A STUDY OF IRONY IN THE POETRY OF A. E. HOUSMAN

by

KENNETH WILLIAM HAMIffiS J R . , B . A .

A THESIS

IN

ENGLISH

Submitted to the Graduate Faculty of Texas Tech University in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for

the Degree of

MASTER OF ARTS

August, 1972

J /jfl^.^iG^ €J

n)0^ t3i^ CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION 1

I. THE CLASSICAL TEMPER OF HOUSMAN»S IRONY . . . . 3

II. TYPES OF IRONY IN HOUSMAN'S POETRY l6

Dramatic Irony l6

Irony of Circumstance 25

Irony of Consolation 35

Irony of Character ^1

III. HOUSMAN»S USE OP RHETORICAL DEVICES FOR

IRONIC EFFECT ^7

Understatement 49

Hyperbole 56

Paradox . 6l

Pun 64

Parody 65

CONCLUSION 69

BIBLIOGRAPHY 76

ii

INTRODUCTION

In the Leslie Stephen Lecture for 1933, which he

entitled, "The Name and Nature of Poetry," A. E. Housman

attempted to define poetry in terms of the way it is

written and the emotional effects it conveys to those who

read or hear it. The emphasis he places upon the ability

of poetic language to achieve these emotional effects can

be seen not only in this lecture but also in his verse as

well. That he was able to incorporate the qualities and

standards which he demanded of all poetry into his own

poems is central to an appreciation of his rhetorical crafts­

manship. His studied ability to clothe poignant ideas in

the simple words of rustic characters, coupled with his

subtle manner of indirectness, gives his poetry a pristine

irony which serves as the touchstone of his poetic power.

I will discuss three aspects of irony which are

fundamental to an understanding of his poetry: 1) the nature

of Housman*s irony, its tradition, and reasons for its

effectiveness as a poetic mode; 2) the four kinds of irony

operating in Housman's poems and various ways in which these

ironic forms achieve the transfusing of emotion which Housman

considered to be poetry's chief function; 3) his use of

rhetorical devices for the achievement of ironic effects and

the fundamental ways in which these devices contribute to

the irony in his poetry,

It is hoped that this study will demonstrate that

the poetic use of irony in Housman's poetry is vital to

the successful fulfillment of the criteria which he set

forth in "The Name and Nature of Poetry" and that his own

peculiar ability to create and control irony in his verse

is vital to his success as a poet.

CHAPTER I

THE CLASSICAL TEMPER OF HOUSMAN'S IRONY

A. E. Housman»s irony is poetically effective in

that it continues in the literary tradition of classical

irony, and his pessimism, or tragic view of life, is

derived, at least partially, from the classical tradition.

J. A. K. Thomson has said that the ironic writer "is made

as well as bom, and the speech he uses today . . . is

moulded and coloured by the Ironical tradition." To say

that Housman consciously adopted ironic devices from the

classical writers would be pretentious, but I believe

that an understanding of the elements of classical irony

helps one to understand the nature of the irony in

Housman»s poetry.

Even if the relationship between his irony and

classical irony is nothing more than an affinity of spirit,

this affinity can be attributed to the fact that Housman

was a classical scholar. In a letter to Witter Bynner, he 2

stated simply: "My trade is that of professor of Latin."

His interest in classical literature began in his early

youth, and his rise from student to classical scholar was

not without trials and setbacks. After he failed the

"Greats" (the final examination for honors in the classics

at Oxford), he worked in the London Patent Office as a

clerk. According to Tom Burns Haber, Housman*s scholarly 3

endeavors during this ten-year period included the follow­

ing pieces which were either published or readied for

publication:

four papers on Horace, a thirty-five page article on his Oxford idol Propertius, two on Ovid, four on Aeschylus, one on Aristotle, two on Euripides, one on Isocrates, one on Persius, three on Sophocles, one on Virgil, and four other smaller miscellanea.3

In 1893, because of his growing reputation for classical

scholarship, he was elected unanimously to the Latin chair

at University College, London. For thirty years he devoted

most of his time to the emendation of classical texts, and

a true perspective of his background in the classics is

reflected in the fact that he felt himself qualified to

apply for the Greek chair at University College as a

matter of second choice.

In light of this extensive background and interest

in the classics, one would expect Housman to be influenced

to some extent by his classical training. The classical

spirit of irony in his poetry can be seen in the rustic

simplicity of the pastoral tradition, in the tragic view

of the elegiac tradition, and in the development of ironic

devices like those reflected in the writings of Aristotle,

Cicero, and Longinus,

It is a matter of general consensus that the use of

irony existed long before irony as a phenomenon was given

a name. In Irony: An Historical Introduction. Thomson

attributes the beginning of irony to the Greeks:

F 1

You may fairly call it a Greek thing; from an impor­tant point of view the most differentiating thing about the Greek spirit. The student finds that not only the literature of the Hellenes but their whole attitude to life is touched with Irony. . . . We hear much of Greek plainness and Greek simplicity. Let us not forget that these virtues would never produce the effect they do if the simplicity were only simple and the plainness merely plain.4

Something of this spirit of plainness and simplicity can be

discerned in the early pastoral tradition. Walter W. Greg

has written that the very nature of the pastoral "breeds

desire for a return to simplicity."^ In the pastoral verse

of Theocritus, this simplicity is artfully deceptive, and

there is an ironic quality in this deception. Greg notes

that "everywhere in these soft melodies of luscious beauty,

even in the studied sketches of primitive innocence itself,

there is an undercurrent of tender melancholy and pathos."

Similarly, in Housman's poetry, the simple words of

innocent, almost naive, rustic lads and lasses convey the

painful incongruities of the real world much more power­

fully than would the language of urban sophisticates.

James H. Hanford suggests that Theocritus*

dramatic imagination, aided by his knowledge of the sober realities of Sicilian shepherd life, carried him beyond the imitation of mere externals and led him really to identify himself with the characters which he portrayed. All the charm of rustic manners, all the fresh beauties of Sicilian scenery were preserved in the idyls of Theocritus; but these served only as a setting for human passions.7

John Stevenson has noted a similar power of expression in

Housman's use of the pastoral setting:

I

V/hether or not Housman consciously adopted the pastoral form I do not know, but he did become Terence, an English rustic from Shropshire; as such he stood before his public as a qualified spokesman. Only in this way could his piercing intellect probe the superficiality and the unctuous morality of the waning Victorian age. The pastoral setting became then the basis of a studied irony which became almost too painful when revealed by a country lad, but V7hich would have become sentimental or overstated if revealed by a Cambridge don.8

This contrast between Housman, the London professor of

Latin, and his Shropshire spokesman (of whom he v/rote, "The

Shropshire Lad is an imaginary figure, with something of my

temper and view of life."^) is much like the situation

which Greg attributes to Theocritus, whose poetry "was

itself directly born of the contrast between the recollec­

tions of a childhood spent in the Sicilian uplands and the

crowded social and intellectual city-life of Alexandria."

To this irony achieved through the delivery of

serious and poignant ideas by a simple, rustic spokesman,

Housman adds a bitter irony quite different in origin.

This bitter form of irony aligns itself with the elegiac

tradition and the poetry of death. The elegiac feeling

and intention in Housman's poetry can be seen in the

concept of elegos (lament or song of mourning) found in

the elegies of Theocritus, Bion, Moschus, and the Latin

elegists who wrote in the Heration tradition; but there is

a stronger affinity of spirit between Housman's poetry and

the very beginnings of the elegiac tradition: the flute

songs of Archilochus, Callinus, and Mimnermus; the war

songs of Tyrtaeus and Semonides; and some of the poems of

Anacreon. The irony inherent in this early elegiac

poetry stems from a blunt, tragic appraisal of the human

condition which Thomson associates with the Greek belief in

the jealousy of the gods. Thomson cites the Persian

Artabanus* speech in Herodotus as an example of this belief:

In our little lives there is no man so happy here or elsewhere but he will often have the thought that he would rather be dead than alive. For misfortunes fall, and diseases confound us, and make life that is short seem long. And so death is the dearest refuge for man from the malady of living, and the Jealousy of God is manifest in this, that He has let us taste the sweet­ness of life.12

A similar view is seen in "We All do Fail as a Leaf" by

Mimnermus:

And when thine hour is spent, and passeth by thee Surely to die were better than to live.

Ere grief or evil fortune come anigh thee. And penury that hath but ill to give.

Who longs for children's love, for all his yearning Shall haply pass to death anhungered still;

Or pain shall come, his life to anguish turning, Zeus hath for all an endless store of ill. 13

(11. 9-16)

Housman expresses the same spirit in a letter written to

Gilbert Murray:

Sic notus Ulixes? do you think you can outwit the resourceful malevolence of Nature? God is not mocked, as St Paul long ago warned the Galatians. When man gets rid of a great trouble he is easier for a little while, but not for long: Nature instantly sets to work to weaken his power of sustaining trouble, and very soon seven pounds is as heavy as fourteen pounds used to be. , . .It looks to me as if the state of mankind always had been and always would be a state of just tolerable discomfort,^^

8

For the early elegists and Housman, the absurdities

and incongruities of life become a mere prelude to death.

Man is bom, Man will die. That he can never attain the

perfection that he aspires for while he is alive is ironic,

but even more ironic is the stark fact that man (in the

words of Charles Glicksberg) must reconcile himself to "the

realization that Nature, of which man is a part, cares

nothing for the human creatures it spawns so prodigally";

death becomes the "be-all and end-all of his pilgrimage

on earth." - Much of Housman*s poetry concerns death, and

his tragic view must have been reinforced, if not influenced

by the classical belief in the certainty and finality of

death. Life's obstacle course is the same for all men:

birth, youth, passion, old age, disillusion, death. In "We

all do Fail as a Leaf" (0. B. G. V., p. I91), Mimnermus

reveals the irony of this classical point of view as he

writes about how swiftly youth passes into old age and death:

We are as leaves in jewelled springtime growing That open to the sunlight's quickening rays;

So joy we in our span of youth, unknowing If God shall bring us good or evil days.

Two fates beside thee stand; the one hath sorrow. Dull age's fruit, that other gives the boon

Of Death, for youth's fair flower hath no to-morrow. And lives but as a sunlit afternoon. (11, 1-8)

These verses imply that because life is short, man must

make the most of present joy and pleasure. This carpe diem

motif is also used by Anacreon in "Old Age" (0. B. G. V.,

p, 221):

To taste the joy of living But little space have I,

And torn with sick misgiving I can but sob and sigh.

So deep the dead men lie. (11. 6-10)

The same kind of ironic urgency is found in Housman*s

"Loveliest of trees, the cherry now":

Now, of my threescore years and ten, Twenty will not come again. And take from seventy springs a score. It only leaves me fifty more.

And since to look at things in bloom Fifty springs are little room. About the woodlands I will go

To see the cherry hung with snow.l6 (ll, 5-12)

The early elegists see death not only as swift and certain,

but also as ironically final. In "The Dead" (0. B. G. V.,

p. 192), Semonides points out the irony of thinking that

ties of any substance or spirit can span the gulf between

the living and the dead: "Of souls departed, if our minds

were strong,/ We'd think no longer than a day is long."

Housman expresses a similar point of view in "Crossing alone

the nighted ferry" (C. P., p, 182): "Whom, on the wharf of

Lethe waiting,/ Count you to find? not me,"

Much of Housman's elegiac irony can be seen in his

poems which deal with the paradoxical plight of the youthful

soldier—the glorified sadness of untimely death. The sacri­

fice of youth and its pleasures to duty provides a similar

ironic paradox in the battle songs of Tyrtaeus, Callinus,

and Semonides, The glory of giving life for country is

contrasted with the shame of rimning from battle in these

10

lines from Tyrtaeus' "How Can Man Die Better" (0, B, G. V,,

p. 181):

Noble is he who falls in front of battle bravely fighting for his native land;

and wretchedest the man who begs, a recreant, citiless, from fertile acres fled, (11, 1-4)

Yet, with glory there is a sadness and sense of loss when

a young soldier is slain, Callinus laments the loss of the

hero in "A Call to Action" (0, B. G. V,, p, 183) :

The whole land mourns a man of heart heroic dead: in life a demigod he seems.

