A Shropshire Lad

by A.E. Housman

Few volumes of poetry in the English language have enjoyed as much success with both literary connoisseurs and the general reader as A.E. Housman's A Shropshire Lad, first published in 1896. Scholars and critics have seen in these timeless poems an elegance of taste and perfection of form and feeling comparable to the greatest of the classic. Yet their simple language, strong musical cadences and direct emotional appeal have won these works a wide audience among general readers as well.

This finely produced volume, reprinted from an authoritative edition of A Shropshire Lad, contains all 63 original poems along with a new Index of First Lines and a brief new section of Notes to the Text. Here are poems that deal poignantly with the changing climate of friendship, the fading of youth, the vanity of dreams — poems that are among the most read, shared, and quoted in our language.

Genres: Poetry, Classics, Fiction, 19th Century, Literature, Victorian, British Literature

95 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1896

About the author

A Shropshire Lad (1896) and Last Poems (1922) apparently published works of British poet and scholar Alfred Edward Housman, brother of Laurence Housman and Clemence Housman.

To his fellow noted classicists, his critical editing of Manilius earned him enduring fame.

The eldest of seven children and a gifted student, Housman won a scholarship to Oxford, where he performed well but for various reasons neglected philosophy and ancient history subjects that failed to pique his interest and consequently failed to gain a degree. Frustrated, he gained at job as a patent clerk but continued his research in the classical studies and published a variety of well-regarded papers. After a decade with such his reputation, he ably obtain a position at University College London in 1902. In 1911, he took the Kennedy professorship of Latin at Trinity College, Cambridge, where he remained for the rest of his life.

As a scholar, Housman concentrated on Latin. He published a five-volume critical edition, the definitive text, of his work on " Astronomica " of Manilus from 1903 to 1930. Housman the poet produced lyrics that express a Romantic pessimism in a spare, simple style. In some of the asperity and directness in lyrics and also scholarship, Housman defended common sense with a sarcastic wit that helped to make him widely feared.

There are several biographies of Housman, and a The Housman Society http://www.housman-society.co.uk/

Reviews

[Bill Kerwin · Rating 4 out of 5]

The much-anthologized lyrics everyone remembers from this slim volume are memorable for their delicate music and Attic restraint, but many of the sixty-three poems contained herein are pretty forgettable; reiterating the familiar themes of youthful beauty and early death without deepening or enriching them, they often veer dangerously close to self-parody. Still . . . "Loveliest of trees, the cherry now," "To an Athlete Dying Young," "Bredon Hill," "With rue may heart is laden," "Is my team ploughing" and a handful of others are as lovely and deathless as anything in the Greek Anthology. And that is enough.

I did find a few new gems . . . a lyric with the wonderful phrase "the blue remembered hills" and this, one of the loveliest combinations of sounds I have ever heard:

"White in the moon the long road lies,
The moon stands blank above.
White in the moon the long road lies
That leads me from my love."

Also . . . I was very moved by the lyric below, which is almost certainly a reference to homosexual desire--something Housman would have had to conceal in the late Victorian world in which he lived:

"Others, I am not the first,
Have willed more mischief than they durst:
If in the breathless night I too
Shiver now, 'tis nothing new.

"More than I, if truth were told,
Have stood and sweated hot and cold,
And through their reins in ice and fire
Fear contended with desire.

"Agued once like me were they,
But I like them shall win my way
Lastly to the bed of mould
Where there's neither heat nor cold."

[Jon Nakapalau · Rating 5 out of 5]

Read this long ago - but I am not sure if it was just selected poems. The Dover issue was wonderful and I will read it again; the poems are simple and true - beautiful and haunting. In my opinion the transitory nature of existence has never been more poetically rendered - highest recommendation.

[Majenta · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'm glad I finally read it. Thank you to M.E. Kerr (THE SON OF SOMEONE FAMOUS) and Blossom Elfman (A HOUSE FOR JONNIE O.) for the consciousness-raising (mentioning this in their books).

