Robert Bridges
Overview
 
Robert Seymour Bridges, OM, (23 October 1844 – 21 April 1930) was a British poet, and poet laureate
Poet Laureate
A poet laureate is a poet officially appointed by a government and is often expected to compose poems for state occasions and other government events...

 from 1913 to 1930.
Bridges was born in Walmer
Walmer
Walmer is a town in the district of Dover, Kent in England: located on the coast, the parish of Walmer is six miles north-east of Dover. Largely residential, its coastline and castle attract many visitors...

, Kent
Kent
Kent is a county in southeast England, and is one of the home counties. It borders East Sussex, Surrey and Greater London and has a defined boundary with Essex in the middle of the Thames Estuary. The ceremonial county boundaries of Kent include the shire county of Kent and the unitary borough of...

, in the UK, and educated at Eton College
Eton College
Eton College, often referred to simply as Eton, is a British independent school for boys aged 13 to 18. It was founded in 1440 by King Henry VI as "The King's College of Our Lady of Eton besides Wyndsor"....

 and Corpus Christi College, Oxford
Corpus Christi College, Oxford
Corpus Christi College is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom...

. He went on to study medicine in London at St Bartholomew's Hospital
St Bartholomew's Hospital
St Bartholomew's Hospital, also known as Barts, is a hospital in Smithfield in the City of London, England.-Early history:It was founded in 1123 by Raherus or Rahere , a favourite courtier of King Henry I...

, intending to practise until the age of forty and then retire to write poetry.

He practised as a casualty physician at his teaching hospital (where he made a series of highly critical remarks about the Victorian medical establishment) and subsequently as a full physician to the Great (later Royal) Northern Hospital.
Quotations

For beauty being the best of all we knowSums up the unsearchable and secret aimsOf nature.

The Growth of Love, Sonnet 8

They gathered up the crystal manna to freezeTheir tongues with tasting, their hands with snowballing;Or rioted in a drift, plunging up to the knees.

London Snow, l. 20-22

To-morrow it seemLike the empty words of a dreamRemembered on waking.

I Love all Beauteous Things, st. 2

Surely thy body is thy mind,For in thy face is nought to find,Only thy soft unchristened smile,That shadows neither love nor guile.

Eros, st. 2

Angels’ song, comfortingas the comfort of ChristWhen he spake tenderlyto his sorrowful flock.

Noel Christmas Eve 1913

 
x
OK