Edward Thomas (poet) Critical Essay | Critical Essay by George F. Whicher

Critical Essay by George F. Whicher

SOURCE: Whicher, George F. “Edward Thomas.” The Yale Review 9, no. 3 (April 1920): 556-67.

In the following essay, written just three years after Thomas's death, the author focuses on the intimacy and sincerity of Thomas's poems, which, the author argues, reflect a “desire to comprehend the world's beauty” along with a “resolve to know the fullness of its reality.”

So many recent English poets, especially those whose lives have been sealed perfect in the war, have been youthful men that it is a surprise to learn that Edward Thomas, a poet of two years' standing, was thirty-eight when he died in action, and had been, as his three words of autobiography in “Who's Who” inform us, “always a writer.” He was born in 1878 of Welsh parentage. His family traditions kept him a little distinct from the South England of his boyhood, and that in turn preserved him from...
(read more)