[Manybooks · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was first introduced to the exquisite poetry of A.E. Housman in my grade ten English class (where we covered British literature from Beowulf to the early 20th century, and oh, how I did enjoy that class). But while I started to appreciate Housman's poetry then, I really only truly began to passionately love love love his poetry when I listened to George Butterworth's lovely and evocative song-cycle rendition of A Shropshire Lad and realisesd that Housman's poems are not just meant to be read, but really and truly are meant to also be sung, to be listened to as musical offerings (offerings showing joy, simplicity, but also the anguish of lost love, of growing up, and of destructive, manipulative war, which has the horrific power to destroy whole bastions of young men). And yes, I just recently and with much joy learned that one of A.E. Houseman's main literary influences was in fact 19th century German poet Heinrich Heine (and considering how much I have always adored Heine's poetry and that even as a child and teenager, his folksong adaptations were amongst my personal favourites, it is therefore also no surprise to and for me whatsoever that A.E. Houseman very quickly also became and has steadfastly remained one of my very very favourite British poets bar none, and one whose verses I most highly and glowingly recommend to anyone).

[Katie Lumsden · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed this much more on a reread – the language is lyrical in a great way and the rhythm is lovely. An interesting exploration of growing up, death and rural life, if a little sentimental at times.

[Brett C · Rating 4 out of 5]

The one little part that stood out to me,

"The tree of man was never quiet:
Then 'twas the Roman, now 'tis I."

This was a neat read. Thanks!

[Steve Hjerrild · Rating 2 out of 5]

I think I never want to see
Another stanza by A.E.
I pity now the friends of Terence,
And eke his siblings, pets and parents.

For oh, good Lord the verse he made--
Too grim and too much in the shade:
The doomstruck lad, the Severn missed,
The Ludlow fair where he got pissed,

The London blues, the snow-hung orchard,
Young life cut short in syntax tortured,
And favorite of all his themes,
The Shropshire schoolboy's martial dreams.

Brave verse to stop a soldier shirking
By one whose work was patent-clerking.
"Stand up, be brave, lad, if you please,
So poets here may live at ease.

"And we shall rhyme and wring our hands
When you're cashiered in distant lands.
For really, 'tis not bad, the grave--
No care, no pain, no need to shave.

"So blah blah blah by Severnside,
And good for you, young suicide."
Well, he's dead too, now, old A.E.
Arrived where he most longed to be.

What's done is done, some good, much bad,
But still he toils, this Shropshire lad,
Producing yet from under plow
Some wholesome grass for Shropshire cow.

[Bettie · Rating 4 out of 5]

http://www.gutenberg.org/files/5720/5...

Picked this up today because I am grieving Endeavour Morse who used to quote from this collection often through the course of his career.

Sixty-three tiny poems urging us to seize the day, not let life just run out without giving all.

IV: REVEILLE

 Wake: the silver dusk returning
 Up the beach of darkness brims,
 And the ship of sunrise burning
 Strands upon the eastern rims.

 Wake: the vaulted shadow shatters,
 Trampled to the floor it spanned,
 And the tent of night in tatters
 Straws the sky-pavilioned land.

 Up, lad, up, 'tis late for lying:
 Hear the drums of morning play;
 Hark, the empty highways crying
 "Who'll beyond the hills away?"

 Towns and countries woo together,
 Forelands beacon, belfries call;
 Never lad that trod on leather
 Lived to feast his heart with all.

 Up, lad: thews that lie and cumber
 Sunlit pallets never thrive;
 Morns abed and daylight slumber
 Were not meant for man alive.

 Clay lies still, but blood's a rover;
 Breath's a ware that will not keep
 Up, lad: when the journey's over
 There'll be time enough to sleep.

So unlike Houseman's Young Lads, at least Morse made it past his early twenties before he laid down to sleep the sleep.

ETA - the title is mispelt on grrramazon

[Andy · Rating 5 out of 5]

A reread. Love Housman. His poems are wistful, longing, evocative of lost youth and natures eternal cycles.

