The Collected Poems of Rupert Brooke
by Rupert Brooke [British Poet -- 1887-1915.]
[Note on text: Italicized stanzas will be indented 5 spaces.
Stanzas that are italicized AND indented will be indented 10 spaces.
Italicized words or phrases will be capitalised.
Lines longer than 75 characters have been broken,
and the continuation is indented two spaces. This etext was transcribed
from the 1915 edition of Rupert Brooke's collected poems.]
[A new Appendix is included in this etext, consisting of poems
ABOUT or TO Rupert Brooke.]
The Collected Poems of Rupert Brooke
Born at Rugby, August 3, 1887
Fellow of King's College, Cambridge, 1913
Sub-Lieutenant, R.N.V.R., September, 1914
Antwerp Expedition, October, 1914
Sailed with British Mediterranean Expeditionary Force, February 28, 1915
Died in the Aegean, April 23, 1915
The Collected Poems of Rupert Brooke
with an introduction by George Edward Woodberry
and a biographical note by Margaret Lavington
Introduction
I
Rupert Brooke was both fair to see and winning in his ways. There was
at the first contact both bloom and charm; and most of all there was life.
To use the word his friends describe him by, he was "vivid".
This vitality, though manifold in expression, is felt primarily
in his sensations -- surprise mingled with delight -
"One after one, like tasting a sweet food."
This is life's "first fine rapture". It makes him patient to
name over those myriad things (each of which seems like a fresh discovery)
curious but potent, and above all common, that he "loved", -he the "Great Lover". Lover of what, then? Why, of
"White plates and cups clean-gleaming,
Ringed with blue lines," -
and the like, through thirty lines of exquisite words; and he is captivated
by the multiple brevity of these vignettes of sense, keen, momentary,
ecstatic with the morning ...
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Go to begin of the document
Go to previous page
Go to next page
Go to the end of document
