Alfred Lord Tennyson (
1809-
1892)
Tennyson was crushed by the death of his dear friend
Arthur Hallam at the age of 22 in 1833. Hallam was his best friend and his sister's fiance. Dedicated to Hallam,
In Memoriam A.H.H. is a lengthy poem cycle of 132 individual poems which he wrote over the course of 17 years. It is a stunning exploration of life, grief, loss, man's place in the universe, and the implications of the then new
sciences like
geology,
astronomy, and
paleontology on the meaning of life. It is also responsible for introducing a number of famous phrases, now
cliches a century later, into the
English language, like "
better to have loved and lost" and "
ring out the old, ring in the new".
Since this is quite a long poem, I may not even node the whole thing, but I'll probably get around to it eventually. I will start seemingly at random by noding the best and most famous sections first, because, well, I feel like it. Suggested starting places are In Memoriam 27 and In Memoriam 54