Wainewright the Poisoner: The Confession of Thomas Griffiths Wainewright

New York: Alfred A Knopf Inc, 2000. Book. Very Good. Hardcover. First American. 8vo - over 7¾" - 9¾" tall. xix, 276pp., index, biblio., ill. VG in lightly worn DJ. "In a time rich in unlikely characters, Thomas Griffiths Wainewright (1794-1847) was one of the strangest of all. A painter, writer, well-known London dandy and friend of most of the major figures of the Romantic era (from Blake to Byron, from John Clare to John Keats, Lamb, De Quincey and Hazlitt), he was also almost certainly a murderer, possibly several times over. Arrested and convicted of forgery - evidence was lacking to prove the murders - he was transported for life to the barbarous penal colony of Tasmania, where, years later, he died in obscurity. With a brilliant blend of creative imagination and scholarly sleuthing, Andrew Motion evokes Wainewright's double life in a tour de force of the biographer's art.".