His strength is as a tower to all beholders—

work for many hands he does alone. (11, 18-21)

In a similar fashion, the dependence on the soldier of

those at home, the glorified sadness of heroism, and the

tower as a symbol of strength contribute to the irony in

these lines of Housman's poem, "The Recruit" (C.. P., p. 12):

Come you home a hero. Or come not home at all.

The lads you leave will mind you

Till Ludlow tower shall fall. (11. 13-16)

The irony is heightened when the fallen dead are allowed to

express their own sentiments in Semonides' "The Athenian

Dead" (0. B. G. V., p, 237): On Dirphys' wrinkled side we fell; And where the Narrow Waters drift

Our countrymen, to mark us well. Raised up this cairn, their gift,

A gift deserved; for youth is sweet. And youth we gave, nor turned away,

Though sharp the storm of battle beat That darkened all our day.

In the same manner, and perhaps more bitter, Housman's fallen

soldiers call out from the grave and ask to be remembered

11

in the poem, "Here dead lie we because we did not choose"

(C. P., p. 197):

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.

The ironic paradox in these examples is inescapable and

powerful in its implication. As well as being tragically

pathetic, it is gloriously noble that man must often die in

the sweetness of youth. Tyrtaeus, in "How Can Man Die

Better" (0, B. G, V., p. 181), stresses that it is a "foul

reproach" for an old man to die in battle: "Naked he lies

where youth were better lying—/ sweet-flow'rd youth, that

nothing misbecomes" (11. 27-28). Housman's "To an Athlete

Dying Young" (C.. P., p. 32) conveys a similar sentiment.

The poem suggests that it is much better for man to die at

the prime of youthful achievement:

Smart lad, to slip betimes away From fields where glory does not stay And early though the laurel grows It withers quicker than the rose. (11. 9-12)

In words that could just as well have been Housman*s,

Archilochus summarizes the early elegiac view of how man

should approach life in a maxim that affords man a kind of

stoic dignity while expressing the need for a keen awareness

of life's irony: "Take you joy when life is joyful, and in

sorrow do not mind/ Overmuch, but know what ups and downs

belong to humankind" (0, B. G. V., p. 186). Housman is

perhaps more cautious, but in agreement with Archilochus

12

v;hen he writes these lines in "Terence this is Stupid Stuff"

(C. P., p. 89):

Therefore, since the world has still Much good, but much less good than ill. And while the sun and moon endure Luck's a chance, but trouble's sure, I'd face it as a wise man would. And train for ill and not for good. (11. 43-48)

The classical nature of Housman's irony is not

limited to similarities found in the pastoral and elegiac

traditions, Aristotle, Cicero, and Longinus recognized

that irony and related ironic devices could be used for

rhetorical effectiveness. The first significant attempt

to define irony is foimd in the writings of Aristotle. In a

discussion of the meanings and history of irony, G, G,

Sedgewick writes:

In fact, it was Aristotle who first made the precise formulation of irony as 'a pretense tending towards the under-side' of the truth. . . . He very sharply defines eironeia in that way in the Nicomachean Ethics, setting it off against alazoneia which is a pretense tending toward exaggeration. . . . This distinction as a part of his discussion of the Mean: Truth, he says, lies between these two opposites; 'the Middle Man is, in a general way, the truthful man, and the Mean is the Truth.' Let me repeat, it is important, at least historically, to remember that, although the notion of irony as understatement—a mere rhetorical figure—derives from Aristotle, it was not the center of his idea of eironeia. In the Ethics, eironeia is a pervasive mode of behavior, a constant pretense of self-depression—of which understatement is only one manifestation.17

Sedgewick also notes that the "actual trick of imderstate-

ment, by whatever name it might go, was a form of speech

to which the Greek mind, hating excess as it did, naturally

tended,"^^

13

In De Oratore (II, Ixvii. 269), Cicero comes nearer

to a purely rhetorical definition of irony, and it is sig­

nificant that his dissimulatio does not have the abusive

connotation of Aristotle's eironia:

Irony too gives pleasure, when your words differ from your thoughts, . . , when the whole tenor of your speech shows you to be solemnly jesting, what you think differing continuously from what you say.-""

Cicero, in the same work, cites Africanus' understatement

as an example of this irony:

A jest very closely resembles this ironical type when something disgraceful is called by an honorable epithet, as happened when Africanus as censor removed from his tribe that centurian who failed to appear at the battle fought under Paulus, though the defaulter pleaded that he had stayed in camp on guard, and sought to know why he was degraded by the censor: 'I am no lover of the over-cautious,' was the answer of Africanus.20

Although Longinus, in A Treatise Concerning

Sublimity, does not discuss irony as such, he does discuss

the use of figures or devices which contribute to sublim­

ity. At the foundation of his remarks on rhetorical

figures is the same tendency toward simplicity and lack of

excess that Thomson finds in the Greek ironic spirit and

that Sedgewick finds in the Greek use of understatement.

Longinus writes: "A figure is best, when the fact that

21 it is a figure goes unnoticed." This same restraint is

the key to the powerful effect that Housman achieves

through the use of ironic devices so subtle as to be

hardly noticed. Longinus uses the example of hyperbole as

a figure which requires this restraint and writes:

14

We ought to know exactly how far each should go, for sometimes to advance beyond these limits destroys the hyperbole. . . . Possibly then the best hyperboles, as we said above in speaking of figures are those which are not noticed as hyperboles at all. This result is obtained when they are uttered in a strong outburst of feeling, and in harmony with a certain grandeur in the crisis described.22

As an example, he cites the passage in Herodotus about the

men of Thermopylae: "On this spot . . . while defending

themselves with daggers, that is, those who still had.them

left, and also with hands and with teeth, they were buried

alive under the missiles of the barbarians." - T. R. Henn

has written in Longinus and English Criticism that the

hyperbole "closest of all to Longinus' heart would be the

last verse of A. E, Housman's The Oracles," a remark which,

24 in itself, is a tribute to Housman's classical manner.

Longinus also discusses a "question-and-answer"

figure which Housman uses for ironic effect:

Is it not true that, by the very form which this figure takes, our orator gives intensity to his language and makes it much more effective and vehement? . . . The thing put simply would be inadequate: as it is, the rush and swift return of question and answer, and the meeting of his own difficulty as if it came from another, make the words not only more sublime by his use of the figure, but actually more convincing, . . . Question and answer carried on with a man's self reproduce the spontaneity of passion. Much as those who are questioned by others, when spurred by the plain truth, so it is with the figure of question and answer; it draws the hearer off till he thinks that each point in the inquiry has been raised and put into words without preparation, and so imposes upon him.25

This "question-and-answer" figure is particularly powerful

in Housman's "Crossing alone the nighted ferry" (C. P., p.

182) .

15

In a letter answering inquiries about A Shropshire

Lad> Housman wrote: "I suppose that my classical training

has been of some use to me in furnishing good models, and

making me fastidious, and telling me what to leave out."^

In view of the similarities between Housman's irony and the

irony of the classical writers, and in view of Housman's

thorough acquaintance with classical literature, it seems

reasonable to suggest that his irony is a continuation of

the classical tradition of irony rather than solely a

pessimistic reaction of despair brought about by the

scientific revolution and rise of evolutionary thought in

the nineteenth century. His irony is old in the classical

sense, but as Lawrence Durrell has suggested, Housman's

poetry was the "work of an ironist during a period when

27

sentimental melancholy was the vogue." ' Housman's irony

is his own, but it is an irony fashioned and tempered with

the spirit of classical simplicity and restraint. It

achieves what Housman defined as the function of poetry in

the Leslie Stephen Lecture for 1933: "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.

This might also be seen as the function of irony in

Housman*s poetry, and it is this classically tempered irony

that makes his poetry succeed.

CHAPTER II

TYPES OF IRONY IN HOUSMAN'S POETRY

In the appraisal of the nature of Housman's irony

in Chapter I, I suggested that his use of irony is poetically

effective because it continues in the tradition of classical

irony and helps to achieve what he considered to be the

peculiar function of poetry. A systematic study of his

poems reveals the use of various kinds or types of irony to

impress upon the reader's sense those corresponding emotions

which he felt as a poet. David Worcester writes in The Art

of Satire: "The distinction between the world of the

uninitiate, common souls and the select few who share some

special knowledge underlies every form of irony." It is

such a distinction that supplies Housman's poetry with an

irony at once unified and rich with variety of form. The

various types of irony can be classified according to the

way each functions. There are instances where traditional

terminology such as "verbal irony" or "irony of manner" are

too general to be of much use. In these instances, more

specific and perhaps less conventional terms will be used

in order to get at the essence of the types of irony func­

tioning in a particular poem or group of poems.

Dramatic Irony

There are several elements which provide Housman's

poems with a dramatic irony which, according to Worcester,

16

17

"has always been an important element in literature; indeed

it is present in almost every plot, just as in life it is

possible to take an ironical view of any situation whatsoever,

given the power of detachment and the superior information."

The act of discovery is one contributing element. Whether

Housman's personae assume the roles of soldier, lover, naive

country lad, or criminal, each has discovered or can be

expected to discover a portion of truth which he has not

known previously and for which he must pay considerable

expense in the hard currency of painful initiation. John

Stevenson writes:

We have only to turn to the poetry, to point out specific situations, to perceive that the "lad" of the poems, whether soldier, lover, or sinner, is himself a discoverer. Almost always Housman presents him at the moment when reality is made apparent, forever after which he must, like Mithridates, "sample all the killing store," and forever after which he knows that "happiness" and "pleasure" are illusions, that life, while perhaps not a sham, is something of a hosix, and that meaning comes only through struggle.3

Founded on the mechanics of discovery, much of Housman's

dramatic irony is achieved by means of a simple, but subtle

formula which plays on the tension between one persona and

another, or between a persona and the reader (in dramatic

terminology, protagonist and spectator). This tension

develops from disproportionate states of enlightenment, emd

the balance is not always tipped in a single direction.

Sometimes the persona has come to a kind of secret knowledge

which the reader discovers about himself as the poem unfolds ,

18

In other instances, the reader secretly knows, but has chosen

to ignore, what the persona discovers in the poem and finds

that this knov/ledge can no longer be rationalized away.

The irony is achieved when the reader or spectator sees

himself mirrored in the persona and realizes that both of

them share a common dileimna, the actual experience of which

is determined only by the whim of circumstance.

Often, the power with which the irony strikes is

heightened by the degree in which either the reader or the

persona is suspended in an aura of disbelief before the trap

is sprimg and the victim, in a state of self-implication,

becomes aware of the real message of the poem. The idyllic

beauty of the pastoral Shropshire setting and the frequent

naivete of Housman's characters are fictional devices which

contribute an atmosphere of unreality that keeps the reader

in a comfortable state of disbelief as though he were

reading or hearing a fairy tale. Occasionally, Housman

makes use of the macabre and fantastic, forcing the reader

to travel an even greater distance between the disparate

worlds of Shropshire and reality.

