Francis William Lauderdale Adams

Francis William Lauderdale Adams Poems

Francis William Lauderdale Adams Biography

Francis William Lauderdale Adams was an essayist, poet, dramatist, novelist and journalist who produced a large volume of work in his short life.

Early life

Adams was born in Malta the son of Andrew Leith Adams F.R.S., F.G.S., an army surgeon, who became afterwards well known as a scientist, a fellow of the Royal Society, and an author of natural history books set in different parts of the British empire. Francis' mother, Bertha Jane Grundy, became a well-known novelist. Francis was educated at Shrewsbury School and from 1879 as an attache in Paris. He took up a teaching position as an assistant master at Ventnor on the Isle of Wight, for two years. He joined the Social Democratic Federation in London in 1883. In 1884 he married Helen Uttley and migrated to Australia where he ...

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The Best Poem Of Francis William Lauderdale Adams

Art

'YES, let Art go, if it must be
That with it men must starve —
If Music, Painting, Poetry
Spring from the wasted hearth!'
Yes, let Art go, till once again
Through fearless heads and hands
The toil of millions and the pain
Be passed from out the lands:
Till from the few their plunder falls
To those who've toiled and earned
But misery's hopeless intervals
From those who've robbed and spurned.
Yes, let Art go, without a fear,
Like Autumn flowers we burn,
For, with her reawakening year,
Be sure she will return! —
Return, but greater, nobler yet
Because her laurel crown
With dew and not with blood is wet,
And as our Queen sit down!