Walter John de la Mare (; 25 April 1873 – 22 June 1956) was an English poet, short story writer, and novelist. He is probably best remembered for his works for children, for his poem "The Listeners", and for a highly acclaimed selection of subtle psychological horror stories, amongst them "Seaton's Aunt" and "All Hallows". In 1921, his novel '' Memoirs of a Midget'' won the

James Tait Black Memorial Prize The James Tait Black Memorial Prizes are literary prizes awarded for literature written in the English language. They, along with the Hawthornden Prize, are Britain's oldest literary awards. Based at the University of Edinburgh in Scotland, Uni ...

for fiction, and his post-war ''

Collected Stories for Children ''Collected Stories for Children'' is a collection of 17 fantasy stories or original fairy tales by Walter de la Mare, first published by Faber in 1947 with illustrations by Irene Hawkins. De la Mare won the annual Carnegie Medal recognising t ...

'' won the 1947 Carnegie Medal for British children's books.

Life

De la Mare was born in Kent at 83, Maryon Road, Charlton (now part of the

Royal Borough of Greenwich The Royal Borough of Greenwich (, , or ) is a London borough in southeast Greater London. The London Borough of Greenwich was formed in 1965 by the London Government Act 1963. The new borough covered the former area of the Metropolitan Borough ...

), partly descended from a family of French

Huguenot The Huguenots ( , also , ) were a religious group of French Protestants who held to the Reformed, or Calvinist, tradition of Protestantism. The term, which may be derived from the name of a Swiss political leader, the Genevan burgomaster Be ...

silk merchants, and was educated at

St Paul's Cathedral School (''By Faith and By Learning'') , established = , closed = , type = Independent preparatory schoolChoral foundation school , religious_affiliation = Church of England , president = , head_label = Headmaster , hea ...

. He was born to James Edward de la Mare (1811–1877), a principal at the Bank of England, and James's second wife Lucy Sophia (1838–1920), daughter of Scottish

naval surgeon A naval surgeon, or less commonly ship's doctor, is the person responsible for the health of the ship's company aboard a warship. The term appears often in reference to Royal Navy's medical personnel during the Age of Sail. Ancient uses Speciali ...

and author Dr Colin Arrott Browning.Theresa Whistler,
Mare, Walter John de la (1873–1956)
, ''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography'', Oxford University Press, 2004; online edn, Oct. 2006. Retrieved 2 April 2013. The suggestion that Lucy was related to poet Robert Browning has been found to be incorrect. He had two brothers, Francis Arthur Edward and James Herbert, and four sisters Florence Mary, Constance Eliza, Ethel (who died in infancy), and Ada Mary. De la Mare preferred to be known as 'Jack' by his family and friends as he disliked the name Walter. He worked from 1890 in the statistics department of the London office of Standard Oil for eighteen years to support his family, but nevertheless found time to write. In 1908, through the efforts of Sir

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 ...

he received a Civil List pension which enabled him to concentrate on writing. In 1892, de la Mare joined the Esperanza Amateur Dramatics Club, where he met and fell in love with (Constance) Elfrida Ingpen, the leading lady, who was ten years older than he. Her father, William Alfred Ingpen, was clerk to the insolvent debtors' court and clerk of the rules. They were married on 4 August 1899, and they went on to have four children: Richard Herbert Ingpen, Colin, Florence and Lucy Elfrida de la Mare. The new family lived in

Beckenham Beckenham () is a town in Greater London, England, within the London Borough of Bromley, in Greater London. Until 1965 it was part of the historic county of Kent. It is located south-east of Charing Cross, situated north of Elmers End and E ...

and

Anerley Anerley () is an area of south east London, England, within the London Borough of Bromley. It is located south south-east of Charing Cross, to the south of Crystal Palace and Upper Norwood, west of Penge, north of Elmers End and South Norwood. ...