[Sandy · Rating 3 out of 5]

Once I got through the rather dismal first 15 or 20 poems, I quite enjoyed this classic collection. From dreary images of murders, hangings, and suicides, there was a gradual shift to a more lighthearted - if somewhat cynical - tone which was underscored by the rhythmic lilt of the verse.

I began to read these poems in an effort to locate the one poem which purportedly inspired the title of the award-winning novel Earth and High Heaven (by Canadian author Gwethalyn Graham). The exact phrase is found in poem number 48 (very few of the poems have titles).

Be still, my soul, be still; the arms you bear are brittle,
           Earth and high heaven are fixt of old and founded strong.
          Think rather,-call to thought, if now you grieve a little,
           The days when we had rest, O soul, for they were long.

I have yet to figure out how the words connect the two - poem and book - but I have plenty of time to ponder that question.

Seldom do I find even one poem which I want to read and re-read, and here is an entire collection. I feel so fortunate! The overarching message of the poems is one which I personally need to hear at this point in time, that message being (as I interpret it) that for humans death, whenever and however it comes, is inevitable and not necessarily loathesome.

[Cherisa B · Rating 3 out of 5]

Sixty-one simple poems mostly about our mortality, what lasts after us, or just to be forgotten. Many on themes of soldiers going from home, of places beloved along the Severn River, never to return to or to lay under long. Here’s the last closing gem.

LXI

I hoed and trenched and weeded,
And took the flowers to fair:
I brought them home unheeded;
The hue was not the wear.

So up and down I sow them
For lads like me to find,
When I shall lie below them,
A dead man out of mind.

Some seeds the birds devour,
And some the season mars,
But here and there will flower
The solitary stars,

And fields will yearly bear them
As light-leaved spring comes on,
And luckless lads will wear them
When I am dead and gone.

[Michael · Rating 4 out of 5]

My expectations for this poem cycle were confounded. I'd got it into my head that A Shropshire Lad was a rural idyll about bucolic farm boys, milk maids and nostalgic reveries about "blue remembered hills". As there is practically none of that ("blue remembered hills" notwithstanding), I'd obviously constructed this false image myself based on nothing more than the title of the collection.

Now, that's a bit of a shame as I was in the mood for (had a need for, in fact) a bit of idylic escapism to lift my mood. What Housman serves up instead is a series of poems of which the majority deal with death, sometimes by way of poetical allusion (autumnal trees shedding leaves, that sort of thing), thigh often directly stated. War is present in some poems, but mostly death simply stalks the countryside, or the city-bound country boy pining for his home fields. A few of the poems pay with the idea of the dead visiting the living, only to find their sweetheart in the arms of their best friend. These melancholy musings are not without their charm, though not exactly what I had in mind as a tonic (fortunately, Keats's remedy of getting out into nature was available to me). However, Housman goes rather further in a couple of poems, encouraging his 'lad' to die by suicide, and in one poem worthy of Poe, his 'lad' (there must be several of them, and presumably Shropshire must have been rather depopulated of young men if Housman is to be taken literally) actually cuts his own throat while on a date with his girlfriend.

Some of the poems remind me of Khayyám-FitzGerald's preoccupation with mortality and the transience of life, and with the consolations of alcohol. The are some quatrains in Housman's collection but, as far as my amateur reading can tell, no deliberate imitation of the Rubáiyát.

First published in 1896, I wonder whether the late Victorian morbid (from a modern perspective) relationship with death, and their often melodramatic sentimentality feeds into Housman's rather dark vision of life's ephemeral nature. How much was England and the Empire overshadowed by the growing inevitability of the death of the Old Queen? The impending death of the seemingly ever-present and eternal Victoria signalling the decease of a way of life, a break in cultural continuity, the end of days?

Overall, an uneven (but enjoyable) collection, I think, though highly praised by J.R.R. Tolkien, who's probably a better judge than I. I'll read the poems again when I'm in a brighter mood and see whether the poems which aren't about death and shagging your dead mate's girlfriend make more of an impression on me.

