Quotes by A. E. Housman

A. E. Housman

A. E. Housman

British poet

Lived from: 1859 - 1936

Category: Poets (Contemporary) Country: FlagUnited Kingdom

Born: 26 march 1859 Died: 30 april 1936

  • Lovers lying two and two Ask not whom they sleep beside, And the bridegroom all night through Never turns him to the bride.
  • 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.
  • Who made the world I cannot tell; 'Tis made, and here am I in hell. My hand, though now my knuckles bleed, I never soiled with such a deed.

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  • A neck God made for other use Than strangling in a string.
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  • Ale, man, ale's the stuff to drink for fellows whom it hurts to think.
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  • And silence sounds no worse than cheers
    After earth has stopped the ears.
    A Shropshire Lad (1896) No. 19 (To an Athlete Dying Young), st. 4
    ― A. E. Housman
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  • Be still, my soul, be still; the arms you bear are brittle,
    Earth and high heaven are fixt of old and founded strong.
    A Shropshire Lad (1896) No. 48, st. 1
    ― A. E. Housman
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  • But from my grave across my brow
    Plays no wind of healing now,
    And fire and ice within me fight
    Beneath the suffocating night.
    A Shropshire Lad (1896) No. 30, st. 4
    ― A. E. Housman
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  • 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.
    A Shropshire Lad (1896) No. 4 (Reveille), st. 6
    ― A. E. Housman
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  • Could man be drunk for ever
    With liquor, love, or fights,
    Lief should I rouse at mornings
    And lief lie down of nights.
    But men at whiles are sober
    And think by fits and starts,
    And if they think, they fasten
    Their hands upon their hearts.
    Last Poems (1922) No. 10, st. 2
    ― A. E. Housman
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  • Even when poetry has a meaning, as it usually has, it may be inadvisable to draw it out... and perfect understanding will sometimes almost extinguish pleasure.
    The Name and Nature of Poetry
    ― A. E. Housman
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  • Experience has taught me, when I am shaving of a morning, to keep watch over my thoughts, because, if a line of poetry strays into my memory, my skin bristles so that the razor ceases to act... The seat of this sensation is the pit of the stomach.
    The Name and Nature of Poetry
    ― A. E. Housman
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  • Far in a western brookland
    That bred me long ago
    The poplars stand and tremble
    By pools I used to know.
    A Shropshire Lad (1896) No. 52, st. 1
    ― A. E. Housman
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  • Good literature continually read for pleasure must, let us hope, 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.
    The Name and Nature of Poetry
    ― A. E. Housman
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  • Good religious poetry... is likely to be most justly appreciated and most discriminately relished by the undevout.
    ― A. E. Housman
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  • Here dead lie we because we did not choose to live and shame the land from which we sprung. Life, to be sure, is nothing much to lose; but young men think it is, and we were young.
    ― A. E. Housman
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  • His folly has not fellow
    Beneath the blue of day
    That gives to man or woman
    His heart and soul away.
    A Shropshire Lad (1896) No. 14, st. 3
    ― A. E. Housman
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  • Hope lies to mortals
    And most believe her,
    But man's deceiver
    Was never mine.
    More Poems (1936) No. 6, st. 1
    ― A. E. Housman
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  • I could no more define poetry than a terrier can define a rat.
    ISBN: 9780198184966 The Letters of A. E. Housman (2007 edition), Oxfor
    ― A. E. Housman
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  • I find Cambridge an asylum, in every sense of the word.
    ― A. E. Housman
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  • I tell the tale that I heard told. Mithridates, he died old.
    A Shropshire Lad no. 62, l. 75 (1896)
    ― A. E. Housman
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  • I, a stranger and afraid in a world I never made.
    ― A. E. Housman
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  • If a line of poetry strays into my memory, my skin bristles so that the razor ceases to act.
    ― A. E. Housman
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What are the most famous quotes from A. E. Housman?

The two most famous quotes from A. E. Housman are:

  • "A neck God made for other use Than strangling in a string."
  • "Ale, man, ale's the stuff to drink for fellows whom it hurts to think."

When did A. E. Housman live?

A. E. Housman was born in 1859 and died in the year 1936.