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The Hound of Heaven
The Classic Victorian poem about Christian angst that still speaks to modern audiences. Accompanied by illustrations that deepen the meaning of the poem.
A portable paperback version of a long poem by the Catholic Victorian poet Francis Thompson that grapples with our relationship with God and faith. The Hound of Heaven was written in 1890, but it foresaw the 20th century themes of existentialism and anxiety in modern times. This poem was much loved by Christian-influenced authors like G. K. Chesterton, J. R. R. Tolkien, and C. S. Lewis, and in turn informed their own writing.
“[A] treat in store for you is the edition of the perennial Catholic classic. Francis Thompson's The Hound of Heaven. Jean Young provides beautiful new illustration for this poem. Thompson tells the familiar story of the sinner's flight from God, and God's even more insistent pursuit of the erring soul. . . . The poem has major appeal on many levels. . . . This little edition is great for a thoughtful gift.”� The Priest
A portable paperback version of a long poem by the Catholic Victorian poet Francis Thompson that grapples with our relationship with God and faith. The Hound of Heaven was written in 1890, but it foresaw the 20th century themes of existentialism and anxiety in modern times. This poem was much loved by Christian-influenced authors like G. K. Chesterton, J. R. R. Tolkien, and C. S. Lewis, and in turn informed their own writing.
“[A] treat in store for you is the edition of the perennial Catholic classic. Francis Thompson's The Hound of Heaven. Jean Young provides beautiful new illustration for this poem. Thompson tells the familiar story of the sinner's flight from God, and God's even more insistent pursuit of the erring soul. . . . The poem has major appeal on many levels. . . . This little edition is great for a thoughtful gift.”� The Priest
30 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1900
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867 people want to read
About the author
Francis Thompson
154books41followersFrancis Thompson was an English poet and ascetic. After attending college, he moved to London to become a writer, but in menial work, became addicted to opium, and was a street vagrant for years. A married couple read his poetry and rescued him, publishing his first book Poems in 1893. Thompson lived as an unbalanced invalid in Wales and at Storrington, but wrote three books of poetry, with other works and essays, before dying of tuberculosis in 1907.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 89 reviews
March 1, 2019
Do you ever get the feeling that enlightenment is weary with waiting, that enlightenment itself—passionately, relentlessly—is looking for you? If so, you may be inspired and moved by this Francis Thompson ode.
Perhaps it is fitting that, during the fin de siecle, when religious poetry was in fashion among the English aesthetes, that one of the greatest poems of Christian faith was composed by a derelict, an opiate addict who wandered the London streets with a small volume of Blake in one pocket and a volume of Aeschylus in the other.
Francis Thompson, born in Lancashire to a middle class Catholic family, was a dreamy, impractical young man. Rejected from the priesthood, Francis made a half-hearted attempt to become a physician like his father, but, after failing medical school, he left for London to seek his fortune, at the age of 25, as a writer. But a lack of practicality hampered his career, as did a growing addiction to laudanum. Soon he was reduced to selling pencils, delivering messages, and tending horses by day, and by night he slept in a large box near the hobo camps by the Thames. Desperate, he was on the verge of ending it all when the poet and suicide Thomas Chatterton, appearing to him in a dream, dissuaded him from taking his own life.
Fortunately, he eventually found a pair of patrons: Francis Meynell editor of the Catholic magazine Merry England and his wife, the poet Alice Meynell. They recognized both his genius and his helplessness, and acted informally as his guardians for most of the rest of his short life. When he died at the age of 47, he left behind him a few handfuls of good poems and one great poem, “The Hound of Heaven.�
Sure, it is a little too full of sin and self-abasement for most contemporary Christians, many of whom—I suspect--are a little too full of themselves. It is also shamelessly old fashioned both in its diction and the extravagance of its religious ardor, but a few old words never hurt anybody, and the saints were known to be passionate about religion too. At the very least, “The Hound of Heaven”—in addition to being honest, direct, and filled with an extraordinary music—paints an unforgettable picture of the Lord Jesus as a hound continually on the track of the sinner, never ceasing until the pursued one comes to realize that His pursuit is the pursuit of Love.
Here are the first few lines, to give you an idea of what is in store:
I fled Him, down the nights and down the days;
I fled Him, down the arches of the years;
I fled Him, down the labyrinthine ways
Of my own mind; and in the midst of tears
I hid from Him, and under running laughter.
Up vistaed hopes I sped;
And shot, precipitated,
Adown Titanic glooms of chasmed fears,
From those strong Feet that followed, followed after.
But with unhurrying chase,
And unperturbèd pace,
Deliberate speed, majestic instancy,
They beat—and a Voice beat
More instant than the Feet�
'All things betray thee, who betrayest Me'.
March 22, 2025
"Oh, what a tangled web we weave
When first we practice to deceive!"
Tonight, I resolved to finally finish this tough nineteenth century masterpiece.
And finish I did, in fifteen minutes, by listening to the epochal Sir Richard Burton passionately declaim its thundering words on YouTube:
Did you get all that... And UNDERSTAND it?
Well, I'll tell you what it means by telling you the saga of my own spiritual battle in a nutshell....
***
Though first, I'll tell you WHY Thompson's masterpiece is tough:
It's because there's a hidden part of ourselves INSIDE us we don't want to see. That's our No Man's Land. It's the area of acute sensitivity to the outside world that our inner Daemons have claimed as their own.
