Marlborough, and Other Poems

By Charles Hamilton Sorley

But the relevancy is not always very close; the moods of the moment are sometimes expressed rather than matured judgments; and it has to be remembered that what was written was not intended for other eyes than those of the person to whom it was addressed. With the poems it is different; and, had he lived, he would probably himself have published a selection of them with such revision as he deemed advisable. But when a suggestion about printing was made to him, soon after he had entered upon his life in the trenches of Flanders, he put the proposal aside as premature, adding Besides, this is no time for oliveyards and vineyards, more especially of the small-holdings type. For three years or the duration of the war, let be. His warfare is now accomplished, and his relatives have felt themselves free to publish. The original order of the poems is retained in this edition. The first place is assigned to the title-poem some early poems are printed at the end; the other contents are arranged in the order of their composition, as nearly as that order could be ascertained. When the date given includes the day of the month, it has been taken from the author's manuscript; some of the other dates are approximate. Of the undated poems, XIII to XVI were received from him in October 1914, XVII to XXIV in April 1915, XXVII was found in his kit sent back from France, and XXVIII (which appeared for the first time in the second edition) was sent to a friendtowards the end of July 1915. A single piece of imagina tive prose has been included amongst the poems.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Forgotten Books
• Release date: Nov 6, 2017