He was a priest, teacher and poet born in Stratford, Essex, England, as the eldest of nine children to Manley Hopkins who was a poet and marine insurance adjustor and his wife Catherine. He studied first in Highgate Grammar School where he was awarded the first prize for his poem “The Escorial” and subsequently was able to attend Balliol College, Oxford, on a scholarship.
Taking his influences from people such as the poet Christina Rosetti and the theorist John Ruskin he initially had his sights set on being a painter-poet along the same lines as D.G. Rosetti. This changed though as he followed the path of religion and converted to Roman Catholicism. He became a member of the Society of Jesus and following the line of personal sacrifice he burned his poems as he deemed them not fitting to the life of a Jesuit priest.
This changed though, after he had become aware of the work of Duns Scotus and he picked up his pen again to begin to write more poetry. When he was 30 years old he was learning the Welsh language as well as theology and the styles that he picked up displayed themselves in his poems and went under the term he invented called “sprung rhythm”.
He became ordained into priesthood in 1877 where he worked in various parishes in England but after two years he relocated to London to begin spiritual study. This was followed with a stint as a teacher of Greek and Latin at Lancashire’s Stoneyhurst College, which in turn led to his taking on the position of Professor of Greek and Latin at Dublin’s University College and teaching students that included James Joyce.
He did, however, also start to suffer from depression. His poetry was never published in his lifetime apart from appearing occasionally in periodicals but he left with us several poems such as “The Wreck of the Deutschland”, “The Bugler’s First Communion”, “The Habit of Perfection” and “Epithalamion” that later appeared in print in 1918 and also hymn translations which include the Christmas Carol “Angelus de Virginem”.
In 1889 he contracted typhoid fever and uttering his last words “I am happy, so happy” he died in Ireland on June 8th when he was still only 44 years old, leaving behind a legacy that has made him be acknowledged as one of the finest poets of the Victorian era. A memorial tablet was put in place for him in Poets Corner in Westminster Abbey, London in 1975 and since 1987 Ireland has held the Gerard Manley Hopkins Literary Festival at Monasterevin.
Sources:
- http://www.victorianweb.org/authors/hopkins/hopkins12.html
- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gerard_Manley_Hopkins
- http://www.gerardmanleyhopkins.org/index.html
- http://www.poetsgraves.co.uk/hopkins.htm
- http://www.hymnsandcarolsofchristmas.com/Hymns_and_Carols/angelus_ad_virginem-hopkins.htm