"In Memoriam A.H.H." is a poem by the British poet Alfred, Lord Tennyson, completed in 1849. It is a requiem for the poet's beloved Cambridge friend Arthur Henry Hallam, who died suddenly of a cerebral haemorrhage in Vienna in 1833. It contains some of Tennyson's most accomplished lyrical work, and is an unusually sustained exercise in lyric verse. It is widely considered to be one of the great poems of the 19th century.

The original title of the poem was 'The Way of the Soul', and this might give an idea of how the poem is an account of all Tennyson's thoughts and emotions as he grieves over the death of a close friend. He views the cruelty of nature and mortality in light of materialist science and faith. Owing to its length and its arguable breadth of focus, the poem might not be thought an elegy or a dirge in the strictest formal sense.

The most frequently quoted lines in the poem are perhaps:

  • I hold it true, whate'er befall;
  • I feel it when I sorrow most;
  • 'Tis better to have loved and lost
  • Than never to have loved at all

More Info: en.wikipedia.org