And that's the ghoulish landscape of this poem.
You'll never see your Daemons - but you'll see the Proofs of their Existence in your wild, unfettered childish outbursts against your parents, your siblings, and your teachers (and today, against anyone who slights you):
Violent Moods. Raging Rebellion. Slamming Doors. Screams and Sobs.
Yikes - and that's only the beginning of our bad times, which our Daemon never lets us see or remember.
He wants us to think we're the cat's pyjamas! So we'll forever RUN from the Hound's Pursuit.
***
But the Hound, on the other hand, remains calm, reasonable and quietly persuasive throughout, if you are listening to Him.
"But NO, NOT HIM!
"We prefer our Freedom. Our WILDNESS. Our hilarious Zaniness.
"ANYTHING but being ordinary: you see, we have erected a pedestal for our exalted Egos!"
(Look behind you, though! Every place you stormed through in your wild passion is now totally desecrated. Yikes.)
But the Hound is listening. Watching. And someday (even if it's on our feverish deathbed) he'll claim you as His own.
In his undying grace.
***
Fellow readers, there is no such strange animal as a Seeker in the world.
Because we are all earnestly SOUGHT by the Hound of Heaven.
Resistance is Futile. He'll pursue you past Death itself.
And at the end, like Francis Thompson says -
All will be well
And all manner of things will be well -
Because, with any luck, we'll have the SENSE TO SURRENDER to Him!
And ask to be forgiven for running away into the short-lived triumphs of our Egos.
When first we practice to deceive!"
Tonight, I resolved to finally finish this tough nineteenth century masterpiece.
And finish I did, in fifteen minutes, by listening to the epochal Sir Richard Burton passionately declaim its thundering words on YouTube:
Did you get all that... And UNDERSTAND it?
Well, I'll tell you what it means by telling you the saga of my own spiritual battle in a nutshell....
***
Though first, I'll tell you WHY Thompson's masterpiece is tough:
It's because there's a hidden part of ourselves INSIDE us we don't want to see. That's our No Man's Land. It's the area of acute sensitivity to the outside world that our inner Daemons have claimed as their own.
And that's the ghoulish landscape of this poem.
You'll never see your Daemons - but you'll see the Proofs of their Existence in your wild, unfettered childish outbursts against your parents, your siblings, and your teachers (and today, against anyone who slights you):
Violent Moods. Raging Rebellion. Slamming Doors. Screams and Sobs.
Yikes - and that's only the beginning of our bad times, which our Daemon never lets us see or remember.
He wants us to think we're the cat's pyjamas! So we'll forever RUN from the Hound's Pursuit.
***
But the Hound, on the other hand, remains calm, reasonable and quietly persuasive throughout, if you are listening to Him.
"But NO, NOT HIM!
"We prefer our Freedom. Our WILDNESS. Our hilarious Zaniness.
"ANYTHING but being ordinary: you see, we have erected a pedestal for our exalted Egos!"
(Look behind you, though! Every place you stormed through in your wild passion is now totally desecrated. Yikes.)
But the Hound is listening. Watching. And someday (even if it's on our feverish deathbed) he'll claim you as His own.
In his undying grace.
***
Fellow readers, there is no such strange animal as a Seeker in the world.
Because we are all earnestly SOUGHT by the Hound of Heaven.
Resistance is Futile. He'll pursue you past Death itself.
And at the end, like Francis Thompson says -
All will be well
And all manner of things will be well -
Because, with any luck, we'll have the SENSE TO SURRENDER to Him!
And ask to be forgiven for running away into the short-lived triumphs of our Egos.
August 30, 2024
Run as far and as fast as your days will allow - the hunt that ends your days was your life - you and the hound will obey the voice of your master - one in the same. This is a very striking poem; it really opened my eyes to a conceptualization of the divine that I would say is (almost) Buddhist - a very thought provoking work that will stay with me.
July 13, 2012
"The Hound of Heaven" is one of the most beautiful and insightful poems ever written. It is a perfect word picture of deviant, depraved, defiant Man running, running, running from God...from Love...who is personified as the Hound of heaven. Thompson's skillful and brilliant use of language is unsurpassed.
Man's senseless, blind flight from God takes him "across the margent of the world...to the gold gateways of the stars", mindlessly thinking he can hide from Him - "I said to Dawn: Be sudden—to Eve: Be soon; With thy young skiey blossoms heap me over From this tremendous Lover—Float thy vague veil about me, lest He see!" How foolish - how childlike - we are.
The fear that drives the flight is always this: "For,though I knew His love Who followèd, Yet was I sore adread Lest, having Him, I must have naught beside." We run from Him seeking everything but Him, knowing in our heart of hearts that ending the chase means yieldedness...surrender. What a stiff-necked race is humankind. And yet He follows calling, wooing, loving open-armed: "Still with unhurrying chase, And unperturbèd pace,Deliberate speed, majestic instancy, Came on the following Feet, And a Voice above their beat—‘Naught shelters thee, who wilt not shelter Me.�"
This poem and its timeless truths and themes has stood me in good stead over and over as I guided five children through the difficult passage of childhood to adulthood. I've often gently reminded each restless, wistful, sometimes broken - sometimes angry, teenage heart that they are simply running from the Hound of Heaven.
The inspired, profound truth and beauty in this poem always bends my knee to the Lord of Lords - sorry and shamed...again...that I've run from the Hound of Heaven.
