When I was One and Twenty

The overriding theme of the poem is that one should always heed the
wisdom of experience. In this particular case, the wise man gives the
youngster some useful advice: never give your heart away; it will cost too
much in terms of emotional pain, and will lead inevitably to enormous
sorrow. Indeed, it would actually be better to be poor than to suffer the
heartrending sorrow of lost love.

But when the narrator first heard this sage advice, he was twenty-one and
never listened to anyone. The wisdom of old age was simply wasted on
him. As with many people of that age, he was young and in love and, as
often happens, he did indeed give his heart away.

A year later, he's finally understood what the wise man meant. His bitter
experience of lost love has made him a little wiser, so much so that he rues
the day he gave his heart away. The emphatic use of the vocative ("oh")
and the repetition of the expression "'tis true" in the final line of the poem
leave us in no doubt that the narrator has experienced a lot of emotional
pain in coming to the realization that the wise man was right all along.

RUE = Sorrow
BOSOM = Person’s Chest where secrets thought and feelings are kept

Invictus, meaning “unconquerable” or “undefeated” in Latin, is a poem by

William Ernest Henley. The poem was written while Henley was in the
hospital being treated for tuberculosis of the bone, also known as Pott’s
disease. He had had the disease since he was very young, and his foot
had been amputated shortly at 17 before he wrote the poem. This poem is
about courage in the face of death, and holding on to one’s own dignity
despite the indignities life places before us.

In the first stanza, Henley refers to the “night that covers me, black as the
pit from pole to pole” (lines 1 and 2); this night is generally a metaphor for
the hardships and problems of a worldly existence, but the line could
clearly be understood at the discretion of the reader by assigning the night
any of negative roles (any particular hardship that may encompass a
person’s entire life, such as a handicap like Henley’s; persistent, taxing
responsibilities; or sustained emotional injury). The next line, “the pit from
pole to pole” is a basic way of likening the darkness (or the difficulty) of the
night to the lightless, deep desolation of the center of the earth, and its
meaning does not require any change as understanding of the poem
changes. Lines 3 and 4, “I thank whatever gods may be/for my
unconquerable soul,” parallel the title and introduce the poem’s primary
focus. By suggesting that the soul is the creation of a higher power, the line
reinforces the theme of the unconquerable by associating the soul with the
interminable. Some critics have argued that line 3 is hard proof of the
author’s agnosticism, but other interpretations have left the statement as a
choice in poetic device rather than a religious preference, even hailing the
poem as one not quite contradictory (as agnostic analyses contend) to
conventional Christianity. Regardless of this, Henley definitely intended to
carry the meaning of his poetry to the spiritual level, which is further
explored in the third stanza.

The second stanza bears the image of a hapless victim whose predators
are the violent “circumstance” and “chance”; both abstract concepts are
solidified by lines 6-9. Line 6, “In the fell clutch of circumstance,” followed
by line 7, “I have not winced nor cried aloud” immediately instills an image
of an animal captured by the “fell clutch” of a predatory bird. The
circumstance, in Henley’s case, was likely a reference to his unfortunate
condition but, much like the many parts of the poem, is manipulable to
personal perspective. Though cursed with a great burden, he did not “wince
nor cry aloud,” that is, complain vociferously about his pain, as an animal
carried away would squeal to its demise. Then Chance, in lines 8-9,
appears with a baseball bat to do his damage: “Under the bludgeoning of
chance/my head is bloody, but unbowed.” Henley’s choice of imagery best
describes any case of one downtrodden by misfortune who has not
conceded due to events that transpire beyond his control, much as a hardy
prisoner beaten by his captors would not allow his head to bow in defeat.

Both warning and consoling, the third stanza brings in something past that
introduced in the second, showing a more spiritual side of the poem:
“Beyond this place of wrath and tears/looms the Horror of the shade” (lines
11 and 12). The “place of wrath and tears” of which Henley writes is the
world we live in, the place where we are the prey of circumstance and the
prisoners of chance. Beyond it, however, Henley suggests that there is
more by expressing his belief in an afterlife, but he does not simply relegate
the “Beyond” to simple optimism. Line 12’s “Horror of the shade” is the
unknown that is across the threshold of life and death that may hold more
hardships for the soul yet, and it is undoubtedly a concept explored by
many poets. “The menace of the years” (Line 13), of course, is the
expiration of our worldly time, the end of which would mark the beginning of
the journey to the shade beyond. To this, Henley holds defiantly that this
imminent end “finds, and shall find him unafraid.” This disregard for fear is
a declaration of acceptance of all that will come at the expiration of the
flesh.

Possibly the most famous and memorable of all, the fourth stanza is the
poem’s final affirmation of spiritual fortitude. Lines 16 and 17 are strongly
associated with Christian ideas and images. “It matters not how strait the
gate” (line 16) contains a direct biblical allusion: “Strait is the gate, and
narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it”
(Matthew 7:13-14). Line 16 is not a contradiction of the straight and narrow
path, but rather an acceptance of its challenge, similar to that in the third
stanza. “Scroll,” in line 17, again alludes to heavenly imagery; it does not
matter what punishments one may bear from life and the afterlife as long as
one is confidently in control.

First Year at Harrow by Sir Winston S. Churchill Summary:

In this essay, the writer has explained the place of examinations in the life
of a student and the choice of the right subjects. He tells that he never liked
examinations because he could not perform well in the examinations. He
tells that examiners asked the questions he could not produce a
satisfactory answer for.
In the entrance examination at Harrow, the author got zero marks in Latin
paper. He just wrote his name and returned the empty answer sheet back.
The Headmaster, Mr. Welldon, however, let him be admitted at Harrow. It
was both surprising and pleasant for the author.
The writer narrates that he was only two from the bottom of the merit list of
admissions. While clever boys went for Latin and Greek because in that
time these subjects were most important. He was taught English because
of his apparent inability to study Latin and Greek.
The author worked hard and got good grades in English. His English
teacher, Mr. Somervell taught him English thoroughly in an effective way.
He surpassed all grammar rules and English prose. He had a long-term
advantage over the clever boy. They had to improve their English later
when they were in their jobs. The author is not sad for having not learned
Latin and Greek. He says that he would whip those boys for not knowing
English.