Thomas Ernest Hulme (; 16 September 1883 – 28 September 1917) was an English critic and poet who, through his writings on art, literature and politics, had a notable influence upon

modernism Modernism is both a philosophy, philosophical and arts movement that arose from broad transformations in Western world, Western society during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The movement reflected a desire for the creation of new fo ...

. He was an aesthetic philosopher and the 'father of imagism'.

Early life

Hulme was born at Gratton Hall,

Endon Endon is a village within the Staffordshire Moorlands district of Staffordshire, England. It is southwest of Leek and north-northeast of Stoke-on-Trent. Endon was formerly a township in civil parish of Leek. Together with neighbouring Stan ...

, Staffordshire, the son of Thomas and Mary Hulme. He was educated at Newcastle-under-Lyme High School and, from 1902, St John's College, Cambridge, where he read mathematics, but was sent down in 1904 after rowdy behaviour on

Boat Race Boat racing is a sport in which boats, or other types of watercraft, race on water. Boat racing powered by oars is recorded as having occurred in ancient Egypt, and it is likely that people have engaged in races involving boats and other wate ...

night. He was thrown out of Cambridge a second time after a scandal involving a Roedean girl. He returned to his studies at

University College London , mottoeng = Let all come who by merit deserve the most reward , established = , type = Public research university , endowment = £143 million (2020) , budget = ...

, before travelling around

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...

and spending time in

Brussels Brussels (french: Bruxelles or ; nl, Brussel ), officially the Brussels-Capital Region (All text and all but one graphic show the English name as Brussels-Capital Region.) (french: link=no, Région de Bruxelles-Capitale; nl, link=no, Bruss ...

acquiring languages.

Proto-modernist

From about 1907 Hulme became interested in philosophy, translating works by Henri Bergson and sitting in on lectures at Cambridge. He translated

Georges Sorel Georges Eugène Sorel (; ; 2 November 1847 – 29 August 1922) was a French social thinker, political theorist, historian, and later journalist. He has inspired theories and movements grouped under the name of Sorelianism. His social and ...

's ''Reflections on Violence''. The most important influences on his thought were Bergson, who asserted that 'human experience is relative, but religious and ethical values are absolute' and, later, Wilhelm Worringer (1881–1965), German art historian and critic – in particular his ''Abstraktion und Einfühlung'' (''Abstraction and Empathy'', 1908). Hulme was influenced by

Remy de Gourmont Remy de Gourmont (4 April 1858 – 27 September 1915) was a French symbolist poet, novelist, and influential critic. He was widely read in his era, and an important influence on Blaise Cendrars and Georges Bataille. The spelling ''Rémy'' de Gour ...

's aristocratic concept of art and his studies of sensibility and style. From 1909 Hulme contributed critical articles to '' The New Age'', edited by A. R. Orage. Hulme developed an interest in poetry and wrote a small number of poems. He was made secretary of the Poets' Club, attended by such establishment figures as

Edmund Gosse Sir Edmund William Gosse (; 21 September 184916 May 1928) was an English poet, author and critic. He was strictly brought up in a small Protestant sect, the Plymouth Brethren, but broke away sharply from that faith. His account of his childhoo ...

and

Henry Newbolt Sir Henry John Newbolt, CH (6 June 1862 – 19 April 1938) was an English poet, novelist and historian. He also had a role as a government adviser with regard to the study of English in England. He is perhaps best remembered for his poems "Vit ...

. There he encountered Ezra Pound and F. S. Flint. In late 1908 Hulme delivered his paper ''

A Lecture on Modern Poetry "A Lecture on Modern Poetry" was a paper by T. E. Hulme which was read to the Poets' Club around the end of 1908. It is a concise statement of Hulme's influential advocacy of free verse Free verse is an open form of poetry, which in its modern ...

'' to the club. Hulme's poems "Autumn" and "A City Sunset", both published in 1909 in a Poets' Club anthology, have the distinction of being the first

Imagist Imagism was a movement in early-20th-century Anglo-American poetry that favored precision of imagery and clear, sharp language. It is considered to be the first organized modernist literary movement in the English language. Imagism is someti ...

poems. A further five poems were published in ''The New Age'' in 1912 as ''The Complete Poetical Works of T. E. Hulme''. Despite this misleading title, Hulme in fact wrote about 25 poems totalling some 260 lines, of which the majority were possibly written between 1908 and 1910. Robert Frost met Hulme in 1913 and was influenced by his ideas. The publisher of the book 'Ripostes' (to which Pound appended the 'complete' poetical works of T. E. Hulme) spoke in that book of Hulme 'the meta-physician, who achieves great rhythmical beauty in curious verse-forms.' In his critical writings Hulme distinguished between

Romanticism Romanticism (also known as the Romantic movement or Romantic era) was an artistic, literary, musical, and intellectual movement that originated in Europe towards the end of the 18th century, and in most areas was at its peak in the approximate ...