Man's senseless, blind flight from God takes him "across the margent of the world...to the gold gateways of the stars", mindlessly thinking he can hide from Him - "I said to Dawn: Be sudden—to Eve: Be soon; With thy young skiey blossoms heap me over From this tremendous Lover—Float thy vague veil about me, lest He see!" How foolish - how childlike - we are.
The fear that drives the flight is always this: "For,though I knew His love Who followèd, Yet was I sore adread Lest, having Him, I must have naught beside." We run from Him seeking everything but Him, knowing in our heart of hearts that ending the chase means yieldedness...surrender. What a stiff-necked race is humankind. And yet He follows calling, wooing, loving open-armed: "Still with unhurrying chase, And unperturbèd pace,Deliberate speed, majestic instancy, Came on the following Feet, And a Voice above their beat—‘Naught shelters thee, who wilt not shelter Me.�"
This poem and its timeless truths and themes has stood me in good stead over and over as I guided five children through the difficult passage of childhood to adulthood. I've often gently reminded each restless, wistful, sometimes broken - sometimes angry, teenage heart that they are simply running from the Hound of Heaven.
The inspired, profound truth and beauty in this poem always bends my knee to the Lord of Lords - sorry and shamed...again...that I've run from the Hound of Heaven.
January 26, 2010
This poem is absolutely beautiful. I studied this poem with our Church Adult Sunday School class under the wonderful teaching of my friend Greg Biddle. Though there is much old English in the poem, it is worth dissecting to find out the meanings and symbolism of this classic. I really enjoyed hearing Greg read the poem in it's entirity on the concluding class. He read it so beautifully, as it was meant to be read :)
The artist R.H.Ives Gammell did some wonderful paintings that are based on this poem take a look at this link.
The artist R.H.Ives Gammell did some wonderful paintings that are based on this poem take a look at this link.
Read
January 15, 2016I am trying to learn how to understand poetry. This was my first shot. I will come back later to this when I am better at understanding poetry. I love the title though.
March 14, 2020
I've long meant to read "The Hound of Heaven" straight through, though of course I know the story and have heard bits of it here and there, and in college I played James Syler's fantastic version for wind ensemble. But just this morning I read the excerpt that appears near the beginning of Rebecca—from the book of poetry the main character takes from Max's car—and I thought it was time to read the whole thing. This copy, illustrated beautifully with woodcuts by Tim Ladwig, has been waiting for me on my shelf for many months.
The poem wonderfully conveys the exhaustion of fleeing God, the desperation to find satisfaction, peace, comfort, and rest in anything else in the world other than a God who seems cruel and terrifying, the assumption that it is God who has vindictively taken away all comforts in the world. The actual imagery of the hound in pursuit is not as direct as I'd assumed. But I love the repeated phrase to show the manner of his chase:
The poem wonderfully conveys the exhaustion of fleeing God, the desperation to find satisfaction, peace, comfort, and rest in anything else in the world other than a God who seems cruel and terrifying, the assumption that it is God who has vindictively taken away all comforts in the world. The actual imagery of the hound in pursuit is not as direct as I'd assumed. But I love the repeated phrase to show the manner of his chase:
But with unhurrying chase,The final speech of the hound is so good—echoes of Jesus, and resonating in some of Aslan's speeches later on in Narnia:
And unperturbéd pace,
Deliberate speed, majestic instancy
"And human love needs human meriting:The poem is a beautiful meditation on running away and being found.
How hast thou merited�
Of all man's clotted clay the dingiest clot?
Alack, though knowest not
How little worthy of any love thou art!
Whom wilt thou find to love ignoble thee,
Save Me, save only Me?"
November 23, 2023
So beautiful and real.
February 8, 2021
Feb 7, 845pm ~~ Review asap.
Feb 8, 130pm ~~ Way back in September of 2017 I read a book called by . In it Egan talked about the books he had read over the years, and it amused me to make a list of the ones he seemed especially fond of, thinking I would maybe read a few of them for myself Someday.
My first list got whittled down to 25, then whittled down again to 10 titles that I intended to read in the order that Egan mentioned, so that I could follow in his reading footsteps. I made a bookshelf of these titles, and then the world shifted for more than a little while. When life settled down a bit I decided it was time to make an effort to clear this list. I read two titles in 2020, but because I was never quite in the proper mood for poetry last year, I let the list sit some more.
But this year is IT. This year I will work my way through to the end, and The Hound Of Heaven is the book that will start me down Egan's confessional trail once again. Apologies for not going back to the book itself and rediscovering what Egan thought about this poem and why he read it, but I am too lazy these days for such labor. All I can say for sure is that he read it early in his life because it was number three on the list overall. And I can't imagine what an impressionable young mind must have made of this poem!
So, The Hound Of Heaven is the most famous poem by Francis Thompson, who was (according to Wiki) "an English poet and Catholic mystic". I read his poem The Mistress Of Vision in right before reading this one, and in my review for that poem I talked enough about the man, so I won't repeat any of that information here.
This poem was written in 1893. The 1926 edition I read at Project Gutenberg has a wonderfully entertaining introduction by a man by the name of James J. Daly, S.J., who goes into poetic raptures of his own about the poem more than once. The book is worth reading just to see the incredible enthusiasm Daly overflowed with, whether or not you agree with him about the poem.
