FORSTER, JOHN

born April 2, 1812, Newcastle upon Tyne, Northumberland, Eng. died Feb. 2, 1876, London writer and journalist, a notable figure in mid-19th-century literary London who, through his friendship with the influential editor Leigh Hunt, became adviser, agent, and proofreader to many leading writers of the day. A close friend of Charles Dickens, he wrote The Life of Dickens (187274), an essential source book and a literary masterpiece, despite its personal bias and occasional suppressions and inaccuracies. After early contributions to an encyclopaedia and to periodicals, he joined The Examiner (1833) and was its editor (184755). In 1855 he became secretary to the lunacy commissioners and in 1861 became a commissioner. Apart from his Dickens study, Forster's Life and Adventures of Oliver Goldsmith (1848; expanded into The Life and Times . . . , 1854), his Walter Savage Landor (1869), and his unfinished Life of Jonathan Swift (1876) remain authoritative and readable.