"Along the field as we came by" is a poem in which

4 these various elements are used for ironic effect. In the

opening lines, Housman sets up a fictional dramatic situa­

tion:

Along the field as we came by A year ago, my love and I, The aspen over stile and stone Was talking to itself alone. (11. 1-4)

19

Since one can hardly be expected to accept a talking aspen

as a purveyor of reality, there seems to be little risk in

playing the game to find out what the aspen is saying to

itself,-' In this instance, the aspen has a secret knowledge

which both the persona and reader must overhear, i.e., that

"'she shall lie with earth above,/ And he [the persona]

beside another love'" (11. 9-10), At this point in the poem,

the aspen's words are still simply conjecture. The first

lines of the second stanza, however, leave us no choice but

to accept the prophecy of the aspen as truth: "And sure

enough beneath the tree/ There walks another love with me"

(11. 11-12). The reader and persona must now accept the

fact that death can abruptly separate two lovers and sever

their love so completely and finally that the partner who

remains alive can soon forget and forsake the one who lies

"with earth above," Yet, at this stage in the poem's

development, there is nothing in the protagonist's narration

that suggests a sense of loss or sorrow. He has simply lost

one love and found another. The last eight lines, in a

sudden but almost imperceptible change of tone, wrench a

chilling truth out of the world of fantasy as the persona

hears the whispering leaves of the aspen once again:

And overhead the aspen heaves Its rainy-sounding silver leaves; And I spell nothing in their stir. But now perhaps they speak to her. And plain for her to understand They talk about a time at hand When I shall sleep with clover clad. And she beside another lad. (11. 13-20)

20

Ironically, this second prophecy of the aspen is clearly

born in the mind of the persona, and the message has a very

personal implication which becomes the crux of his self-

discovery. He may die, and there is something expressly

sinister about this possibility because the aspen and his

new love may know when he will die, and this is a secret

he cannot know.

The final message strikes suddenly and powerfully,

but it is not stated in the text of the poem. Housman

relies upon irony to suggest the sobering thought which both

persona and reader must conclude in their own minds. The

effect is that of a final, phantom stanza—a stanza which

has no impression on paper yet indelibly impresses a

peculiar emotional awareness on the mind of the spectator

as he identifies with the protagonist and realizes that

sudden reversal in the fortimes of the hero which Aristotle

attributed to all true tragedy. The protagonist, a country

lad with the exuberance and innocence of youth, becomes

aware of his own personal vulnerability to a death which

touches whom it will with no concern for even the strongest

of earthly commitments. The reader has no choice but to

nod in affirmation and agree that he, too, shares the same

vulnerability.

The character of the aspen deserves close attention

because it contributes dramatic irony by giving the poem a

purposefully misleading aura of fantasy and by functioning

1

21

as a keenly experienced and perceptive spokesman for the

particular message of the poem. The trunk of the aspen,

with its light colored bark, has long been a traditional

carving place for lovers' initials; and the interest which

the aspen displays in the poem for lovers that "kiss and

pass" seems quite appropriate.' There are also other quali­

ties about the aspen which make it a qualified spokesman

for this poem. It is difficult to walk among aspens without

feeling that someone or some other presence is watching.

The characteristic eye-shaped markings on the bark of the

tree seem to stare in every direction with all-knowing

sureness. Perhaps more significant is the fact that the

aspen can speak with assurance about death. Because it

is often found in cemeteries, one might expect it to

share the same familiarity with death that Housman attributes

to the olive tree of "The Olive" (C. P., p, 240) and the

palm tree of one of his manuscript fragments (M, P,, p, 34).

There is still another reason why the aspen, a

member of the poplar family, might presume a knowledge of

death, particularly the kind of death represented in this

poem—a death that would take young lovers in the prime of

life. The aspen is a comparatively fast growing tree

which thrives on direct sunlight. It grows from suckers

and therefore welcomes the brilliant sunshine that stifles

the seedlings of other kinds of trees. As the youthful

aspen grows, it provides a canopy of leafy branches which

1

22

offers the shade needed for other kinds of trees to

accelerate their growth. In a brief matter of time, the

aspen is overtaken by the other varieties of trees, deprived

of the direct sunlight, and is left to die an untimely

death in the shade of their branches.

A final quality gives the aspen the physical ability

to speak. Long leafstalks cause its broad leaves to tremble

and rustle. In the lightest breeze it whispers and sighs

to those who will hear, and so the aspen is a perfectly

drawn character for sharing secrets. Housman's use of the

aspen as a dramatic character is itself a source of irony,

for on the surface, the tree appears to be unimportant; yet

what better spokesman for the ironies of love and death

could be found?

"Is my team ploughing" (C. P., pp. 42-43) is another

of Housman's poems that is rich in dramatic irony. In

several ways the poem is similar to "Along the field as we

came by," The same disproportionate states of enlightenment

are present, the persona knowing much less than the character

to which he addresses his questions. The same aura of

fantasy is achieved through Housman's use of a character

who calls out from the grave, and just as in "Along the

field as we came by," the ironic message of the poem is

suggested indirectly in the final lines, leaving the chilling

conclusion to be worked out in the minds of the persona and

reader. Along with the similarities, however, there are

23

some differences between the two poems which give the

dramatic irony in "Is my team ploughing" a classical

quality. In a manner similar to that of classical Greek

tragedy, the spectator or reader knows more than the

poem's protagonist, because he becomes increasingly aware

as the poem progresses that the persona is rushing

unknowingly toward a painful discovery. The persona*s

motive appears to be a search for peace of mind, and as he

pursues his investigation it becomes apparent that he is

behaving in a way that is both unwise and quite inappro­

priate. The final ironic effect is achieved when the

reader sees clearly that there is an obvious difference

between what the persona imderstands about his concerned

curiosity and what the poem suggests about such concern

in the light of his situation.

The persona*s first questions deal with somewhat

mundane topics which are not difficult for the addressee

to answer, but once the subject turns from ploughing and

football to the girl that both characters share, the answer

is at once cautioning and evasive: "Your girl is well

contented,/ Be still, my lad, and sleep" (11, 23-24), The

persona blindly refuses to "be still" and asks a final

question which is doubly ironical because of its ambiguity:

'Is my friend hearty, Now I am thin and pine.

And has he found to sleep in A better bed than mine?* (11. 25-28)

24

Irony is present whether the persona is referring to his

bed of earth, or whether he intends "bed" to mean the one

he share with his girl before his death. In the first

instance, the obvious smswer is that any bed is better

than the grave. In the latter context, the irony is

apparent after the addressee delivers the coup de grSce:

"I cheer a dead man*s sweetheart,/ Never ask me whose"

(11. 31-32). The element of mercy makes the friend*s

final answer approach ridicule. In the case of either

meaning for "bed," the naive idealism of the persona

ceases to be palatable, and he becomes a kind of tragic

buffoon. The dramatic aspect of the irony in his behav­

ior can be more fully appreciated when his attitude is

contrasted with that of the persona of "Stone, steel,

dominions pass" (C.. P., p. 183), where neither idealism

nor naivete can be seen in the narrator*s words:

Stone, steel, dominions pass. Faith too, no wonder;

So leave alone the grass That I am under.

All knots that lovers tie Are tied to sever.

Here shall your sweetheart lie,

Untrue for ever.

The total irony of "Is my team ploughing" comes

from the contrived comparison of the situations of charac­

ters for dramatic and ironic effects, and in this sense,

the poem is similar to Thomas Hardy's "Ah, Are You Digging

on My Grave?" The characters in "Is my team ploughing"

25

possess the one basic difference that is all-important in

Housman*s poetry—the difference between life and death.

The same contrast in situation provides the irony in "This

time of year a twelvemonth past" (C. P,, p, 40), but in

this poem Housman states a case for the character who

remains alive and lies "as lads would choose," The lad

who proves inferior by all other counts is much superior

to the once superior lad who breathes no more:

The better man she walks with still. Though now 'tis not with Fred:

A lad that lives and has his will Is worth a dozen dead, (11. 9-12)

Irony of Circumstance

Irony of circumstance (irony of events) can be seen

as a specific form of dramatic irony or as a type of irony g

often contributing to the total effect of dramatic irony.

In application to Housman*s poetry, the term will be used

to delineate the type of irony which occurs when the persona,

though not involved in a comparison of situations for ironic

effect, discovers that fate or circumstance has modified his

own situation so that the outcome is contrary to his original

expectations. Irony of circumstance has some of the same

elements as dramatic irony, such as the act of discovery

(Aristotle's oeripety) and disproportionate states of

enlightenment; but the act of discovery is reached by the

persona without the direct aid of another character, and the

disproportionate states of enlightenment are fused into the

26

disparity between the persona*s knowledge of expectation

and the superior knowledge that comes to him as he discovers

the true consequence of his situation after circumstance

has altered his plans.

The range of the irony of circumstance in Housman's

poetry covers the span between the general irony of the

human condition (in which man discovers that he is an

impermanent, evanescent being, subject to mutability and

death of body and soul even as his milieu displays a

contrasting quality of permanence) and specific instances

of irony in which a particular individual finds himself

a victim of fate. In the general application of this

irony to the ills of mankind, it is helpful to recall

Housman's pessimistic evaluation of the state of man: "It

looks to me as if the state of mankind always had been and

always would be a state of just tolerable discomfort"

(see Chapter I, p, 7). "When Adam walked in Eden young"

(C. P., p. 218) envisions a much better world for man than

the one man has inherited:

When Adam walked in Eden young Happy, 'tis writ, was he.

While high the fruit of knowledge hung Unbitten on the tree, (11. 1-4)

Yet, all that remains of the expectations of Eden is a

life riddled with troubles and death:

And now my feet are tired of rest And here they will not stay And the soul fevers in my breast And aches to be away. (11, 9-12)

27

Irony of circumstance dates back to the fall of man in

Eden, and Housman is content, for the most part, to spend

his time elaborating on the sorry consequences; but on

occasion, he hints at the existence of some design or

governing force which has somehow fashioned the circum­

stances through which mankind fell from innocence, and by

which mankind continues to suffer through the ages. In

"The chestnut casts his flambeaux, and the flowers"

(C. P., p. 107), he writes:

We for a certainty are not the first Have sat in taverns while the tempest hurled

Their hopeful plans to emptiness, and cursed Whatever brute and blackguard made the world.

(11. 9-12)

An example of such manipulated circumstance is found in

"Oh who is that young sinner with the handcuffs on his

wrists?" (C. P., p. 233):

Oh who is that young sinner with the handcuffs on his wrists?

And what has he been after that they groan and shake their fists?

And wherefore is he wearing such a conscience-stricken air?

Oh they're taking him to prison for the colour of his

hair. (11. 1-4)

It is indeed ironic that a man be punished for something as

removed from his own control as the color of his hair, but

note how the irony is heightened in the final climactic line

of the poem: "He can curse the God that made him for the

colour of his hair," Since Housman rarely blames a super­

natural force for the designs of circumstance, it seems

most likely that he does so in these two poems to emphasize

28

how little control man really has over his own fate, rather

than to view circumstance as such a coordinated working

together of everything in the universe as Thomas Hardy's

"Imminent Will." In these two examples, curses of God can

be seen as a rhetorical device used to heighten the irony

of circumstance (see Chapter III, p,59 ) rather than as a

philosophical stance.

In spite of on whom the blame is placed, "The chestnut

casts his flambeaux, and the flowers" (C. P., p. 107)

stresses that "our only portion is the estate of man" (1. 19).

Man is trapped in a continuous cycle of birth and death

that would seem to promise the same sort of permanence found

in the renewal of life brought with the change of the seasons

in the natural world, but ironically, although man is

replenished as a species, each individual can live only once.

Such a discovery is made by the persona of "Yon flakes that

fret the eastern sky" (C. P., p. 184):^

Yon flakes that fret the eastern sky Lead back my day of birth;

The far, wide-wandered hour when I Came crying upon earth.

Then came I crying, and to-day. With heavier cause to plain.

Depart I into death away.

Not to be born again.