And I must say, I pretty much do not. The poem is lovely, it would certainly be inspirational to many people, but mostly it made me sad for the author. I suppose a person's upbringing would be a deciding factor about how the poem is seen. Thompson was a sickly, dreamy child whose father expected things from him that he was unable to produce. So from practically day one he felt the torture of being dominated and the ego-shattering insecurity because of the inability to be the person that Father expected him to be.
Is it any wonder he approached his idea of God with such fear? He describes himself in the poem as running from God but knowing He is always following him, always waiting, tireless, unescapable, never pressuring him exactly, but never not there either.
I had a little trouble with this idea of a lurking God. I had no religious training as a child, so when I began to explore my own spirituality, I did not see myself as surrendering. I felt and still feel a partnership with the Universe. Sort of like that character in the musical Hair who sings "I believe in God and I believe that God believes in Claude. That's me".
How sad it seems to me to miss a moment of such beauty. "Be at peace with God, whatever you conceive Him to be." Desiderata shaped me much more than THOH would have done if I had read it at the same time. I think that even then, in the beginnings of my awareness of the Universe, I would not have understood the dread that Thompson expresses in this poem.
Well, each reader will decide for themselves, as it should be. The Hound Of Heaven with its old-fashioned and sometimes bizarre language and its (to me) equally old-fashioned idea of God The Father will not appeal to everyone, but the Universe is big enough to hold all opinions equally in respect and love.
Feb 8, 130pm ~~ Way back in September of 2017 I read a book called by . In it Egan talked about the books he had read over the years, and it amused me to make a list of the ones he seemed especially fond of, thinking I would maybe read a few of them for myself Someday.
My first list got whittled down to 25, then whittled down again to 10 titles that I intended to read in the order that Egan mentioned, so that I could follow in his reading footsteps. I made a bookshelf of these titles, and then the world shifted for more than a little while. When life settled down a bit I decided it was time to make an effort to clear this list. I read two titles in 2020, but because I was never quite in the proper mood for poetry last year, I let the list sit some more.
But this year is IT. This year I will work my way through to the end, and The Hound Of Heaven is the book that will start me down Egan's confessional trail once again. Apologies for not going back to the book itself and rediscovering what Egan thought about this poem and why he read it, but I am too lazy these days for such labor. All I can say for sure is that he read it early in his life because it was number three on the list overall. And I can't imagine what an impressionable young mind must have made of this poem!
So, The Hound Of Heaven is the most famous poem by Francis Thompson, who was (according to Wiki) "an English poet and Catholic mystic". I read his poem The Mistress Of Vision in right before reading this one, and in my review for that poem I talked enough about the man, so I won't repeat any of that information here.
This poem was written in 1893. The 1926 edition I read at Project Gutenberg has a wonderfully entertaining introduction by a man by the name of James J. Daly, S.J., who goes into poetic raptures of his own about the poem more than once. The book is worth reading just to see the incredible enthusiasm Daly overflowed with, whether or not you agree with him about the poem.
And I must say, I pretty much do not. The poem is lovely, it would certainly be inspirational to many people, but mostly it made me sad for the author. I suppose a person's upbringing would be a deciding factor about how the poem is seen. Thompson was a sickly, dreamy child whose father expected things from him that he was unable to produce. So from practically day one he felt the torture of being dominated and the ego-shattering insecurity because of the inability to be the person that Father expected him to be.
Is it any wonder he approached his idea of God with such fear? He describes himself in the poem as running from God but knowing He is always following him, always waiting, tireless, unescapable, never pressuring him exactly, but never not there either.
I had a little trouble with this idea of a lurking God. I had no religious training as a child, so when I began to explore my own spirituality, I did not see myself as surrendering. I felt and still feel a partnership with the Universe. Sort of like that character in the musical Hair who sings "I believe in God and I believe that God believes in Claude. That's me".
How sad it seems to me to miss a moment of such beauty. "Be at peace with God, whatever you conceive Him to be." Desiderata shaped me much more than THOH would have done if I had read it at the same time. I think that even then, in the beginnings of my awareness of the Universe, I would not have understood the dread that Thompson expresses in this poem.
Well, each reader will decide for themselves, as it should be. The Hound Of Heaven with its old-fashioned and sometimes bizarre language and its (to me) equally old-fashioned idea of God The Father will not appeal to everyone, but the Universe is big enough to hold all opinions equally in respect and love.
May 23, 2018
Three stars for the poem (on a first reading, possibly to be revised), with an extra half-star for the woodcut illustrations, rounded up to four stars (as it feels like that's probably where I'll end up with it).
I spotted this one on the shelf of Great Grandfather's Bookshop in Leyland, Lancashire, struck by the front cover illustration, then half remembering the title, then fully remembering the opening lines, though I can't quite place from where: the introduction to another book of poetry, I'm sure, but which one I can't recall. The disappointment of the slightly torn dust jacket and internal staining were ameliorated by the £1.50 price mark penciled in the front, so it ended up coming home with me.
I recognised the author's name, too, and looking him up I was pleasantly surprised to discover that he was born in Winkley Street in Preston, a street I walk down each week, and his name I recognise from the plaque hung there to commemorate his birth in the city. I'll pay more attention to it on my next visit.
As for the poem itself, it's written in a highly wrought Romantic style. I'm not entirely adverse to that, but at times it feels like it was laid on a bit thick. However, in the vastly more important opinion of , Thompson is to be "ranked amongst the very greatest of poets" (, page 51), so there's that to recommend him.