[K Marcu · Rating 5 out of 5]

And malt does more than Milton can

To justify God’s ways to man.

Ale, man, ale’s the stuff to drink

For fellows whom it hurts to think:

Look into the pewter pot

To see the world as the world’s not.

[Jim · Rating 4 out of 5]

As a lad I was very fond of one of Housman's poems, Reveille, because it was upbeat and inspirational:

" Up, lad: thews that lie and cumber
Sunlit pallets never thrive;
Morns abed and daylight slumber
Were not meant for man alive.

So when I received my copy of the Folio edition of this book, I expected more of the same. Boy, was I right out to lunch! What utter doom and gloom! Death is present in real or allegorical form in just about every poem. I had never read anything like it from the pen of any other poet. Sure, sometimes your average poet gets a little down and writes some gloomy or remorseful tirade on the way his little feelings were hurt, but then he'll get lucky one night and be writing about plucking pansies the next day. Believe me, judging by his poems, Housman NEVER got lucky a single night in his life. Death was the one constant factor in his work. Many went like this: you are going to die and your best friend will be poking your girlfriend. Then he would try a variation: your best friend will die and you'll be poking HIS girlfriend.

It wasn't until Housman actually started advocating suicide that the light started to glimmer for me. I Googled Housman and, sure enough, he was a homosexual. On top of that, in Housman's era homosexual acts were illegal and, if caught, you could go to prison where you would be unable to commit homosexual acts, according to the thinking of the time. Presumably, if he lived in this day and age, where homosexuality is practically compulsory, Housman wouldn't have written a darn thing.

With my newfound knowledge, I had another go at Housman's work and forewarned is definitely forearmed in this case. In an era where you could be ruined for even suggesting homosexual inclinations, Housman was heartbroken and frustrated; the gloominess of his poems made much more sense. Although Housman's stanzas are very carefully constructed and his poems easily understood, I found that there was just too much misery as the prevailing theme for his work. It is a short volume, easily read and understood, and the Folio edition is very nicely constructed.

[Brok3n · Rating 5 out of 5]

For a breathe I tarry...

It is my habit to read a page or two of poetry every morning. I find that I can't read a book of poetry as I would a novel, one page after another, all day long. I need some time to take it in. Even at this pace, one can, if one persists, get through a lot of the canon of classic poetry. I chose A.E. Housman's A Shropshire Lad because of its role in Roger Zelazny's story For a Breath I Tarry. For a Breath I Tarry is a science fiction story set after humanity has accomplished its own self-extinction. A sentient machine, Frost, wishes to understand humans. To aid in this purpose, he reads books, the first three being Human Physiology, An Outline of History, and A Shropshire Lad.

A Shropshire Lad is the Platonic ideal of the "thin volume of poetry" you have heard of so often. It is, in this Dover Thrift edition, 51 pages, including notes and index. It contains 63 poems. A few have titles, but most are just numbered. The Shropshire of the poems is imaginary. Housman was not from Shropshire, nor was he a "lad" when he wrote the poems, being by then a 36-year-old professor. The poems do not tell a coherent story, at least not one that I could discern, but they do tell stories, and there is a central character, the young man Terence. He is, at the start of the book, twenty years old. We know this, because he tells us (poem II)

Now, of my threescore years and ten,
Twenty will not come again,
And take from seventy springs a score,
It only leaves me fifty more.

This concern with the transience of life pervades the poems. Many of them do more than hint at death: murder, suicide, and death in battle are among the stories told. One of the poems (XIX) is entitled "To An Athlete Dying Young", and is more congratulatory than mournful.

This focus on death inspired some parodies. Indeed, in poem LXII ( the second to last), Housman mocks himself

But oh, good Lord, the verse you make,
It gives a chap the belly-ache.
The cow, the old cow, she is dead;
It sleeps well, the horned head:
We poor lads, ‘tis our turn now
To hear such tunes as killed the cow.