In Housman's poetry, there is no such phenomenon as

good fortune. Luck rarely comes, and when it does, it comes

in degrees of bad as the persona suggests in "Now dreary

dawns the eastern light" {C_. P,, p. 131) i

29

Little is the luck I've had. And oh, 'tis comfort small

To think that many another lad Has had no luck at all. (11. 5-8)

The same irony of circumstance is present in the resigned

words of the narrator in "'Tis five years since, 'An end,*

said I" (C. P., p, 230):

*Tis five years since, 'An end,* said I, 'I'll march no further, time to die. All's lost; no worse has heaven to give.* Worse it has given, and yet I live,

I shall not die to-day, no fear: I shall live yet for many a year. And see worse ills and worse again. And die of age and not of pain.10 (ll. 1-8)

Also implicit in Housman*s verse is the observation that

the "estate of man" cannot be changed. "Stars, I have seen

them fall" (C. P., p. 166) implies that all of the influences

working for good cannot change the world's ills:

Stars, I have seen them fall. But when they drop and die

No star is lost at all From the star-sown sky.

The toil of all that be Helps not the primal fault;

It rains into the sea.

And still the sea is salt.

Irony of circumstance is an important element in

those poems that deal with the generally sorry state of

mankind, and it is no less important in the poems which

reflect Housman's search for an acceptable way to live in

such a world. He does not present a clear and consistent

solution for the ills of mankind; indeed, his own beliefs

seem to waver from poem to poem, and he has been criticized

II

30

for this supposed inconsistency.-^^ Perhaps the question

should be raised as to whether a single, pseudo-simplistic

solution would be credible or even desirable in view of

the broad spectrum of the human ills presented in his

poetry. I see a consistency in Housman*s flexibility of

approach. His poetry becomes more universal in the sense

that there are no set limits on the ways each man may attempt

to solve the dilemmas imposed on him by circumstance. Even

if Housman implies that no solution is really successful,

his approaches are numerous enough to offer some consolation

to those looking for answers to the problems he poses. In

a letter to Katherine Symons, he writes: "I do not know

that I can do better than send you some verses that I wrote

many years ago; because the essential business of poetry,

as it has been said, is to harmonise the sadness of the

13 universe." - It is not surprising to find Housman saying

in the introductory stanzas to More Poems (C, £., p. 155):

They say my verse is sad: no wonder Its narrow measure spans

Tears of eternity, and sorrow Not mine, but man's.

This is for all ill-treated fellows Unborn and unbegot,

For them to read when they're in trouble And I, am not .14

Housman's answers to the dilemmas posed by the

human condition are varied, but universal enough to appeal

to a broad segment of humanity made up of individuals who,

in their needs and preferences, are themselves as varied.

31

With each possible way of meeting the problems of life and

death in his poems, there is an underlying statement of

circumstantial irony which suggests that perhaps there is no

true cure available. Such a statement sets the ironic tone

of "To stand up straight and tread the turning mill" (C. P.,

p, 186):

To stand up straight and tread the turning mill. To lie flat and know nothing and be still. Are the two trades of man; and which is worse '

I know not, but I know that both are ill.

For those individuals who are keenly sensitive, think­

ing about the ironies of circumstance is much too painful to

endure, and for this reason, the practice should be avoided

at all costs, ^ "Could man be drunk for ever" (C. P., p. 109)

suggests that escape through intoxication or passionate

involvement is preferable to such inward meditation:

Could man be drunk for ever With liquor, love, or fights.

Lief should I rouse at morning 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,

"Think no more, lad; laugh, be jolly" (C, P,, p, 73) suggests

escape through wild abandonment and merrymaking:

Think no more, lad; laugh, be jolly: Why should men make haste to die?

Empty heads and tongues a-talking Make the rough road easy walking, And the feather pate of folly Bears the falling sky.

Oh, 'tis jesting, dancing, drinking Spins the heavy world around.

f

32

If young hearts were not so clever. Oh, they would be young for ever: Think no more; 'tis only thinking Lays lads underground.

Such is the argument of the character who criticizes the

melancholy poetry of Terence in "Terence, this is stupid

stuff" (C. P,, pp. 88-90):

Pretty friendship 'tis to rhyme Your friends to death before their time Moping melancholy mad: Come, pipe a tune to dance to, lad,'

(11, 11-14)

Terence's answer, however, offers an antithetical alterna­

tive: Ale, man, ale's the stuff to drink For fellows who fsid it hurts to think: Look into the pewter pot To see the world as the world's not. And faith, 'tis pleasant till 'tis past: The mischief is that 'twill not last.

Therefore, since the world has still Much good, but much less good than ill. And while the sun and moon endure Luck's a chance, but trouble's sure, I'd face it as a wise man would. And train for ill and not for good.

(11. 23-28, 43-48)

For those who would be strong of heart, the solution demands

thinking; and the primary purpose of poetry, according to

Terence, is not only to foster escape, but also to offer

consolation by pointing out the ill-fortime in life before

it comes. Terence contends:

'Tis true the stuff I bring for sale Is not so brisk a brew as ale:

33

But take it: if the smack is sour. The better for the embittered hour; It should do good to heart and head When your soul is in my soul's stead; And I will friend you, if I may. In the dark and cloudy day. (11. 49-50, 53-58)

If one is prepared for the worst, and if he becomes the

victim of circumstance, he will be able to say, with some

measure of consolation, what the persona of "I to my perils"

(S.» £• > p. 165) is able to say:

The thoughts of others Were light and fleeting. Of lovers' meeting

Or luck or fame. Mine were of trouble. And mine were steady; So I was ready

When trouble came, (11, 9-l6)

Housman, then, suggests two general ways of dealing

with the ills of fate. One may employ some means of escape,

or one may face up to the worst that may happen, and like

Mithridates, in "Terence, this is stupid stuff" (C. P.,

p, 90), gather "all that springs to birth/ From the many-

venomed earth" (11, 63-64), It is from these points of

view that Housman's characters choose their own particular

ways of dealing with the ironies of circumstance. The

persona of "Ho, everyone that thirsteth" (C. P., p. 181)

proclaims that living to the fullest possible extent is an

effective solution:

It shall not last for ever. No more than earth and skies;

But he that drinks in season Shall live before he dies.

w

34

June suns, you cannot store them To warm the winter's cold.

The lad that hopes for heaven Shall fill his mouth with mould.

(11. 9-16)

The spokesman in "You smile upon your friend to-day"

(C. P., p. 83) admonishes man to seize the moment while it

can be had:

'Tis late to hearken, late to smile. But better late than never:

I shall have lived a little while Before I die for ever, (11. 5-8)

Finally, in the event that the blows of circumstance are

so overbearing and painful that they can be neither ignored

nor stoically accepted, Housman suggests suicide as an

alternative in "If it chance your eye offend you" (C_. P.,

p, 68):

If it chance your eye offend you. Pluck it out, lad, and be sound:

'Twill hurt, but here are salves to friend you. And many a balsam grows on ground.

And if your hand or foot offend you. Cut it off, lad, and be whole;

But play the man, stand up and end you.

When your sickness is your soul.

Although Housman employs irony of circumstance in

his poetry to point up many more problems than he pretends

to solve, and although his solutions, when they do appear,

are often inconsistent with each other and seem feeble at

best, it is not clear to me why this should be otherwise.

That he would cast doubt on the prospects of a true panacea

certainly serves to strengthen his stance as an ironist,

and, as I have suggested, his poetry has a more universal

f

35

application that stems from a resourcefulness not unlike

the resourcefulness of the early Greek poets who provided

their listeners with a variety of models and strategies for

facing life's obstacles and troubles. Housman seems to say

that the ironies and pitfalls of circumstance are so varied

and certain that any staving initiative should not be untried,

and if all fail, there is some small consolation in knowing

that all men are victims of fate's calling.

Irony of Consolation

There is another kind of consolation in Housman's

poetry quite different from that inherent in the poems

which point out the imiversality of circumstantial

misfortune. The difference lies in the fact that what is

often implied to be consolation is really no consolation

at all, or only a grim sort of false consolation. Irony

of consolation will be used as a term for the ironic effect

achieved when a poem implies solace and manifests affliction.

"The night is freezing fast" (C, P,, p, 121) is a prime

example of such a poem. The persona, in the growing cold

of the night, recalls past winterfalls and remembers one

particular character trait of a deceased friend:

The night is freezing fast. To-morrow comes December; And winterfalls of old

Are with me from the past; And chiefly I remember

How Dick would hate the cold. (11. 1-6)

36

In the second stanza, the persona makes an assessment of

his friend's present condition and uses the language and

tone that would normally be used in a consoling after­

thought—an afterthought which one might expect to make

amends for the cold. The consolation in an ironic sense

is a permanent one, lasting from year to year, season to

season, "fall, winter, fall." Resourcefully, Dick, with a

prompt "hand and headpiece clever,/ Has woven a winter

robe." At this point in the poem's development, Dick all

but appears to have found a way to conquer the cold he

hated so much; but in the final three lines, Housman

characteristically supplies the irony of consolation:

And [Dick has] made of earth and sea His overcoat for ever. And wears the turning globe,

Dick's winter robe and overcoat is woven not of fine wool

or animal fur; ironically, it is dirt-cheap, a weave of

cold damp earth and chilly sea. With an overcoat as massive

as the "turning globe," it is exceedingly ironical that

Dick can find no warmth. Instead, he must endure the cold

he hates for as long as the turning globe—an overcoat of

superior lasting quality—remains. The line: "Prompt

hand and headpiece clever" takes on new meaning and makes

Dick's plight appear almost ridiculous to the point of

being humorous; but there is no consolation, either for

Dick or for the rest of mankind. The overcoat of earth and

2)^ i

37

sea is bequeathed to all—a gift that cannot be turned down,

even by those who hate the cold.

The persona of "He looked at me with eyes I thought"

(C. P., p. 202) is also reminded of a respected and deceased

friend:

He looked at me with eyes I thought I was not like to find.

The voice he begged for pence with brought Another man to mind. (11, 1-4)

The beggar is given the gift of a half-crown in memory of

the persona's friend:

Oh no, lad, never touch your cap; It is not my half-crown:

You have it from a better chap

That long ago lay down. (11. 5-8)

The closing stanza reveals an irony of consolation which

grows out of the inequitable resting place that fate has

given the remembered companion. The beggar is sent on an

ironic pilgrimage: "Turn east and over Thames to Kent/

And come to the sea's brim," smd the final lines reveal that

the grave has no monument, no shrine, not even a marker:

"And find his everlasting tent/ And touch your cap to him,"

Like Dick, in "The night is freezing fast," the friend has

inherited an eternal shelter hardly fitting for a "better

chap" and far less than the heavenly reward traditional

Christian consolation would provide,

"Illic Jacet" (C, P,, p, 101) has an elegiac tone as

Housman searches for consolation in the death of a young

soldier:

38

Oh hard is the bed they have made him. And common the blanket and cheap;

But there will he lie as they laid him: Where else could you trust him to sleep?

To sleep when the bugle is crying And cravens have heard and are brave.

When mothers and sweethearts are sighing And lads are in love with the grave. (11. 1-8)

Is it consoling that in a war where even cowards respond

to the bugle call with bravery, the young fighter will

fight no more, but "lie as they laid him" in the grave

where he can be trusted to sleep? The irony of consolation

is more subtle in this poem, and it does not depend as much

upon what is said as it depends upon Housman's apparent

mood. There can be only a bitter, ironic solace in knowing

that the lad will stay buried where

Oh, dark is the chamber and lonely. And lights and companions depart;

But lief will he lose them and only Behold the desire of his heart.

