LANDON, Charles Paul (1760-1826), French painter and art-author, was born at Nonant in 1760, entered the studio of Régnault, and carried off the first prize of the Academy in 1792. After his return from Italy, disturbed by the Revolution, he seems to have abandoned painting for letters, but he began to exhibit in 1795, and continued to do so at various intervals up to 1814. His Leda obtained an award of merit in 1801, and is now in the Louvre. His Mother’s Lesson, Paul and Virginia Bathing, and Daedalus and Icarus have been engraved; but his works on painting and painters, which reach nearly one hundred volumes, now form his chief title to be remembered. In spite of a complete want of critical accuracy, an extreme carelessness in the biographical details, and the feebleness of the line engravings by which they are illustrated, Landon’s Annales du Musee, in 33 vols., form a vast repertory of compositions by masters of every age and school, which will always, have value for the writer on art. Besides this work and many others of less importance, Landon published Lives of Celebrated Painters, in 22 vols.; An Historical Description of Paris, 2 vols.; a Description of London, with 42 plates; and descriptions of the Luxembourg, of the Giustiniani collection, and of the gallery of the Duchesse de Berry. He died at Paris in 1826....
LANDON, Letitia Elizabeth (1802-1838), a writer of poetry and fiction, better known by her initials L. E. L. than as Miss Landon or Mrs Maclean, was descended from an old Herefordshire family, and was born at Chelsea, 14th August 1802. Her father, an army agent, succeeded in amassing a large property, which he lost by speculation shortly before his death. By this time the daughter by her contributions to the Literary Gazette and to various Christmas annuals, as well as by some volumes of verse, had acquired a wide literary fame. Probably her position in society contributed to the interest they awakened, but the gentle melancholy and romantic sentiment her writings embodied would in any case have secured her the sympathy and approval of a wide class of readers. Though deficient in condensation and finish, they occasionally display a richness of fancy and an aptness of language which might have ripened, by more sedulous culture, into true poetical worth. In June 1838 she married George Maclean, governor of Cape Coast Castle, but she only survived her marriage a few months, dying from an overdose of prussic acid, which, it is supposed, was taken accidentally.
For some time L. E. L. was joint editor of the Literary Gazelle. Her first volume of poetry appeared in 1820 under the title The Fate of Adelaide, and was followed by other collections of verses with similar titles. She also wrote several novels. Various editions of her Poetical Works have been published since her death, the last being that with an introductory memoir by W. B. Scott, 1880. The Life and Literary Remains of Letitia Elizabeth Landon, by Laman Blanchard, appeared in 1841, and a second edition in 1855.
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