Richard Aldington

Richard Aldington (8 July 1892 – 27 July 1962), born Edward Godfree Aldington, was an English writer and poet. Aldington was best known for his World War I poetry.

Aldington by Howard Coster, 1931

Quotes

• Why do we call ourselves 'Imagists'. Well why not? Well I think it is a very good and descriptive title and it serves to enunciate some of the principles we mos firmly believe in... Direct treatment of the subject... as few adjectives as possible... a hardness, as of cut stone... individuality of rhythm...
  • Modern Poetry and the Imagists in the Egoist, London 1914

• I dream of silent verses where the rhyme
  Glides noiseless as an oar.
  • From At the British Museum Collected Poems, 1929

• By the sense of mystery I understand the experience of certain places and times when one's whole nature seems to be in touch with a prescence, a genius loci, a potency.
  • Introduction to Complete Poems, 1948

• I began to write what I called 'rhythms' ie unrhymed pieces with no formal metrical scheme where the rhythm was created by a kind if inner chant..Later I was told I was writing 'free verse' or Vers libre.
  • Introduction to Collected Poems, 1929

• Patriotism is a lively sense of collective responsibility. Nationalism is a silly cock crowing on its own dunghill.
  • The Colonel’s Daughter (1931) pt. 1, ch. 6