Lytton, Edward Robert Bulwer, 1st Earl of Lytton

(1831-1891)

   Poet and statesman, s. of the above, was ed. at Harrow and Bonn, and thereafter was private sec. to his uncle, Sir H. Bulwer, afterwards Lord Dalling and Bulwer (q.v.), at Washington and Florence. Subsequently he held various diplomatic appointments at other European capitals. In 1873 he succeeded his f. in the title, and in 1876 became Viceroy of India. He was cr. an Earl on his retirement in 1880, and was in 1887 appointed Ambassador at Paris, where he d. in 1891. He valued himself much more as a poet than as a man of affairs; but, though he had in a considerable degree some of the qualities of a poet, he never quite succeeded in commanding the recognition of either the public or the critics. His writings, usually appearing under the pseudonym of "Owen Meredith," include Clytemnestra (1855), The Wanderer (1857), Lucile (1860), Chronicles and Characters (1868), Orval, or the Fool of Time (1869), Fables in Song (1874), and King Poppy (1892). As Viceroy of India he introduced important reforms, and his dispatches were remarkable for their fine literary form.