Housman was an atheist, and, unusually for the time and place when they were written, especially given the focus on mortality, religion is virtually absent from the collection. The first poem, "1887", does indeed mention God, but more in mockery than in reverence. There is even a poem (XLIII) entitled "The Immortal Part", but it transpires that the immortal part referred to is not the soul, but the bones.

My favorite poems are those that are less explicitly about death, but rather focus on the transience of life. I will end with XXXII, which inspired the title of Zelazny's story

From far, from eve and morning
  And yon twelve-winded sky,
The stuff of life to knit me
  Blew hither: here am I.

Now—for a breath I tarry
  Nor yet disperse apart—
Take my hand quick and tell me,
  What have you in your heart.

Speak now, and I will answer;
  How shall I help you, say;
Ere to the wind’s twelve quarters
  I take my endless way.

Blog review.

[Michael · Rating 3 out of 5]

It seems a little otherworldly to read a book of highly formal, good-quality poetry that was a runaway bestseller appealing most strongly to young men. Worth reading if only for the shock of realizing how much influence it had on twentieth century popular literature. Bracingly morbid, but then Mithridates died old, and by gum A.E. Housman made it to 77 himself.

[Sarah · Rating 4 out of 5]

I went into this hoping for lots of lovely English-countryside-type poems, and I got lots of lovely English-countryside-poems-about-death.

I really enjoyed it. Houseman is an amazing formalist. "To An Athlete Dying Young" is definitely the most remarkable poem in here, but there are lots of other good ones as well.

[Andrea Zuvich · Rating 4 out of 5]

Nice poetry, though not my favourite kind. 'Tis a shame I didn't read it when I lived in Clungunford, Shropshire (mentioned in this work). It is a very short read, and can be done in one sitting.

[Jimmy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Here is my favorite. Not the most famous of his poems, but I love it. It had a great influence on me in high school:

"Terence, this is stupid stuff:
You eat your victuals fast enough;
There's nothing much amiss, 'tis clear,
To see the rate you drink your beer.
But oh, good Lord, the verse you make,
It gives a chap the belly-ache.
The cow, the old cow, she is dead;
It sleeps well, the horned head:
We poor lads, 'tis our turn now
To hear such tunes as killed the cow.
Pretty friendship 'tis to rhyme
Your friends to death before their time
Moping melancholy mad:
Come, pipe a tune to dance to, lad."

Why, if 'tis dancing you would be,
There's brisker pipes than poetry.
Say, for what were hop-yards meant,
Or why was Burton built on Trent?
Oh many a peer of England brews
Livelier liquor than the Muse,
And malt does more than Milton can
To justify God's ways to man.
Ale, man, ale's the stuff to drink
For fellows whom it hurts to think:
Look into the pewter pot
To see the world as the world's not.
And faith, 'tis pleasant till 'tis past:
The mischief is that 'twill not last.
Oh I have been to Ludlow fair
And left my necktie God knows where,
And carried half way home, or near,
Pints and quarts of Ludlow beer:
Then the world seemed none so bad,
And I myself a sterling lad;
And down in lovely muck I've lain,
Happy till I woke again.
Then I saw the morning sky:
Heigho, the tale was all a lie;
The world, it was the old world yet,
I was I, my things were wet,
And nothing now remained to do
But begin the game anew.

Therefore, since the world has still
Much good, but much less good than ill,
And while the sun and moon endure
Luck's a chance, but trouble's sure,
I'd face it as a wise man would,
And train for ill and not for good.
'Tis true, the stuff I bring for sale
Is not so brisk a brew as ale:
Out of a stem that scored the hand
I wrung it in a weary land.
But take it: if the smack is sour
The better for the embittered hour;
It will do good to heart and head
When your soul is in my soul's stead;
And I will friend you, if I may,
In the dark and cloudy day.