, a style informed by a belief in the infinite in man and nature, characterised by Hulme as "spilt religion", and

Classicism Classicism, in the arts, refers generally to a high regard for a classical period, classical antiquity in the Western tradition, as setting standards for taste which the classicists seek to emulate. In its purest form, classicism is an aesthet ...

, a mode of art stressing human finitude, formal restraint, concrete imagery and, in Hulme's words, "dry hardness". Similar views were later expressed by T. S. Eliot. Hulme's ideas had a major effect on

Wyndham Lewis Percy Wyndham Lewis (18 November 1882 – 7 March 1957) was a British writer, painter and critic. He was a co-founder of the Vorticist movement in art and edited ''BLAST,'' the literary magazine of the Vorticists. His novels include ''Tarr'' ( ...

(quite literally when they came to blows over Kate Lechmere; Lewis ended the worse for it, hung upside down by the cuffs of his trousers from the railings of Great Ormond Street). He championed the art of

Jacob Epstein Sir Jacob Epstein (10 November 1880 – 21 August 1959) was an American-British sculptor who helped pioneer modern sculpture. He was born in the United States, and moved to Europe in 1902, becoming a British subject in 1911. He often produce ...

and

David Bomberg David Garshen Bomberg (5 December 1890 – 19 August 1957) was a British painter, and one of the Whitechapel Boys. Bomberg was one of the most audacious of the exceptional generation of artists who studied at the Slade School of Art under Henr ...

, was a friend of Gaudier-Brzeska, and was in on the debut of Lewis's literary magazine ''

BLAST Blast or The Blast may refer to: *Explosion, a rapid increase in volume and release of energy in an extreme manner *Detonation, an exothermic front accelerating through a medium that eventually drives a shock front Film * ''Blast'' (1997 film), ...

'' and

vorticism Vorticism was a London-based modernist art movement formed in 1914 by the writer and artist Wyndham Lewis. The movement was partially inspired by Cubism and was introduced to the public by means of the publication of the Vorticist manifesto in ...

. Hulme's politics were conservative, and he moved further to the right after 1911 as a result of contact with Pierre Lasserre, who was associated with ''

Action Française Action may refer to: * Action (narrative), a literary mode * Action fiction, a type of genre fiction * Action game, a genre of video game Film * Action film, a genre of film * ''Action'' (1921 film), a film by John Ford * ''Action'' (1980 fil ...

''.

First World War

Hulme volunteered as an artilleryman in 1914 and served with the

Honourable Artillery Company The Honourable Artillery Company (HAC) is a reserve regiment in the British Army. Incorporated by royal charter in 1537 by King Henry VIII, it is the oldest regiment in the British Army and is considered the second-oldest military unit in the w ...

and later the

Royal Marine Artillery The history of the Royal Marines began on 28 October 1664 with the formation of the Duke of York and Albany's Maritime Regiment of Foot soon becoming known as the Admiral's Regiment. During the War of the Spanish Succession the most historic achi ...

in France and Belgium. He kept up his writing for ''The New Age''. Notable publications during this period for that magazine were "War Notes", written under the pen name "North Staffs", and "A Notebook", which contains some of his most organised critical writing. He was wounded in 1916. Back at the front in 1917, he was killed by a shell at

Oostduinkerke Oostduinkerke (; french: Ostdunkerque ; vls, Ôostduunkerke) is a place in the Belgian province of West Flanders, where it is located on the southern west coast of Belgium. Once a municipality of its own, Oostduinkerke now is a sub-municipali ...

near Nieuwpoort, in

West Flanders ) , settlement_type = Province of Belgium , image_flag = Flag of West Flanders.svg , flag_size = , image_shield = Wapen van West-Vlaanderen.svg , shield_size = , image_map ...

..On 28 September 1917, four days after his thirty-fourth birthday, Hulme suffered a direct hit from a large shell which literally blew him to pieces. Apparently absorbed in some thought of his own he had failed to hear it coming and remained standing while those around threw themselves flat on the ground. What was left of him was buried in the Military Cemetery at Koksijde, West-Vlaanderen, in Belgium where—no doubt for want of space—he is described simply as 'One of the
War poet A war poet is a poet who participates in a war and writes about their experiences, or a non-combatant who writes poems about war. While the term is applied especially to those who served during the First World War, the term can be applied to a p ...
s'."Ferguson, Robert (2002). ''The Short Sharp Life of T. E. Hulme''. London: Allen Lane, p. 270.