Tolkien would, I'm sure, be drawn to the Catholic sentiment of The Hound of Heaven, in which the Hound is Christ, who lovingly hunts the lost soul of the poem's narrator, a biographical theme given Thompson's loss of faith, destitution, drug-addiction and ultimate return to the Christian fold. For myself, if I'm to get anything from the poem beyond the poetic imagery, and the rhythm and rhyme, it will be as symbolic of the finding of the Self in a psychological sense. I didn't find it in this, my first, reading, but I strongly suspect it's lying in wait for me in there, somewhere.
I spotted this one on the shelf of Great Grandfather's Bookshop in Leyland, Lancashire, struck by the front cover illustration, then half remembering the title, then fully remembering the opening lines, though I can't quite place from where: the introduction to another book of poetry, I'm sure, but which one I can't recall. The disappointment of the slightly torn dust jacket and internal staining were ameliorated by the £1.50 price mark penciled in the front, so it ended up coming home with me.
I recognised the author's name, too, and looking him up I was pleasantly surprised to discover that he was born in Winkley Street in Preston, a street I walk down each week, and his name I recognise from the plaque hung there to commemorate his birth in the city. I'll pay more attention to it on my next visit.
As for the poem itself, it's written in a highly wrought Romantic style. I'm not entirely adverse to that, but at times it feels like it was laid on a bit thick. However, in the vastly more important opinion of , Thompson is to be "ranked amongst the very greatest of poets" (, page 51), so there's that to recommend him.
Tolkien would, I'm sure, be drawn to the Catholic sentiment of The Hound of Heaven, in which the Hound is Christ, who lovingly hunts the lost soul of the poem's narrator, a biographical theme given Thompson's loss of faith, destitution, drug-addiction and ultimate return to the Christian fold. For myself, if I'm to get anything from the poem beyond the poetic imagery, and the rhythm and rhyme, it will be as symbolic of the finding of the Self in a psychological sense. I didn't find it in this, my first, reading, but I strongly suspect it's lying in wait for me in there, somewhere.
January 28, 2014
"And pulled my life upon me; grimed with smears,
I stand amid the dust o� the mounded years�
My mangled youth lies dead beneath the heap.
My days have crackled and gone up in smoke,
Have puffed and burst as sun-starts on a stream."
Yup. It's true.
I stand amid the dust o� the mounded years�
My mangled youth lies dead beneath the heap.
My days have crackled and gone up in smoke,
Have puffed and burst as sun-starts on a stream."
Yup. It's true.
September 10, 2016
“This dramatization of God’s grace is one of the greatest Christian poems�
- Quote Gene Edward Veith
Literary critic
Francis Thompson’s idealistic, illuminative poetic tale about realistic redemption, is startlingly sincere -- as the protagonist is freed from his dark depravities. One is taken on a transcendental voyage of internal and literal realities, encapsulated within an evangelical experimental work of epic proportions. This enduring, eternal tale is one that has been re-told many times over; within the works of creative genius� throughout the generations. I have to concur with G E. Veith’s view as this being ‘one of the greatest Christian poems�, for the veracity of verisimilitude within the verse is truly astonishing.
“All which thy child’s mistake
Fancies are lost. […]
‘Ah, fondest, blindest, weakest,
I am He Whom thou sleekest!�
F. Thompson’s poem tells the tale of a wealthy young man addicted to Opium in Victorian England, who is saved by God’s grace � as represented within the metaphor of ‘the hound� (of God’s footprints beside him). The ironic undercurrent is within the author’s own personal story � as Francis Thompson was a man who after rebelling against his forceful Father, lost himself in London. Therein lies the paradox of probability, when it wasn’t until he lay in the gloomy gutter of hopeless horrors did he have an epiphany! It was this ascension of arisen vision, when F. Thompson decided to write this paradoxical poem of potential possibility � a classic of continuum.
When wondering the wilderness of confused, conflicting realities it is actually not by the grace of God that the main protagonist [and author] is “saved� � rather that by reflecting upon wrongdoing, ‘he� is inherently saving himself.
‘Post tenebras lux!�
Where there is HOPE there is life.
March 26, 2015
There are two definitions for 'hound:'
(1) a type of dog that has a very good sense of smell and is trained to hunt
(2) a person who is very determined to get something especially for a collection : a very enthusiastic collector
Throughout this poem it is not only clear that our hero, the hound, is God personified, but it is also painfully clear that both hound definitions, as described above, are entirely apt.
So that's why I offered forth the hound definition up there at the beginning. Because it was apt.
I would have loved if writer dude used that stoner psychological religious trick about how "... dog is God spelled backward..." during one of his clever stanzas. But it didn't happen.
I will make it happen by personally constructing part two of the poem. I'm educated, so it'll be fine.
Hound of Heaven 2: Looking for the Man Who Shot My Paw
'Are you a carpenter?' was asked from afar.
'My specialty is roofing' came the answer from the stars.
Even with a new leash on life, the day had been ruff;
Some won't like it and they'll flea; others will say 'Muzzle toff!'
Subwoofers turned to news station informed of the following:
A nursing dog was arrested for littering.
A performing animal was involved with a fire at the circus (it was in tents.)
"Was it a talking dog?" "No, it was a spelling bee" said a man with no pants.
Waldo wears stripes because he doesn't want to be spotted...
A sad tail indeed was woven and you've just read how it transpired.
