A. E. Housman: A Collection of Critical Essays

20th Century Views

by Christopher Ricks (Compiler)

Cared for in a professional library and in acceptable condition.

182 pages, Paperback

First published June 1, 1968

About the author

Sir Christopher Bruce Ricks, FBA, is a British literary critic and scholar. He is the William M. and Sara B. Warren Professor of the Humanities at Boston University (U.S.) and Co-Director of the Editorial Institute at Boston University, and was Professor of Poetry at the University of Oxford (England) from 2004 to 2009. He is the immediate past-president of the Association of Literary Scholars and Critics. He is known as a champion of Victorian poetry; an enthusiast of Bob Dylan, whose lyrics he has analysed at book-length; a trenchant reviewer of writers he considers pretentious (Marshall McLuhan, Christopher Norris, Geoffrey Hartman, Stanley Fish); and a warm reviewer of those he thinks humane or humorous (F. R. Leavis, W. K. Wimsatt, Christina Stead). Hugh Kenner has praised his 'intent eloquence', and Geoffrey Hill his 'unrivalled critical intelligence'. W. H. Auden described Ricks as 'exactly the kind of critic every poet dreams of finding'.

Reviews

[m · Rating 3 out of 5]

2½ stars.

Overall I found this collection disappointing; too many of these "Critical Essays" are too narrow in their scope to interest a lay reader like myself. I presume the intended audience for these essays are fellow Housman pedants, not readers like myself who are curious to know what exactly about Housman inspired Tom Stoppard to write a play (The Invention of Love) about him.

Now I want to contradict my above complaint by stating that the essays by Cleanth Brooks (7700 words) and by Edmund Wilson (4700 words) are very interesting meditations on the man & his poetry, well worth reading. I've never before read anything by Brooks, but on the strength of this one essay I'm open to reading more by him. Edmund Wilson, on the other hand, is someone I'm familiar with and rank very high. His essay is good.

Most of the essays collected in this short book are of the type I'd call "insider baseball."

1. Introduction
by Christopher Ricks 1

2. A. E. Housman,
by W. H. Auden 11

3. Mr. Housman's Message,
by Ezra Pound 12

4. A. E. H.,
by Kingsley Amis 13

5. A. E. Housman,
by Edmund Wilson 14

6. Housman,
by John Wain 26

7. Jehovah Housman and Satan Housman,
by W. H. Auden 32

8. A. E. Housman: A Controversy,
by Cyril Connolly (with replies by F. L. Lucas, Martin Cooper, L. P. Wilkinson, and John Sparrow) 35

9. Texts from Housman,
by Randall Jarrell 51

10. Alfred Edward Housman,
by Cleanth Brooks 62

11. Round About A Poem of Housman's,
by Richard Wilbur 85

12. The Nature of Housman's Poetry
by Christopher Ricks 106

13. The Whole of Housman,
by Morton Dauwen Zabel 123

14. The Poetry of Emphasis,
by F. W. Bateson 130

15. "The Leading Classic of His Generation,"
by J. P. Sullivan 146

16. The Houseman Dilemma
by John Sparrow 163

[Cole VanEtten · Rating 3 out of 5]

I didn’t really like this book, there was a lot going on and didn’t understand where I was. This book goes into detail about A.E.Housman’s views on life, threw out the book 20 different view point are share about A.E.Housman’s life. I would recommend this book to anyone looking to learn more about A.E.Housman’s.

[Seth · Rating 3 out of 5]

Pretty good collection of criticism from all angles.