Works

*
Notes on Language and Style
' (1929, University of Washington Book Store); in ''The Criterion'', Vol. 3, No. 12, (July 1925) (ed. Herbert Read) *
Speculations: Essays on Humanism and the Philosophy of Art
' (1936, K. Paul, Trench, Trubner & Co., Ltd.), edited by Herbert Read * ''Further Speculations of T. E. Hulme'' (1955, University of Minnesota), edited by Samuel Hynes * ''The Collected Writings of T. E. Hulme'' (1996, OUP), edited by Karen Csengeri * ''Selected Writings of T. E. Hulme'' (2003, Fyfield Books), edited by

Patrick McGuinness Patrick McGuinness (born 1968) is a British academic, critic, novelist, and poet. He is Professor of French and Comparative Literature at the University of Oxford, where he is Fellow and Tutor at St Anne's College. Life McGuinness was born i ...

Selected poems

* ''Above the Dock'' * ''Autumn'' * ''A City Sunset'' * ''Conversion'' * ''The Embankment'' * ''Mana Aboda'' * ''The Man in the Crow's Nest'' * ''Susan Ann and Immortality'' * ''The Poet'' * ''A Tall Woman'' * ''A Sudden Secret'' * ''In the Quiet Land'' * ''At Night!'' * ''Town Sky-line''

As translator

* Henri Bergson,
An Introduction to Metaphysics
', (1912) *

,
Reflections on Violence
', (1915)

Articles

"Belated Romanticism,"
''The New Age'', Vol. IV, No. 17, 1909.
"The New Philosophy,"
''The New Age'', Vol. V, No. 10, 1909.
"Bergson and Bax,"
''The New Age'', Vol. V, No. 13, 1909.
"Searchers after Reality: Bax,"
''The New Age'', Vol. V, No. 14, 1909.
"Searchers after Reality: Haldane,"
''The New Age'', Vol. V, No. 17, 1909.
"A Note on 'La Foi',"
''The New Age'', Vol. V, No. 27, 1909.
"Searchers after Reality: Jules De Gaultier,"
''The New Age'', Vol. VI, No. 5, 1909.
"Notes on the Bologna Congress,"
''The New Age'', Vol. VIII, No. 26, 1911.
"Bergsonism in Paris,"
''The New Age'', Vol. IX, No. 8, 1911.
"Bax on Bergson,"
''The New Age'', Vol. IX, No. 14, 1911.
"Notes on Bergson,"
''The New Age'', Vol. IX, No. 25, 1911.
"Notes on Bergson II,"
''The New Age'', Vol. IX, No. 26, 1911.
"Mr. Balfour, Bergson, and Politics,"
''The New Age'', Vol. X, No. 2, 1911.
"Notes on Bergson III,"
''The New Age'', Vol. X, No. 4, 1911.
"Notes on Bergson IV,"
''The New Age'', Vol. X, No. 5, 1911.
"Notes on Bergson V,"
''The New Age'', Vol. X, No. 17, 1912.
"Mr. Epstein and the Critics,"
''The New Age'', Vol. XIV, No. 8, 1913.
"German Chronicle"
''Poetry and Drama'', Vol. II, 1914.
"Modern Art: The Grafton Group,"
''The New Age'', Vol. XIV, No. 11, 1914.
"Modern Art: A Preface Note and Neo-Realism,"
''The New Age'', Vol. XIV, No. 15, 1914.