(1) a type of dog that has a very good sense of smell and is trained to hunt
(2) a person who is very determined to get something especially for a collection : a very enthusiastic collector
Throughout this poem it is not only clear that our hero, the hound, is God personified, but it is also painfully clear that both hound definitions, as described above, are entirely apt.
So that's why I offered forth the hound definition up there at the beginning. Because it was apt.
I would have loved if writer dude used that stoner psychological religious trick about how "... dog is God spelled backward..." during one of his clever stanzas. But it didn't happen.
I will make it happen by personally constructing part two of the poem. I'm educated, so it'll be fine.
Hound of Heaven 2: Looking for the Man Who Shot My Paw
'Are you a carpenter?' was asked from afar.
'My specialty is roofing' came the answer from the stars.
Even with a new leash on life, the day had been ruff;
Some won't like it and they'll flea; others will say 'Muzzle toff!'
Subwoofers turned to news station informed of the following:
A nursing dog was arrested for littering.
A performing animal was involved with a fire at the circus (it was in tents.)
"Was it a talking dog?" "No, it was a spelling bee" said a man with no pants.
Waldo wears stripes because he doesn't want to be spotted...
A sad tail indeed was woven and you've just read how it transpired.
April 28, 2016
"Alack, thou knowest not
How little worthy of any love thou art!
Whom wilt thou find to love ignoble thee,
Save Me, save only Me?
All which I took from thee I did but take,
Not for thy harms,
But just that thou might’st seek it in My arms."
A soul runs from God, seeking anything but Him. But he is pursued by the Hound of Heaven. Intense. Beautiful. Even mystical. One to ponder. I've been reading this daily for a week or so and I keep seeing something more. This is intense. I love it.
How little worthy of any love thou art!
Whom wilt thou find to love ignoble thee,
Save Me, save only Me?
All which I took from thee I did but take,
Not for thy harms,
But just that thou might’st seek it in My arms."
A soul runs from God, seeking anything but Him. But he is pursued by the Hound of Heaven. Intense. Beautiful. Even mystical. One to ponder. I've been reading this daily for a week or so and I keep seeing something more. This is intense. I love it.
Shelved as 'started-and-not-finished'
January 3, 2022A review of this collection early last year by a ŷ friend, who I felt misunderstood the title poem (which I originally read back in the 70s, though I'd never read any of Thompson's other work), prompted me to add it to my to-read shelf. When I was planning my January reading, I'd originally intended to begin the year with this book; and I did read G. K. Chesterton's insightful introduction, reread "The Hound of Heaven" itself, and got through some of the 10-page "Ode to the Setting Sun." Unfortunately, the main take-away from the experience was a forceful reminder that I usually don't get into Romantic-school lyric poetry, especially if it's long. The overblown, somewhat opaque style tends to make me bored and glassy-eyed; in this case, I almost fell asleep at one point. (That's a bit dangerous if, like me, you read while pedaling a stationary bike!) When my reading session ended, I knew I couldn't subject myself to another one. Many readers with different stylistic preferences in poetry from mine greatly appreciate this collection, however; I wouldn't presume to rate it, nor to discuss the other 22 poems that I didn't even read partially.
All of that said, though, having now read the title poem twice, I do feel qualified to have an opinion about Thompson's intended message in it. The friend I mentioned built her view of the poem on the fact that Thompson's father was a rather domineering parent who always expected more from Francis (who from boyhood on was on the sickly, day-dreamy side), in terms of worldly productivity, than he could produce, which meant that the boy always felt negatively judged by his dad, with resulting feelings of low self-esteem. From this, she assumed as obvious fact that the poet projected his view of his human father onto his view of God. To her, then, the poem is a story of a poor, put-upon human fleeing (with good reason) from a God-concept that he sees as persistently hounding him in order to browbeat him and force his square peg into a round hole. With all due respect, I see that interpretation as one read into the poem rather than "read out" of it, and in fact as refuted by a close reading of the poem itself. Thompson's own language here conveys the idea that, by the time he wrote the poem, he came to see his heavenly Father as someone who only wanted to offer him unmerited, unconditional love and acceptance, which he'd perversely been fruitlessly looking for in all the wrong places. (This message is especially clear on the last page of the poem.) The hound metaphor isn't that of a predator after its prey; rather, it emphasizes the idea of dog-like persistence and fidelity in following a loved one's scent. This "canine" just wants to jump into the poet's arms with tail wagging and cover his face with slobbery doggy kisses, not to take hold of his throat and savage him. That perception gives a considerably different slant on the poem!
All of that said, though, having now read the title poem twice, I do feel qualified to have an opinion about Thompson's intended message in it. The friend I mentioned built her view of the poem on the fact that Thompson's father was a rather domineering parent who always expected more from Francis (who from boyhood on was on the sickly, day-dreamy side), in terms of worldly productivity, than he could produce, which meant that the boy always felt negatively judged by his dad, with resulting feelings of low self-esteem. From this, she assumed as obvious fact that the poet projected his view of his human father onto his view of God. To her, then, the poem is a story of a poor, put-upon human fleeing (with good reason) from a God-concept that he sees as persistently hounding him in order to browbeat him and force his square peg into a round hole. With all due respect, I see that interpretation as one read into the poem rather than "read out" of it, and in fact as refuted by a close reading of the poem itself. Thompson's own language here conveys the idea that, by the time he wrote the poem, he came to see his heavenly Father as someone who only wanted to offer him unmerited, unconditional love and acceptance, which he'd perversely been fruitlessly looking for in all the wrong places. (This message is especially clear on the last page of the poem.) The hound metaphor isn't that of a predator after its prey; rather, it emphasizes the idea of dog-like persistence and fidelity in following a loved one's scent. This "canine" just wants to jump into the poet's arms with tail wagging and cover his face with slobbery doggy kisses, not to take hold of his throat and savage him. That perception gives a considerably different slant on the poem!
