“I Hope You Will Forgive the Liberty I Have Taken in Speaking My Mind Thus Freely”: Charles Burney, William Mason, and Polite Exchange

Charles Burney (1726 – 1814), historian of music, friend of Samuel Johnson, and established member of London literary society, corresponded with William Mason (1725 – 97), poet and original editor of Thomas Gray's letters, for over twenty-five years. There are sixteen surviving letters between them, most unpublished. What they display is a series of debates, largely on musical matters of common interest, and the management through the strategies of polite discourse of fundamental disagreements, principally on politics and the status of Johnson: Burney indulged in anonymous reviews of Mason's published works, and Mason published anonymous attacks on Burney's friend Johnson. The essay examines how the correspondents employed the techniques of polite exchange to support an extended friendship that survived profound differences of opinion.