from 1899 till 1924. It was in Beckenham at Mackenzie Road that the children were born; the family subsequently moved to accommodation in Samos Road, Anerley, then Worbeck Road, Anerley, and Thornsett Road. His first book of poems, ''Songs of Childhood'', (published under the name Walter Ramal), and the novel ''Henry Brocken'' were written during this time. Their house at Anerley in south London was the scene of many parties, notable for imaginative games of charades. From 1925 to 1939, de la Mare lived at Hill House, Taplow. In 1940, his wife Elfrida was diagnosed with

Parkinson's disease Parkinson's disease (PD), or simply Parkinson's, is a long-term degenerative disorder of the central nervous system that mainly affects the motor system. The symptoms usually emerge slowly, and as the disease worsens, non-motor symptoms becom ...

and spent the rest of her life as an invalid, eventually dying in 1943. From 1940 until his death, de la Mare lived in South End House, Montpelier Row,

Twickenham Twickenham is a suburban district in London, England. It is situated on the River Thames southwest of Charing Cross. Historically part of Middlesex, it has formed part of the London Borough of Richmond upon Thames since 1965, and the boroug ...

, the same street on which Alfred, Lord Tennyson, had lived a century earlier. For the ''Collected Stories for Children'' (Faber and Faber, 1947), he won the annual Carnegie Medal from the Library Association, recognising the year's best children's book by a British subject. It was the first collection to win the award. De la Mare suffered from a

coronary thrombosis Coronary thrombosis is defined as the formation of a blood clot inside a blood vessel of the heart. This blood clot may then restrict blood flow within the heart, leading to heart tissue damage, or a myocardial infarction, also known as a heart at ...

in 1947 and died of another in 1956. He spent his final year mostly bed-ridden, being cared for by a nurse whom he loved but never had a physical relationship with.James Campbell
A kind of magic
''The Guardian'', 10 June 2006. His ashes are buried in the crypt of St Paul's Cathedral, where he had once been a choirboy.

Imagination

De la Mare described two distinct "types" of imagination – although "aspects" might be a better term: the childlike and the boylike. It was at the border between the two that

Shakespeare William Shakespeare ( 26 April 1564 – 23 April 1616) was an English playwright, poet and actor. He is widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's natio ...

Dante Dante Alighieri (; – 14 September 1321), probably baptized Durante di Alighiero degli Alighieri and often referred to as Dante (, ), was an Italian people, Italian Italian poetry, poet, writer and philosopher. His ''Divine Comedy'', origin ...

, and the rest of the great poets lay. De la Mare claimed that all children fall into the category of having a childlike imagination at first, which is usually replaced at some point in their lives. He explained in the lecture " Rupert Brooke and the Intellectual Imagination" that children "are not bound in by their groping senses. Facts to them are the liveliest of chameleons. ... They are contemplatives, solitaries, fakirs, who sink again and again out of the noise and fever of existence and into a waking vision." His biographer Doris Ross McCrosson summarises this passage, "Children are, in short, visionaries." This visionary view of life can be seen as either vital creativity and ingenuity, or fatal disconnection from reality (or, in a limited sense, both). The increasing intrusions of the external world upon the mind, however, frighten the childlike imagination, which "retires like a shocked snail into its shell". From then onward the boyish imagination flourishes, the "intellectual, analytical type". By adulthood (de la Mare proposed), the childlike imagination has either retreated for ever or grown bold enough to face the real world. Thus emerge the two extremes of the

spectrum A spectrum (plural ''spectra'' or ''spectrums'') is a condition that is not limited to a specific set of values but can vary, without gaps, across a continuum. The word was first used scientifically in optics to describe the rainbow of colors ...

of adult minds: the mind moulded by the boylike is "

logical Logic is the study of correct reasoning. It includes both formal and informal logic. Formal logic is the science of deductively valid inferences or of logical truths. It is a formal science investigating how conclusions follow from premises ...

" and "

deductive Deductive reasoning is the mental process of drawing deductive inferences. An inference is deductively valid if its conclusion follows logically from its premises, i.e. if it is impossible for the premises to be true and the conclusion to be fals ...

". That shaped by the childlike becomes " intuitive, inductive". For de la Mare, "The one knows that beauty is truth, the other reveals that truth is beauty." Yet another way he puts it is that the visionary's source of poetry is within, while the intellectual's sources are without – external – in "action, knowledge of things, and experience" (McCrosson's terms). De la Mare hastens to add that this does not make the intellectual's poetry any less good, but it is clear where his own preference lies.