There was a king reigned in the East:
There, when kings will sit to feast,
They get their fill before they think
With poisoned meat and poisoned drink.
He gathered all that sprang to birth
From the many-venomed earth;
First a little, thence to more,
He sampled all her killing store;
And easy, smiling, seasoned sound,
Sate the king when healths went round.
They put arsenic in his meat
And stared aghast to watch him eat;
They poured strychnine in his cup
And shook to see him drink it up:
They shook, they stared as white's their shirt:
Them it was their poison hurt.
-- I tell the tale that I heard told.
Mithridates, he died old.

[Pamela Shropshire · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have come across references to A Shropshire Lad for years, so when I found a copy at my favorite UBS, I didn’t hesitate. My (married) surname being Shropshire and having visited Shropshire County in England last year are other reasons I was drawn to it.

I understand Housman was not from Shropshire, but Worcestershire, and that most of the scenic descriptions were from his imagination and some quite erroneous. Nevertheless, this collection of poems quickly became popular and remained so for many years.

The poems themselves are rhythmic and lyrical while the subject matter is darkly humorous and fatalistic. Poem LXII is perhaps the best known - it’s about drinking to forget the world’s and one’s problems, surely something most people would relate to whether they indulge or are abstemious.

Say, for what were hop-yards meant,
Or why was Burton built on Trent?
Oh many a peer of England brews
Livelier liquor than the Muse,
And malt does more than Milton can
To justify God’s ways to man.
Ale, man, ale’s the stuff to drink
For fellows whom it hurts to think;
Look into the pewter pot
To see the world as the world’s not.

These lines are probably the most quoted, and with good reason. They’re fun to read and recite.

Another one I enjoyed was Poem XIII:

When I was one-and-twenty
I heard a wise man say,
‘Give crowns and pounds and guineas
But not your heart away.
Give pearls away and rubies
But keep your fancy free.
But I was one-and-twenty,
No use to talk to me.

When I was one-and-twenty
I heard him say again,
‘The heart out of the bosom
Was never given in vain;
‘Tis paid with sighs a plenty
And sold for endless rue.’
And I am two-and-twenty,
And oh, ‘tis true, ‘tis true.

Having raised two sons, I can attest to the veracity of those lines.

IMO, these poems deserve the recognition they receive. I enjoyed them a lot.

[Melody · Rating 5 out of 5]

8/2012 I come to Housman when I'm hollow, when I'm lost, when I'm confused. I come here when I need to come here, and he takes me in, he comforts me with snark, with acute observation, with hilarity and bottomless woe. There's nobody, nobody at all like Housman. I have entire swaths of this by heart, and generally read a poem or two at need. Today I read it cover to cover and was, once again, entirely blown away.


2010: What's to say of Housman? His words are like strange wine that changes one utterly once imbibed.

"...that grace, that manhood gone..."

[Fern Adams · Rating 4 out of 5]

One of my favourite more tradition poetry collections. Simple yet beautiful language evoking a time gone by. This is my second time reading it and first time via audiobook. There was something better about hearing it aloud, you can imagine them being recited one evening by a fire or in a gathering at an inn or pub with verses being swapped.

[Mark · Rating 3 out of 5]

Picked this up because I'd never read the whole thing and because I thought the way Simon Callow says its title in A Room With a View is very funny. One of those cases where the anthologists really have found all the good stuff. Difficult now to imagine a generation of young British men going nuts for all these very artificial poems about suicide. Still, there's something in its compression that's a step towards modernism--easy to see where Frost and Auden would take it. In comparison to those two, though, hard to shake the impression that the poet here is not in total control of the material. Perhaps best read as a novel about a depressed poetaster who obsessively churns out nearly identical poems on a handful of themes, told entirely through the verse.

[Erik Graff · Rating 3 out of 5]

It has been claimed that this collection was that most popularly carried by British troops into WWI. Housman, according to Wikipedia, declined royalties in order to make it available in cheap, compact editions. It is certainly a work focused on youth, on love, on war and the transience of life.