"Modern Art: The London Group,"
''The New Age'', Vol. XIV, No. 21, 1914.
"Modern Art: Mr. David Bomberg's Show,"
''The New Age'', Vol. XV, No. 10, 1914.
"The Translator's Preface to Sorel's 'Reflections on Violence',"
''The New Age'', Vol. XVII, No. 24, 1915.
"War Notes,"
''The New Age'', Vol. XVIII, No. 2, 1915 (as ''North Staffs'').
"War Notes,"
''The New Age'', Vol. XVIII, No. 3, 1915 (as ''North Staffs'').
"War Notes,"
''The New Age'', Vol. XVIII, No. 4, 1915 (as ''North Staffs'').
"War Notes,"
''The New Age'', Vol. XVIII, No. 5, 1915 (as ''North Staffs'').
"A Notebook,"
''The New Age'', Vol. XVIII, No. 5, 1915.
"War Notes,"
''The New Age'', Vol. XVIII, No. 6, 1915 (as ''North Staffs'').
"A Notebook,"
''The New Age'', Vol. XVIII, No. 6, 1915.
"War Notes,"
''The New Age'', Vol. XVIII, No. 7, 1915 (as ''North Staffs'').
"A Notebook,"
''The New Age'', Vol. XVIII, No. 7, 1915.
"War Notes,"
''The New Age'', Vol. XVIII, No. 8, 1915 (as ''North Staffs'').
"A Notebook,"
''The New Age'', Vol. XVIII, No. 8, 1915.
"War Notes,"
''The New Age'', Vol. XVIII, No. 9, 1915 (as ''North Staffs'').
"War Notes,"
''The New Age'', Vol. XVIII, No. 10, 1916 (as ''North Staffs'').
"A Notebook,"
''The New Age'', Vol. XVIII, No. 10, 1916.
"War Notes,"
''The New Age'', Vol. XVIII, No. 11, 1916 (as ''North Staffs'').
"War Notes,"
''The New Age'', Vol. XVIII, No. 12, 1916 (as ''North Staffs'').
"War Notes,"
''The New Age'', Vol. XVIII, No. 13, 1916 (as ''North Staffs'').
"A Notebook,"
''The New Age'', Vol. XVIII, No. 13, 1916.
"War Notes,"
''The New Age'', Vol. XVIII, No. 14, 1916 (as ''North Staffs'').
"War Notes,"
''The New Age'', Vol. XVIII, No. 15, 1916 (as ''North Staffs'').
"A Notebook,"
''The New Age'', Vol. XVIII, No. 15, 1916.
"War Notes,"
''The New Age'', Vol. XVIII, No. 16, 1916 (as ''North Staffs'').
"War Notes,"
''The New Age'', Vol. XVIII, No. 17, 1916 (as ''North Staffs'').
"War Notes,"
''The New Age'', Vol. XVIII, No. 18, 1916 (as ''North Staffs'').
"The Note-Books of T. E. Hulme,"
''The New Age'', Vol. XXX, No. 12, 1922.
"The Note-Books of T. E. Hulme: II,"
''The New Age'', Vol. XXX, No. 13, 1922.
"The Note-Books of T. E. Hulme: III,"
''The New Age'', Vol. XXX, No. 15, 1922.
"The Note-Books of T. E. Hulme: IV,"
''The New Age'', Vol. XXX, No. 16, 1922.
"The Note-Books of T. E. Hulme: Bergson's Theory of Art,"
''The New Age'', Vol. XXX, No. 22, 1922.
"The Note-Books of T. E. Hulme: Bergson's Theory of Art, II"
''The New Age'', Vol. XXX, No. 23, 1922.
"The Note-Books of T. E. Hulme: Bergson's Theory of Art, III"
''The New Age'', Vol. XXX, No. 24, 1922.

