Poets

Archibald Thomas Strong was an Australian scholar and poet.

Early Life

Strong was born at South Yarra, Melbourne, the son of Professor Herbert Strong, professor of classics at the University of Melbourne, and his wife Helen Campbell, née Edmiston.

Strong and his family moved to Liverpool, England in 1883 when Prof. Herbert Strong became professor of Latin at University College, Liverpool. Archibald was educated at Sedbergh School and University College, Liverpool where he graduated B.A. in 1896 with first-class honours in classics. Strong then went to Magdalen College, Oxford, however a long illness prevented any possibility of a first in "Greats". Strong graduated in Literae Humaniores (1900) and spent several months at the University of Marburg, Germany, before returning to read law with F. E. Smith, 1st Earl of Birkenhead, then a rising barrister, afterwards to become Lord Chancellor of England. Strong became a member of the Middle Temple, but ill-health caused him in 1901 to return to Australia seeking a warmer climate.

Literary Career

Settling again in Melbourne, Strong did some tutoring and lecturing, and published a volume of verse, Sonnets and Songs (1905). In 1910 Strong was president of the Literature Society of Melbourne and his presidential address, 'Nature in Meredith and Wordsworth', was printed as a pamphlet in that year. Strong was a long-term literary critic for the Herald newspaper and in 1911 republished some of his earlier wri..