The Works of Francis Thompson: Poems (Vols I & 2) by Francis Thompson (HQ342)

Published 1913: First Editions / Hardcover / Very Good Condition / Illustrated frontispieces / Volumes One and Two

Original green embossed cloth with gilt titles. 450 + combined clean pages, speckled foxing on the endpapers and occasional other pages within, previous owners dedication on the first free page. Boards slightly rubbed, part stained and faded with time consistent with age. Overall firm and solid. (HQ342)

Postage €6.95 including any additional books ordered.
An Post prepaid postage envelopes within the Republic of Ireland, with no weight restrictions from €6.95.

Born in Lancashire in 1859, Francis Thompson was a colorful character best known for his poem The Hound of Heaven. He spent a period of time as a vagrant and opium addict and even attempted to commit suicide before getting his life back together at a priory in Storrington. Even though he discovered some success with his poetry in later years, he lived most of his life struggling to make ends meet.

Thompson was the son of a doctor and initially went to what is now Manchester University to study medicine himself, though he rarely took it seriously and eventually left to pursue a career in London. He hoped to be a writer but was initially disappointed and ended up selling newspapers and matches on the street. For most of his life he suffered from ill health and, in London, he became addicted to opium.

Sleeping rough on the streets, he was spiraling down into a world of despair and attempted to commit suicide. Taken in by a pros-titute who gave him a share of the money she earned, Thompson later said that she had saved him from a desperate end. In 1888, his luck changed a little when some of his poetry was published in Merrie England, a small press literary magazine of the time. The publication was run by a couple who, judging that he had some talent, decided to send him to the Our Lady of England Priory to recover from his opium addiction.

The poem The Hound of Heaven was often recited by school children in the years after Thompson’s death, a tale of a lost soul being pursued by God. The poem is all the more startling in that he was such a troubled person, still battling his addiction and ill health. Between 1893 and ’97, he published three collections including Poems, Sister Songs and New Poems. Google Books...