Isaac Asimov recounted that when his English class studied this poem in elementary school or thereabouts, the teacher asked why Abou's name was at the head of the list. In a fit of inspiration, he raised his hand and said, "Alphabetical order!" He was punished as usual, but was pleased at having forestalled a lesson in the bloody obvious.
I was pleasantly surprised seeing this poem in my feed, for I had last read in way back in school. 14 years ago, I suppose? I chanted it in the same singsong way I did back then, but I could also understand what Hunt is trying to say here. ^^
In Walker Percy's novel The Last Gentleman, there's a hilarious takedown of Leigh Hunt (for this poem) by Sutter Vaught (possibly my favorite Percy character ever).
My first encounter with this poem was this bizarre BBC comedy sketch from 1980, when I was 15, and before I'd even heard of Leigh Hunt: "Not The Nine O'Clock News", with a very young Rowan Atkinson. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rG-7miFQR_I
I knew it from Untermeyer's Golden Treasury of Poetry, my childhood reader (as I mentioned when I wrote here about Newton's "Skippery Boo" comic poem). My Brazilian wife picked up "May his tribe increase!" and would use it occasionally tongue in cheek — as when the host would offer coffee after a dinner party: "May your tribe increase!"
And to continue upon a superficial Victorian vein, may the good Lord bless those who eulogize so-called minor figures along with all the rest (or, along with all "the best..") !
This poem was one of the many in Arthur Mee’s Children’s Encyclopaedia that I treasured as a boy. I hadn’t thought about for decades - thank you for triggering the happy memories! The ethos of the CE, if it had one, was very much in tune with these sentiments
This has not worked well: "The replacement of metaphysics with ethics, at the center of Christianity" . . . either for poetry or as the foundation for human life.
Isaac Asimov recounted that when his English class studied this poem in elementary school or thereabouts, the teacher asked why Abou's name was at the head of the list. In a fit of inspiration, he raised his hand and said, "Alphabetical order!" He was punished as usual, but was pleased at having forestalled a lesson in the bloody obvious.
Here is a parody by Hilaire Belloc:
The Philanthropist (c. 1918-21)
(With Apologies to a Beautiful Poem)
Abou Ben Adhem (may his tribe decrease
By cautious birth-control and die in peace)
Mellow with learning lightly took the word
That marked him not with them that love the Lord,
And told the angel of the book and pen
"Write me as one that loves his fellow-men:
For them alone I labour; to reclaim
The ragged roaming Bedouin and to tame
To ordered service; to uproot their vine
Who mock the Prophet, being mad with wine;
Let daylight through their tents and through their lives
Number their camels, even count their wives;
Plot out the deserts into streets and squares,
And count it a more fruitful work than theirs
Who lift a vain and visionary love
To your vague Allah in the skies above."
Gently replied the angel of the pen:
"Labour in peace and love your fellow-men:
And love not God, since men alone are dear,
Only fear God; for you have cause to fear."
I was pleasantly surprised seeing this poem in my feed, for I had last read in way back in school. 14 years ago, I suppose? I chanted it in the same singsong way I did back then, but I could also understand what Hunt is trying to say here. ^^
In Walker Percy's novel The Last Gentleman, there's a hilarious takedown of Leigh Hunt (for this poem) by Sutter Vaught (possibly my favorite Percy character ever).
Hunt was the inspiration for the character of Harold Skimpole in Charles Dickens' novel "Bleak House".
I was going to ask a question is he the guy who is charactered in Dickens bleak House as someone who is always scrounging money?
That’s him…
So he loved his fellow man when he could tap him for a fiver as it seems
The mere child!
My first encounter with this poem was this bizarre BBC comedy sketch from 1980, when I was 15, and before I'd even heard of Leigh Hunt: "Not The Nine O'Clock News", with a very young Rowan Atkinson. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rG-7miFQR_I
I knew it from Untermeyer's Golden Treasury of Poetry, my childhood reader (as I mentioned when I wrote here about Newton's "Skippery Boo" comic poem). My Brazilian wife picked up "May his tribe increase!" and would use it occasionally tongue in cheek — as when the host would offer coffee after a dinner party: "May your tribe increase!"
https://poemsancientandmodern.substack.com/p/todays-poem-the-skippery-boo
Thanks for this Jodi. A sweet poem and a helpful commentary!
I'm very fond of "The Fish, the Man, and the Spirit": https://poetrysociety.org/poems/the-fish-the-man-and-the-spirit
And to continue upon a superficial Victorian vein, may the good Lord bless those who eulogize so-called minor figures along with all the rest (or, along with all "the best..") !
This poem was one of the many in Arthur Mee’s Children’s Encyclopaedia that I treasured as a boy. I hadn’t thought about for decades - thank you for triggering the happy memories! The ethos of the CE, if it had one, was very much in tune with these sentiments
This has not worked well: "The replacement of metaphysics with ethics, at the center of Christianity" . . . either for poetry or as the foundation for human life.