberculosis, in Wales; a forebear was
Swift’s executor. CAB DNB JMC DIW RAF ODQ OCIL DIL
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Works
[as ‘Cervantès Hogg’] The Rising Sun: A Serio-Comic
Satiric Romance, 2 [var. 3] vols. (London: Appleyards 1807); [as ‘Polypus’]
All The Talents: A Satirical Poem In Three Dialogues [var. All
the Talents in London] 5th edn. (London: J. J. Stockdale 1807); Do.,
rep. as All the Talents: The Second Titan War; or, The Talents Buried
under Portland-Isle (London: H. Colburn 1807), Do., rep. as
The Talents Run Mad: or, Eighteen Hundred and Sixteen (London:
Colburn 1816), and Do., rep. as The Talents Run Mad, introd.
by Donald H. Reiman (NY: Garland 1979), 314pp.; A Pastoral Epilogue
to, and by the Author of All the Talents (London: J. J. Stockdale
1807), 16pp.; [as 'Scrutator'] All the Talents in Ireland (London:
J. J. Stockdale 1807); The Comet (London: J. J. Stockdale 1808),
86pp.; The Miss-Led General (London: H. Oddy 1808), 197pp.; [as
‘Cervantès Hogg’] The Setting Sun; or, Devil amongst
the Placemen, to Which is Added, a New Musical Drama; Being a Parody on
The Beggar’s Opera... 3 vols. (London: T. Hughes 1809), [75]-148pp.;
The Tarantula: or, The Dance of Fools, 2 vols. (London: Hughes
1809); Woman: A Poem (London: W. Bulmer & Co [for John Murray],
London: Manners & Miller, Edinburgh; Dublin: M. N. Mahon 1810), xv,
[1], 85, [3]pp., [1] pl.; Do., rep. as Woman: A Poem, Occasional
Poems (London: Henry Colburn 1818), 121, [7] pp. ill.; Do.,
rep edn.., introd. by Donald H. Reiman (NY: Garland 1979, 264 pp.;
The Heroine; or, Adventures of a Fair Romance Reader, 3 vols. (London:
Henry Colburn 1813; enl. 2nd edn. 1814; 3rd. edn., 3 vols. 1815); Do.,
rep. as The Heroine; or, Adventures Of Cherubina, 2 vols. [rep.
of 1814 London edn.] (Philadelphia: M. Carey 1815); Do., rep. as
The Heroine; or, Adventures Of Cherubina, 2 vols. (Boston: West
& Richardson 1816), Do. [rep. edn.], introd. by Walter Raleigh
(London: Henry Frowde 1909), xv, 298pp.; Do. [rep. edn.] , intro.
by Michael Sadleir (London: Mathews & Marrot 1927), 364 pp.; My
Wife! What Wife?: A Comedy In Three Acts (London: C. Chapple
1815), 64 pp.; Six Weeks At Long’s: By a Late Resident, 3
vols. (London: for the author 1817); Henry Schultze: A Tale. The Savoyard,
A French Republican’s Story with Other Poems (London: C. &
J. Ollier 1821), ix, 143pp.
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Notes
Dictionary of National Biography; bio-dates 1786-1820; b.
Cork; ed. TCD; a barrister whose satirical poem on the Whig Administration,
All the Talents (1807) went into many editions; used the pseudonyms
Polypus and Cervantes Hogg, F.S.M.; among other works a comedy, My
Wife, What Wife? (1815) and Woman (1810), were successful.
D. J. O’Donoghue, The Poets Of Ireland: A Biographical Dictionary (Dublin: Hodges Figgis & Co 1912), lists Barrett’s satirical poems incl. All the Talents 1807, on British political figures; also The Second Titan War; or The Talents Buried under Portland Isle (1807); The Talents Run Mad, or 1816 (1816); The Tarantula or The Dance of the Fools (1809), all satirical verse; ed. TCD. d. Wales. The lines on Moore’s daughter’s grave, attrib. to Atkinson [q.v.] are by him.
