Algernon Charles Swinburne Quote

Algernon Charles Swinburne (5 April 1837 – 10 April 1909) was an English poet, playwright, novelist, and critic. He was a major contributor to the Pre-Raphaelite movement in poetry, along with Dante Gabriel Rossetti and William Morris. His greatest works are the verse drama Atalanta in Calydon (1865), written in the form of an Ancient Greek tragedy, and his Pre-Raphaelite Poems and Ballads (1866).
In his poetry, Swinburne rebelled against the Christian morality of the Victorian era, drawing from Classical, medieval, and Renaissance sources to explore taboo topics such as atheism in "Hymn to Proserpine," homosexuality in "Anactoria," and sado-masochism in "Dolores." While Swinburne's work attracted considerable scandal, it had many prominent Victorian defenders, including John Ruskin.
Swinburne's poetic style—rhythmic, alliterative, and sensual—drew critical acclaim and moral condemnation during his lifetime. His poems are often complex, working double rhymes and anapestic meter into intricate stanzas. Swinburne's style was influenced by the French poet Charles Baudelaire, author of the notorious Les Fleurs du mal, for whom Swinburne wrote the poetic eulogy "Ave Atque Vale."
Swinburne was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature every year from 1903 to 1909. After the death of Alfred, Lord Tennyson in 1892, Swinburne was considered for the post of Poet Laureate of the United Kingdom, but was disqualified by Queen Victoria on moral grounds. Nevertheless, Swinburne's example inspired a later generation of fin-de-siecle poets such as Oscar Wilde and Ernest Dowson.