And low is the roof, but it covers A sleeper content to repose;

And far from his friends and lovers He lies with the sweetheart he chose,

(11, 9-16)

The consoling tone and assurances that the dead soldier is

contented are simply not conveyed effectively enough to off­

set the Stygian description of death and the cruelty of war,

A similar contrast between tone and mood brings about

an irony of consolation in "As I gird on for fighting" (C, P.,

p. 99). The persona's tone is one of assurance and hope as

he considers a subject which has the potential of providing

39

him with comfort as he gets ready to fight:

Think I, the round v7orld over. What golden lads are low

With hurts not mine to mourn for And shames I shall not know.

What evil luck soever For me remains in store,

'Tis sure much finer fellows Have fared much worse before, (11, 5-12)

The potential comfort, however, is betrayed as a false conso­

lation in the last stanza:

So here are things to think on That ought to make me brave.

As I strap on for fighting

My sword that will not save, (11, 13-16)

The persona's mood becomes one of doubt and resignation.

Although this mood is not articulated in the text of the poem,

it is strongly implied by Housman's use of the word "ought"

and by the lad's admission of fear that his own sword will

not save him from death.

In "When Israel out of Egypt came" (C. P., p. 158),

Housman contrasts the promised land of Israel with the inher­

itance granted to the persona:

Ascended is the cloudy flame. The mount of thunder dumb;

The tokens that to Israel came. To me they have not come.

I see the country far away Where I shall never stand;

The heart goes where no footstep may Into the promised land. (11. 13-16)

Although the persona expresses an air of disappointment, his

tone holds an assurance that there is a just reward for him

40

in the scheme of things. Ironically, his consolation prize

is no prize at all:

But I will go where they are hid That never were begot.

To my inheritance amid The nation that is not.

When mixed with me the sandstorms drift And nerve and thew and brain

Are ashes for the air to lift

And lightly shower again. (11. 25-32)

The ironies of consolation in the above examples have

resulted from situations in which the victims have not been

afforded those comforting favors that would traditionally be

considered befitting and appropriate. "Bring, in this time­

less grave to throw" {C_, P., p. 69) draws its irony by

suggesting that the appropriate tokens of consolation are of

no use to the dead. The persona, therefore, admonishes

visitors not to bring cypress, yew, rosemary, willows, or

"spray that ever buds in spring." He says, instead:

—Oh, bring from hill and stream and plain Whatever will not flower again. To give him comfort: he and those Shall bide eternal bedfellows Where low upon the couch he lies

Whence he never shall arise, (11. 17-22)

There is no mistaking the message implied by the poem. There

is no consolation for the dead, and if there were, it could

not be conveyed with flowers "bright with rime/ And sparkling

to the cruel clime," Perhaps most appropriate would be the

stinging nettle of "With seed the sowers scatter" (C, P,,

p, 191):^'^

41

The stinging-nettle only Will still be sure to stand:

The numberless, the lonely. The thronger of the land. The leaf that hurts the hand.

That thrives, come sun, come showers; Blow east, blow west, it springs;

It peoples town, and towers About the courts of Kings, And touch it and it stings, (11, 11-20)

It is the reversal of the traditional and appropriate for a

discordant substitute that gives the irony of consolation in

"Bring, in this timeless grave to throw" a novel twist, but

the anticipated effect is still achieved—a consolation is

promised and never delivered.

Irony of Character

The principle of reversal is also instrumental in

irony of character. This type of irony occurs in Housman's

poetry when an individual's true character is discovered to 18

be in contrast with his appearance or manner, but it is not

limited just to the human characters in his poems, because he

often reverses the traditional characterization of other phe­

nomena for ironic effects. An example of the latter case can

be found in "Bredon Hill" (C. P,, p. 35). The traditional

character of the church bells is developed early in the poem:

In summertime on Bredon The bells they sound so clear;

Round both the shires they ring them In steeples far and near, A happy noise to hear, (11. 1-5)

As a country lad and his lover lie on Bredon Hill, the bells

42

sound their traditional message to her: "*Come all to

church, good people;/ Good people, come and pray,*"

Neither of them find it necessary to go to church, but the

lad answers:

*0h, peal upon our wedding. And we will hear the chime. And come to church in time,*

(11. 18-20)

With winter*s coming, the girl dies, and the country lad

laments:

They tolled the one bell only. Groom there was none to see.

The mourners followed after. And so to church went she, And would not wait for me. (11. 26-30)

In the final stanza, Housman reverses the traditional

message of the bells as their pealing falls on the ears of

the lonely lad and calls him to a death that is sure to come:

The bells they sound on Bredon And still the steeples hum,

*Come all to church, good people,'— Oh, noisy bells, be dumb; I hear you, I will come.

Another instance of irony of character in which

human characters are not involved occurs in "The sigh that

heaves the grasses" (C. P., p. 130). The poem presupposes

a traditional belief in the pathetic fallacy as is often

foiind in Housman*s poetry. He reverses the belief that

nature holds a sympathy for man and shares in the grief

that comes with his death:

The diamond tears adorning Thy low mound on the lea,

'3

Those are the tears of morning.

That weeps, but not for thee. (11. 5-8)

There are three poems which reverse the traditional

view of the beneficent God and Christ that would willingly

sacrifice to save mankind. "For My Funeral" (C. P., p. 210)

has the traditional form of Christian graveside rites, prais­

ing God and celebrating the return to Him as the Father of

man. Housman*s portrayal of God, however, is not one of the

beneficent creator who welcomes the souls of all those who do

His will to prepared mansions in Heaven. Instead, Housman

portrays a god who sends all men away from his mansion to

roam abroad, and then calls them back, not to reward them in

heavenly mansions, but to "shelter them from sunshine" in

"eternal shade." Housman's dead do not celebrate eternal

life, because after death, they find no life at all:

We now to peace and darkness And earth and thee restore

Thy creature that thou madest And wilt cast forth no more. (11. 9-12)

The traditional character of Christ is brought to question in

"Easter Hymn" (C. P., p. 157). Housman allows Christ two

alternatives, both of which express serious doubt in the

traditional tenets of Christian redemption. The first bids

Christ to "sleep well and see no morning" if the resurrection

should prove false, because his death has been in vain: , . . behold how dark and bright

Ascends in smoke and fire by day and night The hate you died to quench and could but fan.

(11. 3-5)

44

The second alternative bids Christ to "bow hither out of

heaven and see and save" if

At the right hand of majesty on high You sit, and sitting so remember yet Your tears, your agony and bloody sweat. Your cross and passion and the life you gave.

(11, 8-11)

Instead of being a traditional Easter hymn to be sung in

celebration of the resurrection, the poem questions both

the divine purpose and the divinity of Christ himself.

This divinity and purpose is brought under even closer

scrutiny in "The Carpenter's Son" (C. P,, pp, 70-71),

because a character who possesses many of the characteris­

tics of Christ in the flesh behaves in a manner which casts

doubt on Christ's selfless motivation and all-encompassing

love for sinful man. The irony of character becomes obvious

when the farewell of the carpenter's son is contrasted with

Christ's petition for forgiveness on behalf of those who

killed him: 'Here hang I, and right and left Two poor fellows hang for theft: All the same's the luck we prove. Though the midmost hangs for love,

'Comrades all, that stand and gaze. Walk henceforth in other ways; See my neck and save your own: Comrades all, leave ill alone, (11, 17-24)

Another instance of irony of character is foimd in

the reversal of the traditional view of true love. In "The

True Lover" (C.. P., p. 78), the traditional lovers* vow,

"Until death do you part," is completely turned around.

9

45

Separation, not a uniting, is the occasion for love in the

lad's request:

*I shall not vex you with my face Henceforth, my love, for aye;

So take me in your arms a space Before the east is grey,' (11. 5-8)

The true nature of the separation does not become apparent

imtil stanzas five and six:

*0h do you breathe, lad, that your breast Seems not to rise and fall.

And here upon my bosom prest There beats no heart at all? *

'Oh loud, my girl, it once would knock You should have felt it then;

But since for you I stopped the clock It never goes again.'

The reason for the suicide is not clear. Perhaps it is

because the girl has rejected him, and this one night of love

is all he dared anticipate; or perhaps he could not bear the

thought of living through some future failing of the love he

shared this night. Regardless of the reason, the irony of

character is clear. The "true lover," while not true to his

love in the traditional sense, is true to his vow: "I shall

not vex you with my face,/ Henceforth, my love, for aye,"

Alan Reynolds Thompson's defense of irony in tragic

drama suggests a unifying purpose for the various types of

irony in Housman's poetry:

While we like to be amused, we remember longest what hurts us, and the irony of serious drama often hurts us a good deal, , , , In a tragedy the pain is increased; and if comedy also remains in our consciousness, it be­comes a violent irritant—it shocks us like sacrilege. We are not likely to forget such an experience quickly,17

46

Whether Housman's various ironic ploys add humor or whether

they writhe with bitterness, they achieve the transfusing of

emotion which he considered to be the function of poetry by

making painfully obvious and memorable the sometimes shock­

ing inconsistencies and misfortunes of mankind. The ironic

revelations of his verse remove those who read or hear them

from the world of the uninitiated and provide them with that

special knowledge so vital to experiencing the emotions he

felt as a poet.

jr

CHAPTER I I I

HOUSMAN'S USE OF RHETORICAL DEVICES

FOR IRONIC EFFECT

In Chapter II, I discussed four types of irony in

Housman's poetry and suggested various ways in which these

ironic forms achieve the transfusing of emotion which he

considered to be poetry's chief function. "Verbal irony"

was not included as one of these types, because the term

in its traditional sense is much too general for meaningful

application in specific poems. There is a sense in which

all poetic irony can be considered as "verbal irony" in as

much as poetry, expressed in words, is a verbal medium. The

phrase, "rhetorical devices," has been chosen to eliminate

any confusion that might arise from the use of a more

general term.

To preface a discussion of the rhetorical devices

which underlie much of Housman's irony, a statement of his

should be recalled to clarify his concept of the nature of

poetry. In the Leslie Stephen Lecture for 1933, he said:

"Poetry is not the thing said, but a way of saying it."

This statement harmonizes his definition of poetry with the

use of rhetorical devices for the achievement of ironic

effects and, therefore, makes possible a study of his

irony at its most fundamental level.

47

48

Housman seems to be saying that the poem's effect on

the reader determines whether the work is truly worthy to

be called a poem. Unless a kindling of emotion takes place,

the poetry he defines in his Leslie Stephen Lecture can not

exist. As an example of his concept of true poetry, he

writes the following about a line in Milton's Arcades:

But in these six simple words of Milton—

Nymphs and shepherds, dance no more—

what is it that can draw tears, as I know it can, to the eyes of more readers than one? What in the world is there to cry about? Why have the mere words the physical effect of pathos v/hen the sense of the passage is blithe and gay? I can only say, because they are poetry, and find their way to something in man which is obscure and latent, something older than the present organisation of his nature, like the patches of fen which still linger here and there in the drained lands of Cambridgeshire,2

When Housman notes that the "mere words have the physical

effect of pathos when the sense of the passage is blithe and

gay," he is describing, quite effectively, the ironic contra­

diction which makes his own verse successful in the trans-

fusion of emotion he demands of all poetry,^ Alan Reynolds

Thompson suggests that such a transfusing of emotion is

fundamental in irony:

The peculiar quality of the ironic contradiction, indeed, lies in its capacity to rouse a special sort of emotional response.

But this is viewing irony as emotional effect, and to do that is difficult, for all emotions are private experi­ences. We cannot really communicate them; we can only hint at them and hope that others, who have already had similar experiences, will know what we mean, , , , It is therefore convenient to view esthetic effects objectively and define them in terms of their external causes. Such and such artistic devices have been observed regularly to

49

rouse emotions in observers. Whether or not the emotions differ in all the observers is irrelevant to this approach. It may reasonably be assumed that their likeness is greater than their difference.^

It is with this kind of approach that various rhetorical

devices—understatement, hyperbole, paradox, question-and-

answer, pun, parody—can be seen as fundamental elements in

Housman's irony.