Patrick Rafroidi, Irish Literature in English, The Romantic Period, 1789-1850 (Gerrards Cross: Colin Smythe 1980), Vol. I, remarks on Eaton Stannard Barrett, another anti-romantic, and his pastiches of novel of terror and Ossianic genre. Viz., The Heroine, or Adventures of Cherubina (1814), in which: "it was on a nocturnal night in autumnal October; the wet rain fell in liquid quantities, and the thunder rolled in an awful and Ossianly manner [...]’ (Heroine, p.20). Further remarks that Barrett’s eponymous poem gave a whole government their name ‘of all the talents’ (p. 23). Rafroidi, Do. (Gerrards Cross: Colin Smythe 1980), Vol. 2 gives details: abandoned law for literature at the time of his first satirical poem which gave the government the name of ‘Ministry of All the Talents’; d. of tuberculosis, Wales. All the Talents, a satirical poem in three dialogues (Lon, JJ Stockdale, 1807), xii, 99pp., pseud. ‘Polypus’; 18th ed. same year, ill. Rowlandson, xvii, 152pp., ‘[...] to which is added a pastoral epilogue’; All the Talents in Ireland, satirical poem, with notes (Stockdale, 1807), viii, 44pp., pseud. ‘Scrutator’; The Rising Sun, serio-comic satiric romance (London: Appleyards 1807), 2 vols, pseud. ‘Cervantes Hogg’; The Second Titan War, or The Talents Buried Under Portland-Isle, by the Author of The Rising Sun (H Colburn 1807), ii, 63pp.; The Comet, by author of All the Talents (Stockdale 1808), 86pp. [a pseudo-newspaper, with satirical tracts, prose and verse]; The Mis-Led General, a serio-comic, satiric, mock-heroic romance by the author of The Rising Sun (London: H Oddy 1808), 197pp.; The Setting Sun, or Devil Amongst the Placemen, [with] a New Musical Drama, being a parody on The Beggar’s Opera (London: Hughes 1809), 3 vols., pseud. ‘Cervantes Hogg’ [in prose and verse]; The Tarantula, or The Dance of Fools, a sat. work (Hughes 1809), 2 vols.; Woman, a poem (Murray 1810), xv, 85pp.; later ed., Woman, A Poem [and] Occasional Poems (London: H. Colburn, 1818), 121pp.; The Heroine, or The Adventures of a Fair Romance Reader (London: Colburn 1813), 3 vols. [a parody in the framework of an epistolary novel], 2nd ed. The Heroine, or Adventures of Cherubina (London: Colburn 1814), 3 vols. [considerable additions and alterations]; My Wife? What Wife?, comedy in 3 acts (Chapple 1815), 60pp.; The Talents Run Mad, or Eighteen Hundred and Sixteen, sat. poem by author of All the Talents in three dialogues, with notes (London: Colburn 1816); Six Weeks at Long’s, by a Late Resident (printed for the author, London 1817; also 3rd ed. 1817); also attributed to him are Henry Schultze, a tale, and The Savoyard. Rafroidi holds that The Hero, or the Adventures of a Night, another parodical novel, is not by Barrett. Rafroidi suggests pages in E. Railo, The Haunted Castle, and E. Birkhead, The Tale of Terror as a critical resource.
Justin McCarthy, gen. ed., Irish Literature (Washington: CUA 1904)m contains "Montmorenci and Cherubina", an extract from The Heroine. Likewise excerpted in Charles A. Read, The Cabinet of Irish Literature (1876-78).
Libraries: Belfast Public Library holds copies of All the Talents, and Woman. University of Ulster Central Library holds The Heroine (1822, 1909).
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Epitaph: The lines on the grave of Thomas Moore’s daughter,
customarily ascribed to Joseph Atkinson, are actually by Barrett.
O[ther] Stannard: Laetitia Pilkington’s poem “Advice to the People of Dublin in the Choice of Their Recorder” refers to an ‘O. Stannard’, taken to be Eaton Stannard (c.1685-1755), barrister and MP for Middleton, Co. Cork, recorder in 1733, and an executor of Jonathan Swift’s will. (Cited in Field Day Anthology, gen. ed. S. Deane, 1991, Vol. 1, ftn., p.483.)
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Princess Grace Irish Library (Monaco)