George Darley

Friends with such literary luminaries as Charles Lamb, Thomas Carlyle, and John Clare,[1] he was considered by some to be on a level with Tennyson in “poetic possibilities” in the 1840s,[2] but in the words of famous literary critic George Saintsbury “he had the marks of a talent that never did what it had it in it to do.”[3] George Darley was born in Dublin, to Arthur Darley and his wife Mary.

During this period he supported himself by writing several mathematical texts for a series published by John Taylor (London) called Darley's Scientific Library.

In it appeared his story Lilian of the Vale, later reprinted in his short-story collection The Labours of Idleness, or, Seven Nights' Experiments (1826), published under the pseudonym "Guy Penseval."

His poem "It is not beauty I demand" was included by F. T. Palgrave in the first edition of his Golden Treasury as an anonymous lyric of the 17th century.

[9] Darley was a friend of such literary luminaries as Charles Lamb, Thomas Carlyle, John Clare, and other writers such as Allan Cunningham and Monckton Milnes.