I read the poems aloud with the owner of Heirloom Books in Chicago over a period of several days, alternating from one to the next, occasionally discussing the content, especially when it was obscure to one or both of us. Fortunately, most of it is clear enough.

Poetry--and I've conservative, not terribly well informed, views about poetry--in its metrical forms displays its ancient affinity to music. Housman's not only maintains metre but also simple rhyme schemes. The trick in reading it aloud is to submerge the music in the sense, avoiding sing-songing it by following the punctuation, emphasizing the meaning of it above its subtle lyricism. Reading it well is challenging, writing such well is exceptionally so.

Oh, and while it's said that Housman accompanied British troops, it's also been claimed that it was Nietzsche who accompanied their German adversaries. (Personally, I suspect the Bible might have had both authors beat.)

[Emily · Rating 5 out of 5]

Two of my favorites:

XIII
When I was one-and-twenty
I heard a wise man say,
"Give crowns and pounds and guineas
But not your heart away;
Give pearls away and rubies
But keep your fancy free."
But I was one-and-twenty,
No use to talk to me.

When I was one-and-twenty
I heard him say again,
"The heart out of the bosom
Was never given in vain;
'Tis paid with sighs a plenty
And sold for endless rue."
And I am two-and-twenty,
And oh, 'tis true, 'tis true.


LX
Now hollows fires burn out to black,
And lights are guttering low:
Square your shoulders, lift your pack,
And leave your friends and go.

Oh never fear, man, nought's to dread,
Look not left nor right:
In all the endless road you tread
There's nothing but the night.

[Jonfaith · Rating 4 out of 5]

That is the land of lost content,
I see it shining plain,
The happy highways where I went
And cannot come again.

Patrick Leigh Fermor brought me here. It must have served him well on his famed hoof. The sparse grace appears well suited for a page or two when knackered after a day’s trek. There were some interesting notes in the edition which I read. But instead, check out Paquita's review instead
is an intriguing point of departure. I imagined reading this elsewhere, perhaps younger. Instead I thought about infection rates and the misty future.

[C. B. · Rating 4 out of 5]

Housman's art is dedicated to misery, veiled yearning, squandered possibility, and early death. While nobody is going to find much comfort in these pages, it gives a vivid impression of one man's emotional and intellectual world; one that matches, in part, that of England in the 1890s. Very poignant indeed.

[Melusina · Rating 5 out of 5]

Absolutely wonderful. A slim poetry collection about death and loss that ranks among the best I have read in a long time. Some call it pathetic, I call it genius.

[Tom · Rating 3 out of 5]

"This collection of verse is Housman’s signature work. Mixing the styles of the traditional English ballad and classical verse, the young Housman takes on the growing pains of youth and young love. His verse is noted for its economy of words and directness of statement, pictures of the English countryside, and the fusion of humor and pathos. https://www.bartleby.com/123/

