Thomas Love Peacock (1785-1866)
England

"The world is a stage, and life is a farce, and he that laughs most has most profit of the performance."
---Brother Michael in Maid Marian, Chap. XVI.

Thomas Love Peacock, born of a merchant, devoted himself to literature in 1803 after a brief experience in business. Through 1804 to 1814, he wrote many unsuccessful poems and plays. His best poems appeared in his novels, and were often drinking songs. In 1815, he published his first satirical romance, Headlong Hall (1816), as a result of becoming Shelley's neighbor in 1815. A year later he published Melincourt, another satirical romance, and Nightmare Abbey (1818) which satirized Shelley, Byron, and Coleridge. His best long poem, Rododaphne, was published in 1818. In 1819, he married and became employed under the East India Company, and served as chief examiner in the last 20 years of his life. Between his retirement from the company in 1856, he wrote Maid Marian (1822), The Misfortunes of Elphin (1829), and Crochet Castle (1831). As a close friend of Shelley's, Peacock became his literary executor upon his death by drowning in 1822. Peacock's last novel was Gryll Grange (1860) and his last literary works appeared in Fraser's Magazine, which included his memories of Shelley. Peacock was best known for his romantic satires and audiences best admired his use of wit, satire, and irony. His specialty was the English drinking song and he best enjoyed mocking and satirizing the intellectual framework of his era and society and the frivolous ideas of his contemporaries.

Works
Gryll Grange (1860)
Melincourt (1817)
Rododaphne (1817)
Nightmare Abbey (1818)
Headlong Hall (1816)
The Misfortunes of Elphin (1829)
Maid Marian (1822)
Crochet Castle (1831)
Four Ages of Poetry (1820)

Additional Information
http://www.thomaslovepeacock.net/

Sources:

Noyes, Russell. English Romantic Poetry and Prose. New York: Oxford University Press, 1956.