Excerpt from Modern British Poetry: Edited

Henley repudiated this languid aestheticism he scorned a negative art which was out of touch with the world. His was a large and sweeping affirmation. He felt that mere existence was glorious, life was coarse, di¿icult, Often dangerous and dirty, but splendid at the heart. Art, he knew, could not be separated from the dreams and hungers of man, it could not ¿ourish only on its own essences or technical accomplishments. To live, poetry would have to share the fears, angers, hopes and struggles of the prosaic world. And so Henley came like a swift salt breeze blowing through a perfumed and heavily-screened studio. He sang loudly (sometimes even too loudly) of the joy of living and the courage of the unconquerable soul. He was a powerful in¿uence not only as a poet but as a critic and editor. In the latter capacity he gathered about him such men as Robert Louis Stevenson, Rudyard Kip ling, Thomas Hardy, H. G. Wells, W. B. Yeats, T. E. Brown, J. M. Barrie. None of these men were his dis ciples, but none of them came into contact with him without being influenced in some way by his sharp and positive personality. A pioneer and something of a prophet, he was one Of the first to champion the paintings Of Whistler and to proclaim the genius of the sculptor Rodin.

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