Alfred Lord Tennyson
Poet Laureate, Ulysses, Charge of the Light Brigade
The Victorian Lion Poet
Alfred Lord Tennyson served as Britain’s Poet Laureate for 42 years — the longest tenure in the role’s history. His Charge of the Light Brigade is the most visceral war poem in the English language. His Ulysses — ‘To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield’ — is a Leo’s manifesto, written in grief for his dead friend Arthur Hallam.
Leo Legacy
- Poet Laureate: 42 years as official poet of Great Britain — longest tenure in history
- The Charge of the Light Brigade: 1854 — the most famous war poem in English literature
- Ulysses: His meditation on aging and the refusal to surrender — a Leo’s poem
- In Memoriam: 17-year elegy for Arthur Hallam — considered Victorian literature’s masterpiece
Tennyson’s Leo poetry turned loss into action — grief was the fuel for his greatest writing.
“‘Tis better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all.”