Alfred Edward Housman and Death - Essay Example

A.E. Housman and Death Alfred Edward Housman (1859-1936) spent most of his life as a of Latin, but managed to publish two books during his lifetime that had a tremendous impact upon the literate community. The first, “A Shropshire Lad,” was published in 1896 and has never been out of print since. The second book wasn’t published until 1922 and was entitled “Last Poems,” however, Housman’s brother Laurence published “More Poems” and “Additional Poems” after his death. During his life, Housman experienced great love for a male classmate who did not return his affections, the early death of his mother and the death of a second person close to him leading to the development of “A Shropshire Lad”, “a collection of sixty-three poems addressing the themes of unrequited love, the oblivion of death, and idealized military life” that carefully navigated around any issues of homosexuality. In addition, he is surprisingly consistent in his writing, showing nearly identical themes, forms and language usage in “Last Poems” as were used in “A Shropshire Lad.” However, his “open investigations of the mysteries of death and the dual nature of humankind have earned him acknowledgment as a precursor to the development of modern poetry” (“A.E. Housman”, 2006). These attitudes about death can be most understood as they are expressed in the poems “To An Athlete Dying Young,” “When I Was One and Twenty,” “With Rue My Heart is Laden” and “Is My Team Ploughing?” In “To An Athlete Dying Young”, Housman demonstrates a sensitive honor for the man who dies in his prime, invoking a powerful sense of regretful comprehension regarding the wisdom of dying young. He begins the poem with a nostalgic look back at the happy crowd carrying the star athlete around on a chair, everyone celebrating and having a good time. This nostalgia is established by the wistful “The time you won” (1) that immediately invokes a fog of memory around the edges of the scene described. The hero’s way is carefully invoked in the lines “Man and boy stood cheering by, / And home we brought you shoulder-high” (3-4) to be carefully juxtaposed against the same phrase in the second stanza: “Shoulder-high we bring you home, / And set you at your threshold down” (6-7). With only this slight change in language, Housman makes it clear that this is no longer a cheering crowd, they are not celebrating and, by distinguishing his friend as “Townsman of a stiller town” (8), he makes it obvious that this is a casket being set down. Such subtle contemplative language is carried throughout the poem, indicating Housman’s attitude toward death is a kind of resolute acceptance of its necessity in order to maintain a hero’s status. With statements like “Smart lad, to slip betimes away / From fields where glory does not stay” (9-10), Housman indicates that only by dying young can one hold onto any glory – you will never see your record beat, you will never know what it’s like to not receive the cheers anymore, you will always carry your champion cup. While the poem “When I Was One and Twenty” addresses the topic of unrequited love, it helps to indicate Housman’s attitude toward endings of any kind. In this poem, the sense of loss at the end is not as keenly felt as the emotions expressed in “To An Athlete Dying Young.” This is because a great deal of the poem is dedicated to expressing the views of the wise man regarding love. “Give crowns and pounds and guineas / But not your heart away” (3-4), he quotes the wise man, but that energetic youth is incapable of heeding the message. “But I was one and twenty, / no use to talk to me” (7-8). He had also been told that no love is ever given in vain because when it is not returned, it is paid for with “sighs a plenty / And sold for endless rue” (13-14). And now, one year later, he realizes the truth in what the man was saying. Riches beyond measure were advised to be sacrificed, eternal pain beyond endurance were the penalty. The final line of the poem captures the essence of the grief and loss, “Oh, ‘tis true, ‘tis true!” (16) as the mind skips back over what was offered instead of the heart and the realization is forced home regarding what this speaker is feeling. From this position, it is apparent that while Housman may accept ending as a necessary fact of life, he does not feel the grief experienced from them are something that can be overcome. This inconsolable grief strolls longingly through the lines of “With Rue My Heart is Laden.” The poem opens in sorrow “For golden friends I had” (2), not for a moment allowing the reader to suppose he is speaking of anyone alive. This concept is confirmed when he tells us that “The lightfoot boys are laid” (6) and “The rose-lipt girls are sleeping” (7). Though the sorrow and grief for these friends is keenly felt in these words, Housman does not allow them to sleep completely in shadows. He remembers them in full bloom as rose-lipt girls and lightfoot boys, imbuing them with a sense of vitality and liveliness in their youth. This sense of energy and motion is carried forward in the choice of the word leaping to describe the width of the brooks. But this fleeting moment of memory of these friends as they were in life are quickly returned to the sorrow that started the poem as it is remembered the brooks are where the boys are laid and the maidens sleep in the faded fields of summer. Again, while Housman expresses profound grief and loss at the concept of death, he also demonstrates a respect for those who die young as they are able to retain a portion of their glory even in death. Housman takes a somewhat lighter look at death from the other side of the grave in “Is My Team Ploughing?” He makes it obvious that he is speaking from the mind of a dead man in the first stanza, “When I was man alive?” (4). His questions indicate a series of concerns that might occur to a man lying in his grave on an afternoon. He inquires as to the sounds he hears in the ground above him, the sounds of the harness he used to work every day of his life. Knowing that work continues on the farm as it always has despite his not being there allows him to move on to his next concern, that of the sounds of boys playing football even though he’s no longer there to participate. He then turns his thoughts to his sweetheart, concerned she might still grieve for him, but finds that “she lies down lightly, / She lies not down to weep: / Your girl is well contented” (21-23). Finally, he asks about the welfare of his best friend and whether he has ever found a happy place to lie. “Yes, lad, I lie easy, / I lie as lads would choose; / I cheer a dead man’s sweetheart, / Never ask me whose” (29-32). Thus, we learn not only that the speaker has been talking with his best friend, but that those he’s left behind no longer feel such sorrow over his passing and have learned to move on with life. Through these poems, Housman is able to demonstrate the depth of his feelings of grief and loss at losing a friendship in his life, whether through death or through unrequited love, but he is also able to demonstrate that life will continue and death is not completely negative. These poems illustrate grief on the part of the one left behind, but glory for the one who has passed on as they are able to cling to their youth, charms and abilities. Although he acknowledges that this grief may not be a permanent condition, it is only when he looks at death from the viewpoint of the deceased that he is able to escape his grief enough to express this concept. It can be inferred, then, that he imagined there would be a time when his grief would not affect him so deeply, but that he had not yet lived long enough to allow that time to come. Works Cited Housman, A.E. A Shropshire Lad. London: K. Paul, Trench, Treubner, 1896. Read More