''Come Hither''

''Come Hither'' was an anthology, edited by de la Mare, mostly of poetry with some prose. It has a frame story, and can be read on several levels. It was first published in 1923, and was a success; further editions followed. Alongside children's literature it includes a selection of the leading Georgian poets (from de la Mare's perspective).

Supernaturalism

De la Mare was a notable writer of ghost stories. His collections '' Eight Tales'', ''The Riddle and Other Stories'', ''The Connoisseur and Other Stories'', ''On the Edge'' and ''The Wind Blows Over'' contain several ghost stories each. De la Mare's supernatural horror writings were a favourite of H. P. Lovecraft, who in his classic study ''

Supernatural Horror in Literature "Supernatural Horror in Literature" is a 28,000 word essay by American writer H. P. Lovecraft, surveying the development and achievements of horror fiction as the field stood in the 1920s and 30s. The essay was researched and written between Nove ...

'' remarked that "he is able to put into his occasional fear-studies a keen potency which only a rare master can achieve", especially praising his short stories "Seaton's Aunt", "The Tree", "Out of the Deep", "Mr Kempe", "A Recluse" and "All Hallows", along with his novel ''The Return''.

Gary William Crawford Gary William Crawford (January 1, 1953 -July 9, 2020) was an American writer and small press publisher. He is the founder and editor of Gothic Press, which since 1979 has published books and periodicals in the field of Gothic literature. Fro ...

has described de la Mare's supernatural fiction for adults as being "among the finest to appear in the first half of this century", whilst noting the disparity between the high quality and low quantity of de la Mare's mature horror stories.Gary William Crawford, "On the Edge: the Ghost Stories of Walter de la Mare" in

Darrell Schweitzer Darrell Charles Schweitzer (born August 27, 1952) is an American writer, editor, and critic in the field of speculative fiction. Much of his focus has been on dark fantasy and horror fiction, horror, although he does also work in science fictio ...

, ed., ''Discovering Classic Horror Fiction I'', Wildside Press, 1992, pp. 53–56. . Other notable de la Mare ghost/horror stories are "A:B:O", "Crewe", "The Green Room" and "Winter". Several later writers of supernatural fiction, including

Robert Aickman Robert Fordyce Aickman (27 June 1914 – 26 February 1981) was an English writer and conservationist. As a conservationist, he co-founded the Inland Waterways Association, a group which has preserved from destruction and restored England's inl ...

Ramsey Campbell Ramsey Campbell (born 4 January 1946) is an English horror fiction writer, editor and critic who has been writing for well over fifty years. He is the author of over 30 novels and hundreds of short stories, many of them winners of literary awa ...

, David A. McIntee and Reggie Oliver, have cited de la Mare's ghost stories as highly inspirational. The horror scholar S. T. Joshi has said that de la Mare's supernatural fiction "should always have an audience that will shudder apprehensively at its horror and be moved to somber reflection by its pensive philosophy". For children, de la Mare wrote the fairy tale ''The Three Mulla Mulgars'' (1910, AKA ''The Three Royal Monkeys''), praised by the literary historian Julia Briggs as a "neglected masterpiece" and by the critic

Brian Stableford Brian Michael Stableford (born 25 July 1948) is a British academic, critic and science fiction writer who has published more than 70 novels. His earlier books were published under the name Brian M. Stableford, but more recent ones have dropped ...

as a "classic animal fantasy". Richard Adams said it was his favourite novel. Writer

Joan Aiken Joan Delano Aiken (4 September 1924 – 4 January 2004) was an English writer specialising in supernatural fiction and children's alternative history novels. In 1999 she was awarded an MBE for her services to children's literature. For ''The ...

cited some of his short stories, such as "The Almond Tree" and "Sambo and the Snow Mountains", for their sometimes unexplained quality, which she also employed in her own work. De la Mare wrote two supernatural novels, ''Henry Brocken'' (1904) and ''The Return'' (1910). His poem "The Ghost Chase" appeared in ''Punch'' for 26 March 1941 and was illustrated by

Rowland Emett Frederick Rowland Emett OBE (22 October 190613 November 1990), known as Rowland Emett (with the forename sometimes spelled "Roland" s his middle name appears on his birth certificateand the surname frequently misspelled "Emmett"), was an Engl ...

