Charles Kent

Who was Charles Kent?

Charles Kent was an English poet, biographer, and journalist, born in London. After completing his education at Prior Park and Oscott, he became editor of the Sun, studied law at the same time and was called to the bar in 1859 as a member of Middle Temple, but thereafter devoted himself to literature. He edited Weekly Register, a Roman Catholic paper.

A personal friend of Charles Dickens, he contributed to Household Words and All the Year Round under Dicken's editorship and to other periodicals. Several volumes of poems, published previously in the forties, fifties, and sixties, provided the materials for his collected Poems.

In later years he gave himself largely to editorial work—chiefly complete editions of the greater English writers, memoirs, and critiques, and notably Burns, Lamb, Moore, Father Prout, and Lord Lytton. He also wrote Leigh Hunt as an Essayist, The Wit and Wisdom of Lord Lytton, and The Humour and Pathos of Charles Dickens. +