Understatement

The use of understatement underlies much of Housman's

irony, and of the several rhetorical devices he employs for

ironic effect, this device comes closest to achieving the

special quality of restrained pathos he observed in Milton's

"Nymphs and shepherds, dance no more." Understatement

(meiosis, litotes, and inversion) functions in a way con­

sistent with the process implied in its name.^ David

Worcester suggests that it is used most effectively when

"the writer means much more than he says, so that the

reader exaggerates the statement,"

Meiosis is the most frequently used form of under­

statement in Housman's verse, and he uses it in poem after

poem to intensify ironic contradiction. The poem "1887"

pays tribute to the soldiers who gave their lives in battle 7

for Queen Victoria,' Housman does not explain that the men

are dead in a simple direct statement, but instead, he uses

meiosis to point out the irony of their situation. He con­

trasts the plight of the dead soldiers with the Golden

9

50

Jubilee celebration of the fiftieth anniversary of the

Queen's reign by describing the light from the beacons as

"the flame they [the soldiers] watch not" that "towers/

Above the soil they trod," They do not watch the beacons

because:

To skies that knit their heartstrings right, To fields that bred them brave.

The saviors come not home to-night:

Themselves they could not save, (11, 13-16)

Even in "Reveille" (C, P., p. 14), a poem that admonishes a

lad to get up with the dawn and "feast his heart with all,"

Housman's characteristic use of meiosis strikes viith the

emotional discord of ironic contradiction in the final stanza

when he encourages the soldiers to rise at dawn to fight in

battle to die: 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.

In "On moonlit heath and lonesome bank" (C. P., pp. 21-22),

Housman uses a series of understatements to convey the

peculiar horror of execution by hanging. His description of

a ghost-like gallows scene from the past pictures a "careless

shepherd" who was hung by moonlight: "And high amongst the

glimmering sheep/ The dead man stood on air" (11, 7-8).

This haunting description is followed by an account of what

is certain to happen to the lad who "sleeps in Shrewsbury

jail to-night," Housman cleverly extends the metaphor of

the dead man standing on air by using the synecdochic

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51

restriction of "heels." This restriction of the whole man to

emphasize an otherwise insignificant and minor part of his

anatomy heightens the irony as well as the quality of

restraint in the understatement:

And sharp the link of life will snap. And dead on air will stand

Heels that held up as straight a chap

As treads upon the land. (11. 21-24)

The persona resolves to wait out the night for the moment

when his unfortunate friend "will hear the stroke of eight/

And not the stroke of nine." Once again, Housman focuses

attention on the commonplace and insignificant. The passing

of an hour of time, which in any other circumstance might

be taken for granted, becomes exaggerated in the reader's

mind because a poignant observation is discovered beneath

the intentionally restrained pose.

The same sort of emphasis on common, everyday details

brings about the successful understatements in "Farewell to

barn and stack and tree" (C. P., p. 20). As he considers

the tragic implications in the spectacle of his brother's

death, the persona decides to leave the scene of the crime.

The emotions behind his decision to flee are conveyed in

a series of understatements. As he thinks of his mother,

he says: "She had two sons at rising day,/ Tonight she'll

be alone" (11. 11-12). The same ironic contradiction is

inherent in his remarks about the everyday routine of work:

"We'll sweat no more on scythe and rake,/ My bloody hands

and I" (11. 15-16). Perhaps the most effective understatement

fA

52

is reserved for the last stanza:

'Long for me the rick will wait. And long will wait the fold.

And long will stand the empty plate. And dinner will be cold.'

Many of Housman's understatements heighten the irony

associated with the physical aspects of death. In "To an

Athlete Dying Young" (C. P., p. 32), the admirers of the

youth salute his death with typical Housmanesque understate­

ments:

To-day, the road all runners come. Shoulder-high we bring you home. And set you at your threshold down. Townsman of a stiller town.

Eyes the shady night has shut Cannot see the record cut And silence sounds no worse than cheers After earth has stopped the ears.

(11. 5-8, 13-16)

A similar example of meiosis is used to describe the condi­

tion of Fred in "This time of year a twelvemonth past" (C.. P.,

p. 40). There is an ironic contradiction in the fact that

Fred is first described as the better man, then as worthless:

The better man she walks with still. Though now 'tis not with Fred:

A lad that lives and has his will

Is worth a dozen dead. (11, 9-12)

The final lines still speak of Fred as a man of responsibility

and action: "Fred keeps the house all kinds of weather"; but

because the house of clay he keeps requires no upkeep at all:

"Stockstill lies Fred and sleeps,"

5

53

Sleep is traditionally used as a euphemism for death,

and it is amusing to note how cleverly Housman is able both

to capture the mild, restrained quality of understatement

by using such a euphemism and to combine with it a word or

thought so distasteful and offensive that a powerful ironic

effect is achieved. An example of this dissonance occurs in

"Others, I am not the first" (C. P,, p, 47) where Housman

combines "bed" and "mould":

But I like them shall win my way Lastly to the bed of mould Where there's neither heat nor cold,

(11, 10-12)

"The Immortal Part" (C. P., p, 65) displays this same

technique: 'Lie down in the bed of dust; Bear the fruit you must; Bring the eternal seed to light. And mom is all the same as night,'

(11, 25-28)

In the last two lines of "Bring, in this timeless grave to

throw" (C., P,, p, 69), Housman combines "couch," a place of

relaxation, with the concept of eternal inactivity to provide

the ironic contradiction: "Where low upon the couch he lies/

Whence he never shall arise," Still another dissonant combi­

nation occurs in the final lines of "With rue my heart is

laden" (C., P,, p, 80): "The rose-lipt girls are sleeping/ In

fields where roses fade." In "Soldier from the wars return­

ing" (C. P., p. 106), Housman initially suggests that there

is a well-deserved rest waiting for the war-weary soldier.

The tone is almost one of celebration:

9

5k

Soldier from the wars returning. Spoiler of the taken town.

Here is ease that asks not earning; Turn you in and sit you down.

Peace is come and wars are over. Welcome you and welcome all.

While the charger crops the clover

And his bridle hangs in stall, (11, 1-8)

But, in the last two lines of the poem, Housman uses meiosis

to make only too clear the kind of rest he celebrates:

"Soldier, sit you down and idle/ At the inn of night for aye."

The understatements concerning death in Housman's o

poems are myriad. The dead lad in "The rain, it streams on

the stone and hillock" (C. P., p. 119) is described as a

fallen house "that none can build again," The soldiers in

"When I would muse in boyhood" (C, P,, p. 138) "sought and

found six feet of ground." In "For these of old the trader"

(C.. P., p. 160), Housman writes of "The pale, the perished

nation/ That never see the sim," and he uses a second under­

statement to intensify the irony of their plight:

From the old deep-dusted annals The years erase their tale.

And round them race the channels

That take no second sail. (11. 21-24)

Housman uses litotes (an expressed affirmative accomplished

by the use of a negative statement) for ironic effect in

"Here dead lie we because we did not choose" (C. P., p, 197).

The dead men chorus: "Life, to be sure, is nothing much to

lose." The message of the poem, however, suggests that life

is everything, especially to the young.

55

Housman also uses inversion for ironic effect, and

David Worcester suggests that this rhetorical device is

really a type of understatement because it causes the

reader to reverse the author's apparent message. He notes

that "even where a sentence must be reversed, not exagger­

ated, a striking observation is concealed under an

unemotional, matter-of-fact surface."^ In "The sigh that

heaves the grasses" (C. P., p, 130), the inversion bears out

Worcester's contention that the "shocking power" of the

device "is greatest when it is , . . used to shatter

complacent truisms and unthinking optimism," The statement

affirming the traditional belief in the pathetic fallacy.

The diamond tears adorning Thy low mound on the lea.

Those are tears of morning.

That weeps, , , ,

must be reversed because of the final four words of the last

line: "but not for thee," "The Olive" (C, P.,p. 240)

has a similar irony that comes from the same type of

inversion. All of the otherwise desirable properties of

the healthy olive tree extolled in the first ten lines of

the poem must be condemned in the reversal forced upon the

reader by the last two lines: "So deep the root is planted/

In the corrupting grave,"

A similar type of reversal is achieved by Housman's

use of the "question-and-answer" device praised by Longinus

in A Treatise Concerning Sublimity (see Chapter I, p, 14),

f

56

The device is actually a form of inversion in the sense that

it can be used to understate the author's intention by forc­

ing a reversal upon the reader. In "I lay me down and

slumber" (C. P,, p. 172), the persona uses the manner of

child-like prayer to shatter the idealistic concept of the

guardian angel that watches over those who sleep. The final

stanza forces the reversal of the traditional answer suggested

by the questions posed in the preceding stanzas:

—I waste my time in talking. No heed at all takes he.

My kind and foolish comrade

That breathes all night for me,

A similar use of this device can be seen in "Crossing alone

the nighted ferry" (C,, P., p. 182). In this poem, Housman

attacks the traditional Christian belief in the reuniting of

loved ones after death by posing what appears to be an inno­

cent question: Crossing alone the nighted ferry With the one coin for fee.

Whom on the warf of Lethe waiting. Count you to find? (11. 1-4)

In the reply, a shocking reversal which seems more taimt than

answer, the persona completely negates any possibility of

reunion by saying curtly: "not me."

Hyperbole

In Housman's use of hyperbole (overstatement), the

exaggeration that is ordinarily supplied by the reader in

response to understatement must be consciously supplied in

51

the text of the poem. The device is employed strategically

in order to intensify the striking power of the ironic con­

tradiction. In "The night is freezing fast" (C. P., p. 121),

the ironic contradiction stems from the fact that Dick is

unable to escape the cold he hates even though he has "woven

a winter robe," The hyperbole is a conscious exaggeration of

both the fabric and the size of the garment. It is woven of

"earth and sea," and the metaphorical "turning globe" leaves

no doubt of its massive size. It would be ironic if Dick's

coat merely failed to keep him warm; but when the nature of

the garment is exaggerated by the use of hyperbole, the irony

is increased immeasurably. "The Oracles" (C.. P., pp. 127-28)

displays an even more effective use of this device. The

irony in the calm behavior of the Spartans at Thermopylae

in the face of certain defeat at the hands of Xerxes' army

is made much more powerful because of the hyperbole used to

describe the Persian horde:

The King with half the East at heel is marched from lands of morning:

Their fighters drink the rivers up. their shafts benight the air.

And he that stands vfill die for nought. and home

there's no returning.10 (11. 13-15)

The contrast between the force of these lines and Housman's

description of the Spartans, "The Spartans on the sea-wet

rock sat down and combed their hair," is exaggerated so much

that the reader is stunned by the ironic contradiction.

^

58

The use of hyperbole is more extensive in "The Welsh

Marches" (C, P,, pp. 44-45) and functions in a somewhat

different manner. In this instance, the persona ponders

a principle of evil which he cannot logically comprehend.

The classical blood-guilt myth underlies his emotional

dilemma, and in the concluding lines of the poem he

acknowledges the inheritance of his father's guilt and,

indirectly, the paradox posed by the original sin in Eden:

When shall I be dead and rid Of the wrong my father did? How long, how long, till spade and hearse Put to sleep my mother's curse?

The ironic contradiction in the poem centers on the problem

of circumstance. Housman uses hyperbole to give the poem

an elevated tone appropriate to such a universal theme.