Works

Novels

*''Henry Brocken'' (1904) *''The Three Mulla Mulgars'' (1910) (edition illustrated by Dorothy P. Lathrop 919, also published as ''The Three Royal Monkeys'' (children's novel) *''The Return'' (1910; revised edition 1922; second revised edition 1945) *'' Memoirs of a Midget'' (1921) *''Mr. Bumps and His Monkey'' (1942) (illustrated by Dorothy P. Lathrop)

Short story collections

*''The Riddle and Other Stories'' (1923): "The Almond Tree", "The Count's Courtship", "The Looking-Glass", "Miss Duveen", "Selina's Parable", "Seaton's Aunt", "The Bird of Travel", "The Bowl", "The Three Friends", "Lispet", "Lispet and Vaine", "The Tree", "Out of the Deep", "The Creatures", "The Riddle", "The Vats" *''Ding Dong Bell'' (1924): "Lichen", "Benighted", "Strangers and Pilgrims", "Winter" *''Broomsticks and Other Tales'' (1925): "Pigtails, Ltd.", "The Dutch Cheese", "Miss Jemima", "The Thief", "Broomsticks", "Lucy", "A Nose", "The Three Sleeping Boys of Warwickshire", "The Lovely Myfanwy", "Maria-Fly", "Visitors" *''The Connoisseur and Other Stories'' (1926): "Mr Kempe", "Missing", "The Connoisseur". "Disillusioned", "The Nap", "Pretty Poll", "All Hallows", "The Wharf", "The Lost Track" *''On the Edge'' (1930): "A Recluse", "Willows", "Crewe", "At First Sight", "The Green Room", "The Orgy", "An Idyll", "The Picnic", "An Ideal Craftsman" *''The Dutch Cheese'' (1931) (editions illustrated by Dorothy P. Lathrop

931 Year 931 ( CMXXXI) was a common year starting on Saturday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar. Events By place Europe * Spring – Hugh of Provence, king of Italy, cedes Lower Burgundy to Rudolph II, in re ...

and Irene Hawkins 947 (children's stories) *''The Lord Fish'' (1933), illustrated by Rex Whistler (children's stories) *''The Walter de la Mare Omnibus'' (1933) *''The Wind Blows Over'' (1936): "What Dreams May Come", "Cape Race", "Physic", "The Talisman", "In the Forest", "A Froward Child", "Miss Miller", "The House", "A Revenant", "A Nest of Singing-Birds", "The Trumpet" *''The Nap and Other Stories'' (1936) *''Stories, Essays and Poems'' (1938) *''The Best Stories of Walter de la Mare'' (1942) *''The Scarecrow and Other Stories'' (1945) *''

'' (1947) (editions illustrated by Irene Hawkins 947and

Robin Jacques Robin Jacques (27 March 1920 – 18 March 1995) was a British illustrator whose work was published in more than 100 novels and children's books. He is notable for his long collaboration with Ruth Manning-Sanders, illustrating many of her coll ...

957 *''A Beginning and Other Stories'' (1955): "Odd Shop", "Music", "The Stranger", "Neighbours", "The Princess", "The Guardian", "The Face", "The Cartouche", "The Picture", "The Quincunx", "An Anniversary", "Bad Company", "A Beginning" *'' Eight Tales'' (1971) *''Walter de la Mare, Short Stories 1895–1926'' (1996): Collection comprising the contents of ''The Riddle and Other Stories'', ''Ding Dong Bell'' and ''The Connoisseur and Other Stories'', as well as "Kismet", "The Hangman Luck", "A Mote", "The Village of Old Age", "The Moon's Miracle", "The Giant", "De Mortuis", "The Rejection of the Rector", "The Match-Maker", "The Budget", "The Pear-Tree", "Leap Year", "Promise at Dusk", "Two Days in Town" *''Walter de la Mare, Short Stories 1927–1956'' (2000): Collection comprising the contents of ''On the Edge'', ''The Wind Blows Over'' and ''A Beginning and Other Stories'', as well as "The Lynx", "A Sort of Interview", "The Miller's Tale", "A:B:O.", "The Orgy: An Idyll, Part II", "Late", "Pig", "Dr Iggatt" *''Walter de la Mare, Short Stories for Children'' (2006)

