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I find Cambridge an asylum, in every sense of the word.

A. E. Housman

Do not ever read books about versification: no poet ever learnt it that way. If you are going to be a poet, it will come to you naturally and you will pick up all you need from reading poetry.
A. E. HOUSMAN

Book Learning Poet Poetry Reading
And silence sounds no worse than cheers After earth has stopped the ears.
A. E. HOUSMAN

Cheer Doubt Ear Emotion Fear Scare Silence Sound Stop Worse
Great literature should do some good to the reader: must quicken his perception though dull, and sharpen his discrimination though blunt, and mellow the rawness of his personal opinions.
A. E. HOUSMAN

Knowledge Literature Low Mad Opinion Perception Personal Stupid Thinking
I, a stranger and afraid, in a world I never made.
A. E. HOUSMAN

Afraid Myself Stranger World
Now hollow fires burn out to black, And lights are guttering low: Square your shoulders, lift your pack And leave your friends and go.
A. E. HOUSMAN

Fire Friend Hollow Light Shoulder
All knots that lovers tie Are tied to sever. Here shall your sweetheart lie, Untrue for ever.
A. E. HOUSMAN

Knot Lover Sever Tie Untrue
Hope lies to mortals And most believe her, But man’s deceiver Was never mine.
A. E. HOUSMAN

Believe Greatness Hope Loyal Lying Soul Today Worship Yesterday
They carry back bright to the coiner the mintage of man,The lads that will die in their glory and never be old.
A. E. HOUSMAN

Concur Glory Knowledge Literature Man Masterwork Men P Writing
Housman is one of my heroes and always has been. He was a detestable and miserable man. Arrogant, unspeakably lonely, cruel, and so on, but and absolutely marvellous minor poet, I think, and a great scholar.
A. E. HOUSMAN

Arrogant Greatness Hero Himself Lonely Man Misery Poet
The troubles of our proud and angry dust are from eternity, and shall not fail. Bear them we can, and if we can we must. Shoulder the sky, my lad, and drink your ale.
A. E. HOUSMAN

Beer Dust Eternity Exploit Hurry Inspirational Literature Reality Reveal Sky True
I think that to transfuse emotion – not to transmit thought but to set up in the reader’s sense a vibration corresponding to what was felt by the writer – is the peculiar function of poetry.
A. E. HOUSMAN

Emotion Poetry Reader Transmit
Earth and high heaven are fixed of old and founded strong.
A. E. HOUSMAN

Earth Heaven High Strong
That is the land of lost content, I see it shining plain, the happy highways where I went and cannot come again.
A. E. HOUSMAN

Content Lost Myself Plain Shine
The fairies break their dances And leave the printed lawn.
A. E. HOUSMAN

Break Dance Leaving Print
Luck’s a chance, but trouble’s sure.
A. E. HOUSMAN
Nature, not content with denying him the ability to think, has endowed him with the ability to write.
A. E. HOUSMAN

Ability Himself Nature Thinking Writing

I find Cambridge an asylum, in every sense of the word.

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I find Cambridge an asylum, in every sense of the word.

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