I. From Clee to heaven the beacon burns 3⭐
II. Loveliest of trees, the cherry now 5⭐
III. Leave your home behind, lad (The Recruit) 3⭐
IV. Wake: the silver dusk returning (Reveille) 3.5 ⭐
V. Oh see how thick the goldcup flowers 3.5⭐
VI. When the lad for longing sighs 3⭐
VII. When smoke stood up from Ludlow 3.5⭐
VIII. Farewell to barn and stack and tree 3.5⭐
IX. On moonlit heath and lonesome bank 4⭐
X. The Sun at noon to higher air (March) 3⭐
XI. On your midnight pallet lying 3⭐
XII. When I watch the living meet 3⭐
XIII. When I was one-and-twenty 4⭐
XIV. There pass the careless people 3⭐
XV. Look not in my eyes, for fear 3.5⭐
XVI. It nods and curtseys and recovers 3.5⭐
XVII. Twice a week the winter thorough 3⭐
XVIII. Oh, when I was in love with you 3⭐
XIX. The time you won your town the race (To an athlete dying young) 4⭐
XX. Oh fair enough are sky and plain 3.5⭐
XXI. In summertime on Bredon (Bredon Hill) 3⭐
XXII. The street sounds to the soldiers’ tread 3⭐
XXIII. The lads in their hundreds 3⭐
XXIV. Say, lad, have you things to do 2.5⭐
XXV. This time of year twelvemonth past 3⭐
XXVI. Along the field as we came by 3.5⭐
XXVII. Is my team ploughing 3.5⭐
XXVIII. High the vanes of Shrewsbury gleam (The Welsh Marches) 3⭐
XXIX. ’Tis spring; come out to ramble (The Lent Lily) 3⭐
XXX. Others, I am not the first 3⭐
XXXI. On Wenlock Edge the wood’s in trouble 3⭐
XXXII. From far, from eve and morning 3.5⭐
XXXIII. If truth in hearts that perish 3.5⭐
XXXIV. Oh, sick I am to see you (The New Mistress) 3.5⭐
XXXV. On the idle hill of summer 3⭐
XXXVI. White in the moon the long road lies 3.25⭐
XXXVII. As through the wild green hills of Wyre 3⭐
XXXVIII. The winds out of the west land blow 3⭐
XXXIX. ’Tis time, I think, by Wenlock town 3⭐
XL. Into my heart an air that kills 3.5⭐
XLI. In my own shire, if I was sad 3.25⭐
XLII. Once in the wind of morning (The Merry Guide) 4⭐
XLIII. When I meet the morning beam (The Immortal Part) 3⭐
XLIV. Shot? so quick, so clean an ending 2.5⭐
XLV. If it chance your eye offend you 2.5⭐
XLVI Bring, in this timeless grave to throw 2.5⭐
XLVII. Here the hangman stops his cart (The Carpenter's Son) 3.25⭐
XLVIII. Be still, my soul, be still 2.5⭐
XLIX. Think no more, lad; laugh, be jolly 3⭐
L. In valleys of springs of rivers 3⭐
LI. Loitering with a vacant eye 3⭐
LII. Far in a western brookland 3.5⭐
LIII. The lad came to the door at night (The True Lover) 3⭐
LIV. With rue my heart is laden 3⭐
LV. Westward on the high-hilled plains 2.5⭐
LVI. Far I hear the bugle blow (The Day of Battle) 3⭐
LVII. You smile upon your friend to-day 3⭐
LVIII. When I came last to Ludlow 3⭐
LIX. The star-filled seas are smooth to-night (The Isle of Portland) 3⭐
LX. Now hollow fires burn out to black 2.5⭐
LXI. The vane on Hughley steeple (Hughley Steeple) 3⭐
LXII. Terence, this is stupid stuff 3.5⭐
LXIII. I hoed and trenched and weeded 3⭐

[Sneha Jaiswal · Rating 4 out of 5]

I purchased a pretty cloth-bound edition of this book by A E Housman and it was smaller in size than expected. But there are enough poems to last you days and charm you with their lyrical allure.

The dominant theme is war in the first few pages. But the poems also dwell into other universal themes like love, loneliness & the perils of youth. It’s the simplicity of language that adds a raw honesty to all that is being said by the poet. The book was published in 1896 and yet, the thoughts of the writers are clear and concise and some of the ideas still very relevant and relatable.

Look at these lines from one of the poem that brought a smile to my face –

Some lads there are, 'tis shame to say,
That only court to thieve,
And once they bear the bloom away
'Tis little enough they leave.
Then keep your heart for men like me
And safe from trustless chaps.
My love is true and all for you.
"Perhaps, young man, perhaps."

This poem talks of a lad falling for a woman and how he tries to woo her in vain. Housman talks of superficial passion and how some men lure women to just exploit them and disappear when they’ve had their fun. It’s an age old cautionary tale recited in a light, almost letter-like manner.

In Shropshire Lad, you find a vivid voice that echoes familiar sentiments,as if someone is singing you a song. It’s the kind of poetry you can read before going to bed and not feel burdened by the weight of its words.