James elroy flecker biography of michael

Poet and playwright James Elroy Flecker was born in in Lewisham, London, and went to school in Cheltenham where his father worked as a headmaster. His verses were greatly influenced by the French style Parnassism which grew out of the positivist movement of the early 19th century and, despite his short life, he wrote a number of collections the most memorable being The Golden Journey to Samarkand.

Between and he attended both Oxford and Cambridge where he published the first of his books, The Bridge of Fire , in Whilst attending Oxford, Flecker was influenced by the last moments of the aesthetic movement and formed a close relationship with the classical art historian John Beazley who was professor of archaeology at the university. When he left Oxford, Flecker went into the consular service and traveled for a while in the Mediterranean where he met his future wife Helle Skiadaressi on a boat to Greece.

His seminal work The Golden Journey to Samarkand appeared two years later. A passage from the poem is, to this day, used by the British military force the SAS, new recruits having to memorize it before they begin the rigorous training. Flecker had been diagnosed with tuberculosis in and suffered attacks over the remaining years of his life but that did not stop him writing.

James elroy flecker biography of michael: Roses and Rain: A

After he married Helle in he taught for a while and continued to work on one of his passions, oriental literature. His consular travels across the Mediterranean led to him writing The Old Ships , a haunting, Ancient Mariner style work that offers echoes of the war to come. Unlike Coleridge, in the poem Flecker manages to evoke the smells and sounds of the ship and his work is informed by an imagination that is steeped in the classics of Greece.