"Plainly Hugo was the greatest man of letters of his day. It has been given to few or none to live a life so full of effort and achievement, so rich in honour and success and fame. Born almost with the century, he was a writer at fifteen, and at his death he was writing still; so that the record of his career embraces a period of more than sixty years. There is hardly a department of art to a foremost place in which he did not prove his right. From first to last; from the time of Chateaubriand to the time of Zola, he was a leader of men; and with his departure from the scene the undivided sovereignty of literature became a thing of the past like Alexander's empire."
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Views and Reviews: Essays in Appreciation (London: David Nutt, 1890), "Hugo", pp. 63–64
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William Ernest Henley
William Ernest Henley (23 August 1849 – 11 July 1903) was an English poet, critic and editor.
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