March 31, 2016
A beautiful poem. More to come in review after class discussion (hopefully).
First: This sets the stage. A man is running from God, not literally, but fleeing from him through the years. Meaning that for all his life he has avoided God.
Second: He flees to hearts, to the comfort of human love. Then he flees to science, which betrays him "in [its] constancy". And again we end with the contrasting difference between the fleeing man and the Pursuer. The former chaotic and spasmodic almost, while the later is firm, constant, walking "unperturbed" after.
Third: He sees in the innocence of the children the truth, but it is not how he should learn of this truth. God wants him to discover it in another way. Her turns then to nature. He "was one" in that fellowship, but "not by that, by that, was eased [his] human smart." Nature cannot satisfy his desire for love because it is below him. Nature is beautiful, it is wonderful, and he can connect to it in a certain way, but "they speak by silences". They have a different language. They work by instinct, not by will as he does.
Fourth: He has nothing left to run to. His dreams have failed. His youth "lies dead beneath the heap", making you feel that he has wasted away his life, that, for all his trying, nothing he did gave life to his memories of his past. He asks if God's love is a love that casts out all other loves. He seems to think that if he accepts the love of God, he can have nothing else. "The pulp so bitter, how shall taste the rind?" Coming to God, discovering his love, knowing of it, all this has been a bitter experience for the man, so how bitter shall be the love of God itself when he accepts it?
Fifth: He thought he was going to lose everything by accepting the love of God. But God says to him, "Lo, all things fly thee, for thou fliest Me!" That love from other things (humans) needs meriting, but the man cannot gain merit, so he cannot gain that love. Then the man finally realizes that what he fears was not what the love of God truly is. "Is my gloom, after all, Shade of his hand, outstretched caressingly?"
"Ah, fondest, blindest, weakest,
I am He Whom thou seekest!
Thou dravest love from thee, who dravest Me."
God was not chasing. The man was not fleeing. God was being driven away from the man.
First: This sets the stage. A man is running from God, not literally, but fleeing from him through the years. Meaning that for all his life he has avoided God.
Second: He flees to hearts, to the comfort of human love. Then he flees to science, which betrays him "in [its] constancy". And again we end with the contrasting difference between the fleeing man and the Pursuer. The former chaotic and spasmodic almost, while the later is firm, constant, walking "unperturbed" after.
Third: He sees in the innocence of the children the truth, but it is not how he should learn of this truth. God wants him to discover it in another way. Her turns then to nature. He "was one" in that fellowship, but "not by that, by that, was eased [his] human smart." Nature cannot satisfy his desire for love because it is below him. Nature is beautiful, it is wonderful, and he can connect to it in a certain way, but "they speak by silences". They have a different language. They work by instinct, not by will as he does.
Fourth: He has nothing left to run to. His dreams have failed. His youth "lies dead beneath the heap", making you feel that he has wasted away his life, that, for all his trying, nothing he did gave life to his memories of his past. He asks if God's love is a love that casts out all other loves. He seems to think that if he accepts the love of God, he can have nothing else. "The pulp so bitter, how shall taste the rind?" Coming to God, discovering his love, knowing of it, all this has been a bitter experience for the man, so how bitter shall be the love of God itself when he accepts it?
Fifth: He thought he was going to lose everything by accepting the love of God. But God says to him, "Lo, all things fly thee, for thou fliest Me!" That love from other things (humans) needs meriting, but the man cannot gain merit, so he cannot gain that love. Then the man finally realizes that what he fears was not what the love of God truly is. "Is my gloom, after all, Shade of his hand, outstretched caressingly?"
"Ah, fondest, blindest, weakest,
I am He Whom thou seekest!
Thou dravest love from thee, who dravest Me."
God was not chasing. The man was not fleeing. God was being driven away from the man.
May 19, 2015
This is rapidly becoming my favorite poem ever. My favorite line in the poem is Thompson's eloquence about his encounter with God has helped me see my own in a better light.
October 20, 2011
this is amazing! Really spoke to my heart, and will continue to do so, as I think this is the kind of thing that takes quite some time to really sink in. You need to keep reading it over and over, which I am planning to do.
March 15, 2020
Very helpful in my current study of both James Joyce and Gerard Manley Hopkins. Great book on its own merits.
April 18, 2021
These poems are to be read laying on a blanket on a hill while sipping wine.
January 19, 2018
A beautiful and intense ode to the inescapability of God's love, shamelessly archaic and grand, clearly influenced by the mystic visions of the likes of Blake and De Quincey.
In Thompson's world, God is everywhere and cannot be avoided, regardless of how we may try and our motives for evasion ('Fear wist not to evade as Love wist to pursue') or all the enticements of the world around us, where even the splendors of Nature can't satisfy:
'Drop yon blue bosom-veil of sky, and show me
The breasts o' her tenderness:
Never did any milk of hers once bless
My thirsting mouth.'
The poem is like a dream-chase, full of images of motion, but where the pursuer is alongside the pursued all along, until the final, welcoming summons:
"Ah, fondest, blindest, weakest,
I am He Whom thou seekest!
