Victorian

Arthur O'Shaughnessy

1844–1881


Arthur O'Shaughnessy (1844–1881) was an English poet who worked as a herpetologist at the British Museum while publishing richly musical, melancholy verse.

His Ode, beginning "We are the music makers," is his most famous poem and a manifesto for the visionary power of artists.

  1. Ianoula
  2. The Fair Maid and the Sun
  3. The Cypress
  4. A Precious Urn
  5. Seraphitus
  6. The Lover
  7. A Whisper from the Grave
  8. Bisclavaret
  9. Thought
  10. The Story of the King
  11. Palm Flowers
  12. Creation
  13. The Wife of Hephæstus
  14. Cleopatra
  15. The Daughter of Herodias
  16. Helen
  17. A Troth for Eternity
  18. Death
  19. The Fountain of Tears
  20. Love After Death
  21. Sown Seed
  22. A Discord
  23. Galanterie
  24. I.
  25. II
  26. Lost Blisses
  27. The Spectre of the Past
  28. A Fading Face
  29. The Heart’s Questions
  30. Barcarolle
  31. Ballad
  32. A Wasted Land
  33. Charmed Moments
  34. A Life-tomb
  35. The Slave of Apollo
  36. The Poet’s Grave
  37. Ode
  38. Song
  39. A Love Symphony
  40. You may feel, when a falling leaf brushes
  41. If one should give me a heart to keep
  42. En Soph: Prayer of the Soul on entering Human Life
  43. Sonnet (1867)
  44. Song of Palms
  45. Zuleika
  46. Song
  47. Greater Memory
  48. In Love's Eternity
  49. At Her Grave
  50. Silences
  51. Lynmouth
  52. If She But Knew
  53. Song

See Arthur O'Shaughnessy in the full archive →