By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University)
1. He was the original ‘airy-fairy’ poet.
The phrase ‘airy-fairy’ – now used as a derogatory term for something light and insubstantial – can be traced back to Tennyson’s use of it in one of his early poems, ‘Lilian’ (1830). The first line of ‘Lilian’ reads: ‘Airy, fairy Lilian…’
In this guest post, Professor Roger Ebbatson talks about his new study of landscape in literature of the period 1830-1914, and sketches out some of the key links between people and their environment in this pivotal period in British history. In examining the ‘spaces’ of literary production in the nineteenth century my new book, Landscape … Read more