Sir Henry Taylor KCMG (18 October 1800 – 27 March 1886) was an English dramatist and poet, Colonial Office official, and man of letters.

[2] Taylor wrote Byronic poems and an article on Thomas Moore, which in 1822 was accepted for the Quarterly Review by William Gifford.

In 1823, on a visit to the Lake District, Henry Taylor made the acquaintance of Robert Southey, and they became friends.

I wish there was more; and I wish that she had left her thoughts behind her in writings of her own.”[13] Taylor's work also brought him literary friends: the circle of Thomas Hyde Villiers, and his colleague James Stephen.

[17] Carlyle's opinion of the "marked veracity" of Taylor was printed wrongly by the editor James Anthony Froude as "morbid vivacity".

[18] He also knew John Sterling,[19] and made the acquaintance of Fanny Trollope whilst attending the court of Louis Philippe of France.

Taylor wrote a number of plays, including Isaac Comnenus (1827),[22] and Philip van Artevelde (1834).

In it, on his own account, he gave Richard Whately's opinion of him as a "resuscitated Bacon", who had better things to do than write verse (which could be left to women).

Lockhart claimed that Philip Van Artevelde secured Taylor "a place among the real artists of his time",[30] and, as late as 1868, J.H.

[31] Modern literary historians, however, tend to overlook Taylor's accomplishments in verse and drama and emphasize his importance as a literary critic, pointing out that he was a strong advocate for stylistic simplicity, subject matter rooted in common life, and intellectual discipline in poetic composition, placing special importance on clear and reasoned structure.