This is probably the ultimate mid-Victorian poem, everything you need to know about British culture around the time of the Great Exhibition condensed into one novella-length (just under 3000 lines) piece of verse. Reflecting on his reaction to the sudden death of his college friend Arthur Hallam at the age of 22 in 1833, Tennyson analyses the process of grieving and recovery, and examines what death means to him in the context of Christian (Anglican) religious ideas and the way they have been shaken up by recent scientific discoveries. Fossils, descent from apes, age of the planet, Nature "So careful of the type ... So careless of the single life", and all the rest of it. You name it, it's in there somewhere.

The sections of the poem follow a roughly chronological sequence, starting with the poet reacting to news of his friend's death and following in his imagination the progress of the ship bringing his remains back to Britain, and ending years later with the happy marriage of the poet's sister Emilia, who had been engaged to marry Arthur. Along the way he goes back and forward through different ways of dealing with grief and loss, sometimes depressed and desperate, sometimes reconciled to the idea that "'Tis better to have loved and lost / Than never to have loved at all."

And of course this is a poem full of lines that have entered the language, from "Nature red in tooth and claw" to "Ring out, wild bells". It was a huge hit in its time, and copies flew off the presses, especially after Queen Victoria announced that she had taken great consolation from it after the death of her husband in 1862. Tennyson ended up with the Laureateship and a peerage, with a standing more like that of a former prime minister than a poet.

Reading it 170 years on, of course there's a lot that feels archaic, and the endless pattern of tetrameter quatrains in ABBA rhyme-scheme can seem a bit mechanical, but there's also a lot in his insight into the way we deal with loss and death that still feels relevant and helpful: I don't suppose many people read this without thinking about the way the poet's reflections would map onto a loss in their own lives, and probably feeling better about it as a result. ( )

A very long poem lamenting the loss of a friend and brother-in-law. I don't give ratings based on quality only enjoyment. And overall i thought this was pretty meh.
There are times when it sparkles but the quality seems very uneven. I like poetry best when its telling a story or painting a picture.
I understand this was written over 17 years but it feels like there was a significant gap before the final 5th, as suddenly it becomes more philosophical and the grief seems severely reduced from the first 4/5ths.
The read does raise some interesting questions though. Due to its length it can come across (perhaps quite wrongly) as self-centered, being so focused on the authors grief with seemingly no thought for anyone else's. Including his sister who was married to the deceased. In fact she barely gets a mention until the end.
I also wonder how much of this affection was returned. Call me cynical but in my experience love/friendship is never mutually strong.
I've always had trouble processing/appreciating poetry that isn't story based (like [b: Idyll's of the King|393636|Idylls of the King|Alfred Tennyson|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1380979896s/393636.jpg|937372] which is awesome!) and this read has none nothing to show that i've grown over the years :) . ( )

"Like Tennyson's "In Memoriam" it seems to me to be work which sprang into full flower fifty years before its time. One can hardly open a page haphazard without lighting upon some passage which illustrates the breadth of view, the felicity of phrase, and the singular power of playful but most suggestive analogy. " --Through the Magic Door, p. 256.