Poetry collections

*''Songs of Childhood'' (1902) *''Poems'' (1906) *''The Listeners'' (1912) *''Peacock Pie'' (1913) (editions illustrated by W. Heath Robinson 916

Claud Lovat Fraser Claud Lovat Fraser (15 May 1890 London – 18 June 1921, Dymchurch) was an English artist, designer and author. Early life Claud Lovat Fraser was christened Lovat Claud; as a young man he reversed those names for euphony's sake but he was alwa ...

924

941and Edward Ardizzone

946 Year 946 (Roman numerals, CMXLVI) was a common year starting on Thursday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar. Events By place Europe * Summer – King Otto I, Holy Roman Emperor, Otto I invades the West Fr ...

*''The Sunken Garden and Other Poems'' (1917) *''Motley and Other Poems'' (1918) *''The Veil and Other Poems'' (1921) *''Down-Adown-Derry: A Book of Fairy Poems'' (1922) (illustrated by Dorothy P. Lathrop) *''A Child's Day: A Book of Rhymes'' (1924) (illustrated by Winifred Bromhall) *''Selected Poems by Walter de la Mare'' (1927, 1931) *''Stuff and Nonsense and So On'' (1927) (editions illustrated by Bold 927and Margaret Wolpe

*''This Year: Next Year'' (1937) (illustrated by Harold Jones) *''Bells and Grass'' (1941) (editions illustrated by

941and Dorothy P. Lathrop 942 *''Time Passes and Other Poems'' (1942) *''Inward Companion'' (1950) *''O Lovely England'' (1952) *''Walter de la Mare: The Complete Poems'', ed. Giles de la Mare (1969) ; Ariel Poems Six poems were published by Faber and Faber as part of the Ariel Poems, for both series. They were the following: * ''Alone'' (1927) * ''Self to Self'' (1928) * ''The Snowdrop'' (1929) * ''News'' (1930) * ''To Lucy'' (1931) * ''The Winnowing Dream'' (1954)

Plays

*''Crossings: A Fairy Play'' (1921) (edition illustrated by Dorothy P. Lathrop (1923))

Nonfiction

*''Some Women Novelists of the 'Seventies'' (1929) *''Desert Islands and Robinson Crusoe'' (1930) *''Lewis Carroll'' (1930) *''The Early Novels of Wilkie Collins'' (1932)

Anthologies edited

*''Come Hither'' (1923; new and revised edition, 1928; third edition, reset and printed from new plates, 1957) *''Tom Tiddler's Ground'' (1931; named after the children's game) *''Early One Morning, in the Spring: Chapters on Children and on Childhood As It Is Revealed in Particular in Early Memories and in Early Writings'' (1935) *''Behold, This Dreamer!: Of Reverie, Night, Sleep, Dream, Love-Dreams, Nightmare, Death, the Unconscious, the Imagination, Divination, the Artist, and Kindred Subjects'' (1939) *''Love'' (1943)

Legacy

References in books

C. K. Scott Moncrieff, in translating Marcel Proust's seven-volume work ''

Remembrance of Things Past ''In Search of Lost Time'' (french: À la recherche du temps perdu), first translated into English as ''Remembrance of Things Past'', and sometimes referred to in French as ''La Recherche'' (''The Search''), is a novel in seven volumes by French ...