Thou dravest love from thee, who dravest Me."
In Thompson's world, God is everywhere and cannot be avoided, regardless of how we may try and our motives for evasion ('Fear wist not to evade as Love wist to pursue') or all the enticements of the world around us, where even the splendors of Nature can't satisfy:
'Drop yon blue bosom-veil of sky, and show me
The breasts o' her tenderness:
Never did any milk of hers once bless
My thirsting mouth.'
The poem is like a dream-chase, full of images of motion, but where the pursuer is alongside the pursued all along, until the final, welcoming summons:
"Ah, fondest, blindest, weakest,
I am He Whom thou seekest!
Thou dravest love from thee, who dravest Me."
August 1, 2022
The Hound of Heaven is a classic poem that has been compared to Shakespeare and also has been called "the greatest ode in the English language". The Hound in the poem is the Lord who continually seeks the writer even though the writer keeps running from Him. I don't have the easiest time comprehending poetry, especially one written long ago, but with the second reading of The Hound of Heaven I read it aloud and that helped me. In fact it even teared me up. I look forward to many more readings of this poem that I only just discovered. Written in 1893.
November 3, 2014
This is the first poem I ever remember reading. I don't think I really understood it that well, despite my Year 9 teacher's attempts to explain it. But it captured my imagination and drew me into another world.
December 23, 2014
'Ah, fondest, blindest, weakest,
I am He Whom thou seekest!
Thou dravest love from thee, who dravest Me.' F.T.
May 10, 2019
There are few poems which speak of GOD'S great love and chasing down of a sinner unlike this.
If anything this is highly reminiscent of the history of Jonah, the runaway prophet.
If anything this is highly reminiscent of the history of Jonah, the runaway prophet.
August 7, 2016
With its 40 pages of introduction and 20 pages of poetry, this poem is far from the epic Paradise Lost. But, even with its brevity and "old" language it is beautiful, lyrical, and fairly understandable. (After reading, I found a a helpful site with one person's interpretation.)
In the introduction, James J. Daly, S. J. writes, "The Divine energy of God's love, as displayed in the supernatural revelation of Himself, seems even vaster and more intense than the Divine energy of creation displayed in the revelation of nature. Every new revelation of God's power and wisdom which science unfolds serves only to restore a balance in our mind between God's power and God's love. The more astronomical the heavens become, the closer they bring God to us.
" . . . The weak soul is afraid of the terrible excess of Divine Love. It tries to elude it; but Love meets it at every cross-road and by-path . . ."
The prodigal flees from God, looking for satisfaction in people, in nature, in human love while God appeals to His beloved with patience and gentleness. As one thing after another fails to satisfy, God speaks. Then the Voice of God bursts forth like the sea and the pursued finally recognizes his unworthiness and understands the folly of his search for meaning.
God: "How little worthy of any love thou art! Whom wilt thou find to love ignoble thee, save Me, save only Me? . . . I am He whom thou seekest!"
"Oh, Love that will not let me go, I hang my wandering soul on Thee . . . " (George Matheson).
In the introduction, James J. Daly, S. J. writes, "The Divine energy of God's love, as displayed in the supernatural revelation of Himself, seems even vaster and more intense than the Divine energy of creation displayed in the revelation of nature. Every new revelation of God's power and wisdom which science unfolds serves only to restore a balance in our mind between God's power and God's love. The more astronomical the heavens become, the closer they bring God to us.
" . . . The weak soul is afraid of the terrible excess of Divine Love. It tries to elude it; but Love meets it at every cross-road and by-path . . ."
The prodigal flees from God, looking for satisfaction in people, in nature, in human love while God appeals to His beloved with patience and gentleness. As one thing after another fails to satisfy, God speaks. Then the Voice of God bursts forth like the sea and the pursued finally recognizes his unworthiness and understands the folly of his search for meaning.
God: "How little worthy of any love thou art! Whom wilt thou find to love ignoble thee, save Me, save only Me? . . . I am He whom thou seekest!"
"Oh, Love that will not let me go, I hang my wandering soul on Thee . . . " (George Matheson).
May 29, 2020
This little book languished on my unread shelf for a full year before I finally sat down and read it cover to cover. The large introduction gave a detailed account of the author's life, valuable background for full appreciation of this beautiful poem. The poem, published in 1893, I read aloud. I loved the way the words joined together and the echos of the author's own life in their lines. The repetition, the theology, the poetic beauty of this poem is stunning. In the introduction, the claim is made that Francis Thompson is second only to Shakespeare as a poet. I don't know enough about poetry to make a judgement on that statement, but it is indeed high praise.
December 7, 2017
I got a very old version of this from ebay or Amazon printed in 1945. There is a longwinded introduction by a Jesuit named James J Daly, and it is about as good as an introduction can be. The poem itself thrills in a way that secular poetry just can't hope to. Absolutely loved every minute I spent with this little book.
February 19, 2016
It's really a long poetic rant/praise about being relentlessly pursued by a loving God, metaphorically deemed a hound, rather than a short book. The language and dynamics are amazing, the theology passionate.
April 13, 2015
Great Poem
This was a great Catholic poem. I found it to be inspirational, thought provoking, and profound. It has inspired me to go toy computer and write.
This was a great Catholic poem. I found it to be inspirational, thought provoking, and profound. It has inspired me to go toy computer and write.
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