William Thom was born in Aberdeen, probably in December 1798, though sources have variously placed his birth in 1798, 1799, or 1800. The uncertainty is not trivial: it reflects the precarious position from which he emerged, a position in which the lives of poor urban families were not always recorded with the precision later granted to writers of standing. He came into the world in Sinclair’s Close, near the Justice…
“I always thought I could speak till now, but language fails me, and I can only say that I thank you from the bottom of my heart.”
Neighbourhood:
Romantic Poets, Scottish Poets, Social Justice Poets, Victorian Poets
Emotional landscape: Tenderness, Longing, Wonder
Thomas Hood was born in London on 23 May 1799 and died there on 3 May 1845, only twenty days short of his forty-sixth birthday. He occupies a distinctive, sometimes deceptively difficult place in English literary history. To generations of readers he has been the author of jokes, puns, comic ballads, and apparently effortless verbal absurdities; to others he is the compassionate author of “The Song of the Shirt” and…
“I have never had a day's health in my life, but I have had several days of illness.”
Neighbourhood:
Death & Mortality, Light Verse Poets, Romantic Poets
Emotional landscape: Longing, Sorrow, Despair