'', used the last line of de la Mare's poem "The Ghost" as the title of the sixth volume, ''The Sweet Cheat Gone'' (French: ''Albertine Disparu'' and ''La Fugitive''). In 1944, Faber and Faber and one of de la Mare's friends, a certain Dr. Bett, originated the idea to secretly produce a tribute for his 75th birthday. This publication was a collaborative effort between many admirers of Walter de la Mare's work, and included individual pieces by a variety of authors, including V. Sackville-West, J. B. Priestly, T. S. Eliot, Siegfried Sassoon, Lord Dunsany, and

Henry Williamson Henry William Williamson (1 December 1895 – 13 August 1977) was an English writer who wrote novels concerned with wildlife, English social history and ruralism. He was awarded the Hawthornden Prize for literature in 1928 for his book ''Tarka ...

. Richard Adams' debut book '' Watership Down'' (1972) uses several of de la Mare's poems for epigraphs. De la Mare's play ''Crossings'' has an important role in Robertson Davies' novel ''

The Manticore ''The Manticore'' is the second novel in Robertson Davies' Deptford Trilogy. Published in 1972 by Macmillan of Canada, it deals with the aftermath of the mysterious death of Percy Boyd "Boy" Staunton retold during a series of conversations bet ...

''. In 1944, when the protagonist David Staunton is sixteen, de la Mare's play is produced by the pupils of his sister's school in Toronto, Canada. Staunton falls deeply in love with the girl playing the main role – a first love which would have a profound effect on the rest of his life. '' Symposium'' by

Muriel Spark Dame Muriel Sarah Spark (née Camberg; 1 February 1918 – 13 April 2006). was a Scottish novelist, short story writer, poet and essayist. Life Muriel Camberg was born in the Bruntsfield area of Edinburgh, the daughter of Bernard Camberg, an ...

references Walter de la Mare's poem "Fare Well", quoting: "Look thy last on all things lovely/Every hour.".

References in music

The composer

Benjamin Britten Edward Benjamin Britten, Baron Britten (22 November 1913 – 4 December 1976, aged 63) was an English composer, conductor, and pianist. He was a central figure of 20th-century British music, with a range of works including opera, other ...

set several of de la Mare's verses to music: de la Mare's version of the traditional song Levy-Dew in 1934, and five others, which were then collected in ''Tit for Tat''. The American composer Theodore Chanler used texts from de la Mare's story "Benighted" for his song cycle ''8 Epitaphs''.

Notes

References

Bibliography

*Adrian, Jack, "De la Mare, Walter", in

David Pringle David Pringle (born 1 March 1950) is a Scottish science fiction editor and critic. Pringle served as the editor of '' Foundation'', an academic journal, from 1980 to 1986, during which time he became one of the prime movers of the collective whi ...

(ed), ''St. James Guide to Horror, Ghost and Gothic Writers''. London: St. James Press, 1998. * * *McCrosson, Doris Ross (1966). ''Walter de la Mare''. Twayne. * Wagenknecht, Edward, "Walter de la Mare", in ''Seven Masters of Supernatural Fiction''. New York: Greenwood, 1991. . *Whistler, Theresa (1993). ''Imagination of the Heart:The Life of Walter de la Mare''. *

Works by de la Mare

* *

External links

Walter de la Mare Society Website
* * * * *

– a secondary bibliography *
de La Mare, Walter
in ''

The Encyclopedia of Fantasy ''The Encyclopedia of Fantasy'' is a 1997 reference work concerning fantasy fiction, edited by John Clute and John Grant. Other contributors include Mike Ashley, Neil Gaiman, Diana Wynne Jones, David Langford, Sam J. Lundwall, Michael S ...

'' * — the famous poem recorded as a song (2009), music composed by Bernd Wahlbrinck {{DEFAULTSORT:De La Mare, Walter 1873 births 1956 deaths English children's writers 20th-century English poets 20th-century English novelists English short story writers English fantasy writers English horror writers Carnegie Medal in Literature winners Members of the Order of the Companions of Honour Members of the Order of Merit British World War I poets 20th-century English male writers English people of Scottish descent Deaths from coronary thrombosis Ghost story writers People from Charlton, London People educated at St. Paul's Cathedral School Burials at St Paul's Cathedral James Tait Black Memorial Prize recipients English male poets English male short story writers English male novelists Children's poets Weird fiction writers