The unaltered passage of time is described with language

that elevates its significance:

The flag of morn in conqueror's state Enters at the English gate: The vanquished eve, as night prevails. Bleeds upon the road to Wales, (11. 5-8)

The father's sin is given an atmosphere of tragic and

universal implication:

When Severn down to Buildwas ran Coloured with the death of man. Couched upon her brother's grave The Saxon got me on the slave, (11. 13-16)

Opposing factions in the mind of the persona are described

in terms of savage battle:

Here the truceless armies yet Trample, rolled in blood and sweat;

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59

They kill and kill and never die;

And I think that each is I, (11. 25-28)

The use of hyperbole makes what might otherwise seem nothing

more than the musings of a naive country lad a query of much

greater ironic impact because the circumstantial misfortune

is elevated to the level of all mankind.

In "The chestnut casts his flambeaux" (C.. P., p. 107),

the hyperbole strengthens the irony by exploiting the shock­

ing effect of sacrilege. The irony of circumstance is

heightened when Housman assails the divine Creator with terms

of abuse:

We for a certainty are not the first Have sat in taverns while the tempest hurled

Their hopeful plans to emptiness, and cursed Whatever brute and blackguard made the world.

(11. 9-12)

The same sort of hyperbolic language can be seen in "Oh who

is that young sinner with the handcuffs on his wrists?"

(C.. P., p. 233). The irony of circumstance is made more

poignant as the persona blames God for the young prisoner's

situation: "He can curse the God that made him for the colour of his hair."

"Astronomy" (C, P., p. 118) makes use of hyperbole to

elevate the nature of the fruitless sacrifice made by a

soldier killed in Africa, Housman uses a clever conceit to

illustrate the message of the poem:

For pay and medals, name and rank. Things that he has not found.

He hove the Cross to heaven and sank The pole-star underground, (11, 5-8)

n

60

Had he not chosen to use hyperbole, he might have said

that the lad enlisted for duty in the southern hemisphere

where Polaris sinks below the horizon out of sight, and the

Southern Cross can be seen high in the evening darkness. The

irony gathers power when Housman suggests that the same lad

who figuratively rearranged the configuration of the heavenly

constellations cannot, in his present condition, even

passively watch from the grave he shares with the North Pole:

And now he does not even see Signs of the nadir roll

At night over the ground where he

Is buried with the pole. (11. 9-12)

Housman's knowledge of astronomy can also be seen in

"Revolution" (C.. P., p. 143), and as might be expected, he

uses the language of hyperbole to elevate the importance of

the otherwise routine revolution of the earth on its axis.

The waning night is described in terms that suggest mechan­

ical movement on a grand scale: "West and away the wheels of

darkness roll," On the opposite horizon "day's beamy banner"

is raised and unfurled. The moment is one of celebration as

all of the unpleasant and mysterious evils of the darkness

dematerialize: "Spectres and fears, the nightmare and her

foal,/ Drown in the golden deluge of the mom." The night is

described in terms which give it an ominous supernatural quality:

But over sea and continent from sight Safe to the Indies has the earth conveyed

The vast and moon-eclipsing cone of night. Her towering foolscap of eternal shade.

(11. 5-8)

I

61

Sights and sounds of noon take on an ironic importance as

they mark the zenith of the day: "See, in mid heaven the

sun is mounted; hark,/ The belfries tingle to the noonday

chime." Then, the final two lines foreshadow the return of

darkness: "'Tis silent, and the subterranean dark/ Has

crossed the nadir, and begins to climb," The common, every­

day changing from day to night becomes something vastly more

important in this poem through the use of overstatement, and

the routine revolution of the earth becomes a symbol of the

12 continuum of eternity,

Paradox

Cleanth Brooks, in The Well-Wrought Urn, has suggested

that "paradox is the language appropriate and inevitable to

poetry," ^ Housman makes use of this rhetorical device

occasionally to sharpen the cutting edge of his irony, A

careful distinction in a study of this nature should be made

between those instances when Housman seems to consciously

use paradox as a rhetorical device for ironic effect and the

many occasions when the ironic contradictions in his poetry

pose problems which can be seen as paradoxical in a sense so

general that the paradox is a product of irony rather than a

contributing device. An excellent example of i)aradox used

as a rhetorical device is found in "1887" (C. P., p, 9),

After the celebration in which the burning beacons attest to

the fact that "God has saved the Queen," Housman writes:

62

"Lads, we'll remember friends of ours/ Who shared the work

with God," The statement is paradoxical because, under the

Judeo-Christian concept of God, The Almighty needs no help.

This paradox is left unresolved and another is added: "The

saviours come not home to-night:/ Themselves they could not

save." There is a Christ-like quality to these saviors,

and there is a paradox in the fact that they, like he,

could not save themselves. Each of these two instances of

paradox produce irony. In the one case there is an all-

pov/erful God who must have help in saving the Queen; in

the other case, there are saviors who cannot save those

they value most—themselves. The truly ironic paradox,

however, is reserved for the last stanza:

Oh, God will save her, fear you not: Be you the men you've been.

Get you the sons your fathers got.

And God will save the Queen.

There is the hint that God may have little or nothing to do

with saving the Queen and that, instead, her welfare might

entirely depend on the courage and strength of her subjects.

Through the use of paradox, the assurance that God has

always saved the Queen and will continue to save her becomes

something less than sure, and the traditional "God save the

Queen" becomes an empty platitude.

Another example of paradox is used in "Loveliest of

trees, the cherry now" {C, T,, p. 11) to point out the

irony in the passage of time. A lad of twenty makes the

63

startling discovery that his years are limited:

Now of my threescore years and ten. Twenty will not come again. And take from seventy springs a score. It only leaves me fifty more. (11. 5-8)

These lines fimction as an introduction for the paradoxical

statement: "And since to look at things in bloom/ Fifty

springs are little room." The paradox grows with the number

of years the reader brings with him to the poem. An old man

would find the statement that "fifty springs are little room"

quite true, but he would no doubt be amused at the trauma of

a lad who still had fifty more to live. No doubt an old man

would welcome fifty more years with much more relish than the

persona of the poem is able to appreciate; yet, paradoxically,

the youth sees the value of living for the moment, and his

paradoxical statement conveys the irony of his moment of

discovery.

Housman also uses paradox for ironic effect in "On

moonlit heath and lonesome bank" (C.. P., p. 21), The ironic

contradiction in the poem comes from the persona's relative

state of innocence as he is portrayed to be a pawn of circum-

stsmce. His innocence and the irony of his situation are

implied by the paradox inherent in the fourth stanza of the

poem:

There sleeps in Shrewsbury jail to-night. Or wakes, as may betide,

A better lad, if things went right. Than most that sleep outside.

The phrase, "if things went right," provides the ironic

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64

contradiction in the poem, and the paradox provides the

sense of doubt needed to extend the irony of the situation

so that it involves all men who find themselves "keeping

sheep by moonlight."

Pun

Housman seldom uses the pun as a rhetorical device,

but in two poems about execution by hanging, such word

play achieves ironic effects. In "On moonlit heath and

lonesome bank" (C, P., p. 21), the word "ring" in the fifth

stanza carries a double meaning:

And naked to the hangman's noose The morning clocks will ring -.-:.-

A neck God made for other use * Than strangling in a string.

The clocks' "ring" marks the passage of time which has run

out for the lad, but the clocks, in a bizarre sense, also

have as much to do with "wringing" the lad's neck as the

noose or the hangman. If the word "ring" is seen in context

with the word "morning," then there is a possible pun

14 because "morning" can also be taken for "mourning,"

It is doubtful, however, that this pun is intentional

because the clocks would have no reason to treat the lad's

neck as a handkerchief. In "The Carpenter's Son" (C. P.,

p. 70), a kind of equivoque is employed to utilize different

meanings of the word "neck." In his farewell statement,

the young lad about to be heinged cries:

9

65

'Comrades all, that stand and gaze, V/alk henceforth in other ways; See my neck and save your own: Comrades all, leave ill alone. (11. 25-28)

He tells his friends to gaze upon his literal "neck,"

surrounded by the noose, and warns them, with a slang ex­

pression, to save their own necks. Implied, of course, is

another slang expression as the reader concludes that the

lad has "stuck his neck out" for his friends.

Parody

Housman's verse-parodies of such personages as

Aeschylus, Longfellow, and Erasmus Darwin have been widely

1 *5 acclaimed. ^ There is, however, a sense in which Housman

parodies, not literary works, but classical legends and myths

in order to achieve ironic effects. In this rather relaxed

application of the term, "parody" (from the Greek paroidia.

"mock-song"), Housman draws upon material from mythology in

order to make serious comments; yet his treatment preserves

much of the flavor found in this example of his nonsense

verse:

I knew a Cappadocian Who fell into the Ocean:

His mother came and took him out With tokens of emotion.

She also had a daughter Who fell into the Water:

At any rate she would have fallen If someone hadn't caught her.

The second son went frantic And fell in the Atlantic:

I

ee

His parent reached the spot too late To check her offspring's antic.

Her grief was then terrific: She fell in the Pacific,

Exclaiming with her latest breath 'I have been too prolific,'16

The second stanza of "Look not in my eyes, for fear" (C. P.,

p. 28) has the same comic style, but Housman draws its

content from the Narcissus legend to give the poem a touch

of irony:

A Grecian lad, as I hear tell. One that many loved in vain.

Looked into a forest well And never looked away again.

There, when the turf in springtime flowers. With downward eye and gazes sad.

Stands amid the glancing showers A jonquil, not a Grecian lad.

Another verse in nonsense style:

When Adam day by day V/oke up in Paradise

He always used to say 'Oh, this is very nice.'

But Eve from scenes of bliss Transported him for life.

The more I think of this ^„ The more I beat my wife. '

is quite similar in style to Housman's use of myth in "When

Adam walked in Eden young" (C. P,, p, 218) as he wryly

understates the ironic contradiction in man's unsuccessful

search for happiness:

When Adam walked in Eden young Happy, 'tis writ, was he.

While high the fruit of knowledge hung Unbitten on the tree.

s •»

67

Happy was he the livelong day: I doubt 'tis written wrong.

The heart of man, for all they say.

Was never happy long, (11. 1-8)

In "Tarry, delight; so seldom met" (C, P,, p, 174), Housman

draws from the classical legend of Hero and Leander to point

out that happiness is fleeting and shortlived, Leander's

drowning in the Hellespont makes the last stanza particularly

ironic: Beneath him, in the nighted firth. Between two continents complain

The seas he swam from earth to earth

And he must swim again.

"Half-way, for one commandment broken" (C. P., p, 196) uses

the Biblical account of Lot's flight from Sodom to suggest

that deliverance can only be found in death. Ironically,

Lot's wife fares better in the poem than Lot does:

Half-way, for one commandment broken. The woman made her endless halt.

And she to-day, a glistering token. Stands in the wilderness of salt.

Behind, the vats of judgment brewing Thundered, and thick the brimstone snowed:

He to the hill of his undoing

Pursued his road.

Perhaps the most effective example of this kind of

parody in Housman's poetry can be found in "Terence, this is

stupid stuff" (C. P., p. 90). The legend of Mithridates,

King of Pontus, is used as a kind of parable in which the

practice of deliberately dwelling on the troubles and pitfalls

of life is defended. In order to avoid death by poisoning,

Mithridates builds up an immunity by sampling small amounts

68

of all the "killing store" of the earth. Housman's comic

style playfully pokes fun at those who attempted to poison

Mithridates in spite of his desensitizing tactics:

They put arsenic in his meat And stared aghast to watch him eat; They poured strychnine in his cup And shook to see him drink it up: They shook, they stared as white's their shirt: Them it was their poison hurt. — I tell the tale that I heard told. Mithridates, he died old. (11, 69-76)

The study of Housman's use of rhetorical devices for

ironic effect enables one to discover the most fundamental

elements of his ability to kindle indirectly an emotional

response on the part of the reader. The various devices of

understatement, hyperbole, paradox, pun, and parody are

fundamental in the operation of the ironic contradictions

that make A. E. Housman's poetry succeed.

