Take Desire Away

The queer sensibility of A.E. Houseman in his own words. He would not stay for me; and who can wonder? He would not stay for me to stand and gaze. I shook his hand and tore my heart in sunder And went with half my life about my ways. Alfred Edward Housman (1859-1936), the English classical scholar and poet best known for his cycle of poems A Shropshire Lad, was the subject of Tom Stoppard’s 1997 National Theatre play The Invention of Love, described at the time as “the most emotionally powerful and enthralling play of his career” (and this “from the bare bones of the dry life of A.E.Housman”). But the clues are there in the poetry – if you know where to look – and the letters tell another story altogether, often with humour.