Editing William Makepeace Thackeray (section)

===Status as a celebrity and lecture tours===
Thackeray achieved more recognition with his ''Snob Papers'' (serialised 1846/7, published in book form in 1848), but the work that really established his fame was the novel ''Vanity Fair'', which first appeared in serialised instalments beginning in January&nbsp;1847. Even before ''Vanity Fair'' completed its serial run, Thackeray had become a [[celebrity]], sought after by the very lords and ladies whom he satirised. They hailed him as the equal of [[Charles Dickens]].<ref>{{cite web |last=Brander |first=Laurence |title=Thackeray, William Makepeace |website=Ebscohost |publisher=Britannica Biographies |url=http://connection.ebscohost.com/c/articles/32424936 |access-date=3 June 2019}}</ref>

[[File:WM Thackeray slnsw.jpg|thumb|Portrait of William Makepeace Thackeray, c. 1863]]
He remained "at the top of the tree", as he put it, for the rest of his life, during which he produced several large novels, notably ''[[Pendennis]]'', ''[[The Newcomes]]'', and ''[[The History of Henry Esmond]]'', despite various illnesses, including a near-fatal one that struck him in 1849 in the middle of writing ''Pendennis''. He twice visited the United States on lecture tours during this period. Longtime [[Washington, D.C.|Washington]] journalist [[Benjamin Perley Poore|B.P. Poore]] described Thackeray on one of those tours:<blockquote>The citizens of Washington enjoyed a rare treat when Thackeray came to deliver his lectures on the English essayists, wits, and humorists of the eighteenth century. Accustomed to the spread-eagle style of oratory too prevalent at the [[United States Capitol|Capitol]], they were delighted with the pleasing voice and easy manner of the burly, gray-haired, rosy-cheeked Briton, who made no gestures, but stood most of the time with his hands in his pockets, as if he were talking with friends at a cozy fireside.<ref name=Poore>{{cite book |last=Poore |first=Ben. Perley |year=1886 |title=Perley's Reminiscences of Sixty Years in the National Metropolis |volume=1 |pages=430–431 |url=https://archive.org/details/perleysreminisce00poor/page/n439/mode/2up?view=theater |via=Internet Archive (archive.org)}}</ref></blockquote> Thackeray also gave lectures in London on the English humorists of the eighteenth century, and on the first four [[House of Hanover|Hanoverian]] monarchs. The latter series was published in book form in 1861 as ''The Four Georges: Sketches of Manners, Morals, Court, and Town Life ''.<ref name=odnb/>