Notes

* Beasley, Rebecca (2007). ''Theorists of Modernist Poetry. T. S. Eliot, T. E. Hulme, Ezra Pound''. London: Routledge. * Belgion, Montgomery (1927). "In Memory of T. E. Hulme," ''The Saturday Review'', Vol. IV, No. 10, pp. 154–155. * Brookner, Jewel Spears, (1984). ''T. E. Hulme and Irving Babbitt: An Annotated Bibliography''. New York: Garland. * Coffman, Stanley K., Jr. (1951). ''Imagism: A Chapter for the History of Modern Poetry''. University of Oklahoma Press. * Collin, W. E. (1930). "Beyond Humanism: Some Notes on T. E. Hulme," ''The Sewanee Review'', Vol. 38, No. 3, pp. 332–339. * Comentale, Edward P.; Andrzej Gasiorek (2013). ''T. E. Hulme and the Question of Modernism''. Aldershot: Ashgate Publishing, Ltd. * Csengeri, K. E. (1982). "T. E. Hulme's Borrowings from the French," ''Comparative Literature'', Vol. 34, No. 1, pp. 16–27. * Eliot, T. S. (1932). ''Selected Essays, 1917-1932''. London: Faber and Faber. * Epstein, Jacob (1955). "T.E. Hulme and his Friends." In: ''Epstein: An Autobiography''. New York: E.P. Dutton & Company, pp. 59–62. * Ferguson, Robert (2002). The Short Sharp Life of T. E. Hulme. London: Allen Lane * Flint, F. S. (1915)
"The History of Imagism,"
''The Egoist'', Vol. II, No. 5, pp. 70–71. * Hadjiyiannis, Christos (2013). "Ezra Pound, T. E. Hulme, Edward Storer: Imagism as Anti-Romanticism in the Pre-Des Imagistes Era". In: ''Imagism: Essays on its Initiation, Impact and Influence''. Ed. John Gery, Daniel Kempton, and H. R. Stoneback, The University of New Orleans Press, pp. 35–46. * Harmer, J. B. (1975). ''Victory in Limbo: Imagism 1908-1917''. London: Secker & Warburg. * Hoeres, Peter (2003)
"T. E. Hulme - Ein konservativer Revolutionär aus England"
in: ''Zeitschrift für Politik'', 50, pp. 187–204. * Hughes, Glenn, (1931). ''Imagism and the Imagists''. Stanford, CA.: Stanford University Press. * Jones, Alun (1960). ''The Life and Opinions of T. E. Hulme''. London: Victor Gollancz. * Kamerbeek, Jr., J. (1969). "T. E. Hulme and German Philosophy: Dilthey and Scheler," ''Comparative Literature'', Vol. 21, No. 3, pp. 193–212. * Kishler, Thomas C. (1976). "Original Sin and T. E. Hulme's Aesthetics," ''Journal of Aesthetic Education'', Vol. 10, No. 2, pp. 99–106. * Kuhn, Elizabeth (2011). "Toward an Anti-Humanism of Life: The Modernism of Nietzsche, Hulme and Yeats," ''Journal of Modern Literature'', Vol. 34, No. 4, pp. 1–20. * Levenson, Michael H. (1984). ''A Genealogy of Modernism. A Study of English Literary Doctrine 1908-1922''. Cambridge University Press. * Litz, A. Walton (2000). ''Modernism and the New Criticism''. Cambridge University Press. * Nott, Kathleen (1954)
"Mr. Hulme's Sloppy Dregs."
In: ''The Emperor Clothes''. London: William Heinemann Ltd., pp. 56–104. * Orage, A. R. (1920)
"Readers and Writers,"
''The New Age'', Vol. XXVII, No. 17, pp. 259–260. * Paige, D. D. (1951)
''The Letters of Ezra Pound, 1907-1941''
London: Faber and Faber. * Rackin, Phyllis (1967). "Hulme, Richards, and the Development of Contextualist Poetic Theory," ''The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism'', Vol. 25, No. 4, pp. 413–425. * Rae, Patricia (1997). ''The Practical Muse. Pragmatist Poetics in Hulme, Pound, and Stevens''. Bucknell University Press. * Read, Herbert (1953). "The Isolation of the Image: T.E. Hulme." In: ''The True Voice of Feeling.'' London: Faber & Faber, pp. 101–115. * Roberts, Michael (1938). ''T. E. Hulme''. London: Faber & Faber (Rep. by Carcanet Press, 1982). * Salter, K. W. (1965)
"Traherne and a Romantic Heresy."
In: ''Thomas Traherne: Mystic And Poet''. New York: Barnes and Noble, Inc., pp. 130–135. * Schuchard, Ronald (2003). "Did Eliot Know Hulme? Final Answer," ''Journal of Modern Literature'', Vol. 27(1/2), pp. 63–69. * Shusterman, Richard (1985). "Remembering Hulme: A Neglected Philosopher-Critic-Poet," ''Journal of the History of Ideas'', Vol. 46, No. 4, pp. 559–576. * Tatham, Jr., Lewis Charles (1965)
"T. E. Hulme."
In: ''Shelley and his Twentieth-Century Detractors''. (M.A. Thesis) University of Florida. * Tigani, Francesco (2016). "Fra immaginazione e realtà: dalla critica del Romanticismo alla teologia politica negli scritti di Thomas Ernest Hulme e Carl Schmitt'", ''Información Filosófica'', XIII, pp. 91–110. * Tindall, William York (1955)
''The Literary Symbol''
Columbia University Press. * Wilhelm, J. J. (2010). ''Ezra Pound in London and Paris, 1908–1925''. Penn State Press * Williams, Raymond (1960)
"T. E. Hulme."
In: ''Culture & Society 1780-1950''. New York: Doubleday & Company, Inc., pp. 205–210.

External links

* * *
Critical discussion of Hulme's work
including texts of 16 poems
Univ. of Southern Denmark

List of manuscript and typescript poems, etc.
held a
Keele University Library

Romanticism and Classicism

A Note on the Art of Political Conversion

‘A Definite Meaning’: The Art Criticism of T. E. Hulme

The Evolution of T. E. Hulme's Thought

{{DEFAULTSORT:Hulme, TE 1883 births 1917 deaths Military personnel from Staffordshire Alumni of St John's College, Cambridge Alumni of University College London Royal Marines officers Royal Marines personnel of World War I British military personnel killed in World War I Imagists English literary critics People from Endon People educated at Newcastle-under-Lyme School English male poets 20th-century English poets 20th-century English male writers English male non-fiction writers British Army personnel of World War I Honourable Artillery Company officers