CONCLUSION

The irony in A. E. Housman's poetry represents the

systematic use of a rhetorical mode firmly established

as a tradition in literature. The relationship between

his irony and the irony foimd in the poems of the early

Greek elegists is one of a strong affinity of spirit, and

its success must be at least partially attributed to the

fact that Housman was an accomplished classical scholar

with an extensive background and a special feeling for the

ironic manner of the Greek and Latin poets. The classical

spirit of irony in his poetry can be seen in the rustic

simplicity of the pastoral tradition, in the laments of

the elegiac tradition, and in the development of ironic

rhetorical devices such as those discussed by Aristotle,

Cicero, and Longinus, Because his verse is fashioned

and tempered with this spirit of classical irony, he

emerges as one of the few successful poets of his period

and as a masterful ironist in spite of the small amoimt

of poetry he published,

Housman's irony is both imified and rich with

variety of form, A unifying thread of discovery and

initiation winds through his poems and gives his ironic

revelations the power and subtle ability to remove the

reader from the world of the uninitiated and provide him

with an awareness of the shocking inconsistencies and

69

70

misfortunes of the human condition. At the same time, the

wide variety of ironic types and rhetorical devices which

he uses for ironic effect give his poems a varied texture

rich with the macabre and unexpected.

Perhaps the most significant property of Housman's

irony can be seen in its ability to function in a manner

which allows him to practice what he preaches in "The Name

and Nature of Poetry," The operation of irony in his own

poetry is vital to the definition and function he assigns

to the genre. Whether this irony tints his verse with

humor or taints it with bitterness, it is vital to the

transfusion of emotion he demands from true poetry; and

it plays an even more vital role in his success as a poet.

NOTES

CHAPTER I

J. A, K. Thomson, Irony: An Historical Introduction (London: George Allen and Unwin Ltd,, 1926), pp, 2-3,

2 A, E. Housman, The Letters of A. E. Housman. ed,

Henry Maas (Cambridge, Mass,: Harvard University Press, 1971), p. 65.

3 Tom Bums Haber, A, E. Housman. Twayne's English

Authors Series, 46, ed, Sylvia E, Bowman (New York: Twayne Publishers Inc., I967), p. 51.

4 Thomson, p. 2. Walter W. Greg, Pastoral Poetry and Pastoral Drama

(London: A. H. Bullen, I906), p, 7,

^ Ibid, 7 ' James H, Hanford, "The Pastoral Elegy and Milton's

Lycidus," PMLA. 25 (1910), 405. o John Stevenson, "The Pastoral Setting in the Poetry

of A. E. Housman," South Atlantic Quarterly. 5^ (1956), 490, Q

^ Housman, The Letters, p, 328, ^^ Greg, p. 5. 11

Norman Marlow, in A. E. Housman: Scholar and Poet (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1958), pp. 42-58, discusses the literary influence of the early Greek elegists on Housman, but he does not discuss irony.

Thomson, p. 121. 13 ^ T, F. Higham and C, M. Bowra, eds., The Oxford Book

of Greek Verse in Translation (Oxford: The Clarendon Press, 1938), pp. 191-92. All textual references to this edition are cited by 0.. B. G. V. and page number.

14 Housman, The Letters, p. 52.

1 5

^ Charles I. Glicksberg, The Ironic Vision in Modern Literature (The Hague, Netherlands: Martinus Nijhoff, 1969), p. 257.

71

72

A, E, Housman, Complete Poems. The Centennial Edition (New York: Henry Holt and Company, 1959), p. H . All textual references to Housman's poetry are from this edition, cited by C.. P, and page number. Untitled poems are given first-line titles,

17 G, G, Sedgewick, 0£ Irony Especially in the Drama

(Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1948), p, 7. ^^ Ibid. 19 ^ E, W, Sutton, trans,, Cicero de Oratore. The Loeb

Classical Library (Cambridge, Mass,: Harvard University Press, and London: William Heinemann Ltd,, 1942), I, 403,

"" Ibid,, p, 405. 21

A. 0. Prickard, trans., Longinus on the Sublime

(Oxford: The Clarendon Press, 1906), p. 41.

^^ Ibid., pp, 68-69. ^^ Ibid., p. 69. 24

T. R. Henn, Longinus and English Criticism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1934), p, 65.

^ Prickard, trans,, Longinus, pp. 42-43, 26

Housman, The Letters, p. 65. ' Lawrence Durrell, A Key to Modern British Poetry

(Norman, Oklahoma: University of Oklahoma Press, 1952), p. 112. A. E. Housman, "The Name and Nature of Poetry,"

Selected Prose, ed. John Carter (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, I96I), p. 187.

CHAPTER II

^ David Worcester, The Art of Satire (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, iW^oTTv^ m .

^ Ibid., p, 120,

^ John Stevenson, "The Martyr as Innocent: Housman's Lonely Lad," South Atlantic Quarterly. 37 (1958), 80.

A. E. Housman, Complete Poems. The Centennial Edition (New York: Henry Holt and Company, 1959), p. 41. All textual references to Housman's poetry are from this edition, cited by C_. P. and page number. Untitled poems are given first-line titles.

73

The blackbird's poignant observation in "When smoke stood up from Ludlow" (C. P,, p. 18) is another example of this particular fictional device used for ironic effect,

6 m Trees function as dramatic characters in the case

of the poplar in "Far in a western brookland" (C. P., p. 77) and the oak in a fragment found in The Manuscript Poems of A. E. Housman. ed, Tom Burns Haber (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1955), p. 33; further references to this edition are cited by M. P. and page number.

In one manuscript fragment, Housman constructs a poem around the carving of lovers' initials in a tree ( . £., p. 94).

o Alan Rejmolds Thompson, The Dry Mock: A Study of

Irony in Drama (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1948), p. 29.

9 The same concept lies behind the irony in "Now to

her lap the incestuous earth" (C. P., p. 223), "A, J. J," (C. P., p, 203), "Like mine, the veins of these that slumber" (C.. P., p, 179), "The rain, it streams on stone and hillock" Tc. P., p, 119), "Soldiers from the wars returning" (C. P., p, 106), and "The West" (C, P., p, 98).

^^ See also "The Isle of Portland" (C, P,, p, 85) and "As I gird on for fighting" (C, P,, p,99).

^^ See also "The Sage to the Young Man" (C, P,, p. I6l). 12

B. J. Legget summarizes various critical works that attack Housman on this matter in Housman's Land of Lost Content: A Critical Study of A Shropshire Lad (Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 1970), p. 13.

13 • A. E. Housman, The Letters of A. E. Housman. ed.

Henry Maas (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1971), p. 141.

14 The use of italics is Housman's.

15 - For additional examples of this point of view, see "The stars have not dealt me the worst they could do" (C. P.. p. 232), "When summer's end is nighing" (C. P., p. 147), "Bells in tower at evening toll" (C, P., p, 176), and "When first my way to fair I took" (C. P., p, 142),

9

74

16 mu ine same carpe diem theme can be seen in "Loveliest

Of trees, the cherry now" (C. P,, p. ll) and "V/hen green buds hang in the elm like dust" (C. P., p. 168),

17 See also "It nods and curtseys and recovers" (C, P.,

p. 29). - - »

Thompson, p. 7.

^^ Ibid., p. 47.

CHAPTER III

A. E. Housman, "The Name and Nature of Poetry," Selected Prose, ed. John Carter (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, I96I), p. 187.

^ Ibid., pp. 192-93.

^ Ibid., p. 172, 4 Alan Reynolds Thompson, The Dry Mock: A Study of

Irony in Drama (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1948), pp. 3-4.

5 The rhetorical term meiosis is used interchangeably

with understatement and should be distinguished from the more specific term "litotes" (an expressed affirmative accomplished by the use of a negative statement).

David Worcester, The Art of Satire (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1940), p. 88.

7 ' A. E. Housman, Complete Poems. The Centennial Edition

(New York: Henry Holt and Company, 1959), p. 9. All textual references to Housman's poems are to this edition, cited by £. P. and page number. Untitled poems are given first-line titles,

o Understatements used by Housman to suggest death are

too numerous for all of them to be listed in this study. Some additional examples are found in "When smoke stood up from Ludlow" (C, P., p, 19), "Along the field as we came by" (C. P,, p. 41), "The New Mistress" (C. P., p. 51), "The True Lover" (C. P., p. 79), and "The Day of Battle" (C. P., p, 82).

° Worcester, p, 88,

^^ Ibid., p. 80.

The use of italics is Housman's.

1

75

12 For additional examples of hyperbole, see "There

pass the careless people" (C. P., p, 27), "On the idle hill of summer" (C, P,, p. 52), "In midnights of November" (Q.« £..» p. 120), and "Epitaph on an Army of Mercenaries" (C, P,, p. 144).

13 • Cleanth Brooks, The Well Wrought Urn (New York:

Harcourt, Brace and World, 1947), p. 3, 14

See also "The sigh that heaves the grasses" (C. P., p. 130; 1. 7).

• See Norman Marlow's discussion of Housman's parodies in "The Nonsense Verse," A, E, Housman: Scholar and Poet (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, i958Trpp. 173-79.

A, E, Housman, The Letters of A, E, Housman. ed, Henry Maas (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1971), p. 47.

•'•' Ibid., p. 48.

1} 1}

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Brooks, Cleanth, Tjie Well Wrought Um. New York: Harcourt, Brace and World, 1947,

Durrell, Lawrence, A Kej jbg Modern British Poetry, Norman, Oklahoma: University of Oklahoma Press, 1952,

Glicksberg, Charles I. The Ironic Vision in Modern Litera­ture, The Hague, Netherlands: Martinus Nijhoff, 1969,

Greg, Walter W, Pastoral Poetry and Pastoral Drama, London: A, H, Bullen, I906,

Haber, Tom Burns. A. E. Housman. Twayne's English Authors Series, 46. Ed, Sylvia E, Bowman, New York: Twayne Publishers Inc, I967,

Hanford, James H, "The Pastoral Elegy and Milton's Lycidus." PMLA, 25 (1910), 403-447.

Henn, T. R. Longinus and English Criticism, Caunbridge: Cambridge University Press, 1934,

Higham, T. F. and C. M. Bowra (eds,). The Oxford Book of Greek Verse in Translation, Oxford: The Clarendon Press, 1938,

Housman, A. E, Complete Poems, The Centennial Edition, New York: Henry Holt and Company, 1959.

The Letters of A. E, Housman. Ed. Henry Maas, Cambridge, Mass,: Harvard University Press, 1971.

Selected Prose, Ed, John Carter, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, I96I,

Legget, B. J. Housman's Land of Lost Content: A Critical Study of A Shropshire Lad, Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 1970,

Marlow, Norman. A. E. Housman: Scholar and Poet. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1958.

Prickard, A. 0. (trans,), Longinus on the Sublime, Oxford: The Clarendon Press, 1906,

Sedgewick, G, G. OX Irony Especially in the Drama, Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1948,

76

^ ^

77

Stevenson, John. "The Martyr as Innocent: Housman's Lonely Lad," South Atlantic Quarterly. 57 (1958),

"The Pastoral Setting in the Poetry of A. E. Housman," South Atlantic Quarterly. 33 (1956), 487-500,

Sutton, E, W. (trans.), Cicero de Oratore, The Loeb Classical Library, Cambridge, Mass,: Harvard University Press, and London: William Heinemann Ltd., 1942,

Thompson, Alan Reynolds, The Dry Mock: A Study of Irony in Drama, Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1948.

Thomson, J. A. K, Irony: An Historical Introduction, London: George Allen and Unwin ltd,, 1926,

V/orcester, David. The Art of Satire. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1940,