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The Hound of Heaven

"The Hound of Heaven" is a 182-line poem written by English poet Francis Thompson (1859–1907). The poem became famous and was the source of much of Thompson's posthumous reputation. It was first printed in 1890 in the periodical Merry England,[1] later to appear in Thompson's first volume of poems in 1893.[2] It was included in the Oxford Book of English Mystical Verse (1917).

The Hound of Heaven (1919)[5]

William Henry Harris

The Hound of Heaven (1924)[6]

Humphrey John Stewart

The Hound of Heaven (1945)[7]

Miriam Gideon

The Hound of Heaven (1953)[8]

Maurice Jacobson

Benedictus (1980)[9]

Howard Blake

The Hound of Heaven (2009)[10]

Ronald Corp

Actor used the line "Under Running Laughter" from the first stanza as the title of his memoir.

Dean Jones

Thompson's work was praised by , and it was also an influence on J. R. R. Tolkien, who presented a paper on Thompson in 1914.[11]

G. K. Chesterton

In 1933, used a phrase from the second line of the poem as the title of his best-selling autobiography, The Arches of the Years.

Halliday Sutherland

In 1935, , an Indian spiritual master, included "The Hound of Heaven" in one of his phonographic albums, Songs of My Heart. Today, his organization, Self-Realization Fellowship, offers this album in the form of a CD. Kamala Silva, a purported direct disciple of Paramahansa Yogananda, received the gift of a printing of the "Hound of Heaven" from Yogananda and he also recited it for her.[12][13]

Paramahansa Yogananda

A short passage from the poem appears in chapter four of 's Rebecca (1938).[14]

Daphne du Maurier

"The Hound of Heaven" inspired Norwegian composer (1887–1952) to compose his Piano Sonata No. 2, Op. 38 (1941).[15] The sonata's three movements reflect different parts of Thompson's poem. The piece has been recorded by Glenn Gould.

Fartein Valen

Thompson's poem is mentioned and quoted in 's 1947 play A Masque of Mercy.

Robert Frost

"The Hound of Heaven" was used as an example of the hero's "refusal of the call" to adventure in 's book, The Hero with a Thousand Faces (1949)

Joseph Campbell

In 1955, a love letter from Suzanne Kempe to her philosophy lecturer, , quotes excerpts from the poem. Their affair was later brought to trial in Tasmania.[16]

Sydney Sparkes Orr

Thompson's poem is the source of the phrase, "with all deliberate speed," used by the in Brown II (1955), the remedy phase of the famous decision on school desegregation.[17]

Supreme Court

Thompson's poem was the inspiration for a series of 23 paintings by the American painter (1893–1981), A Pictorial Sequence Painted by R. H. Ives Gammell Based on The Hound of Heaven, which was in planning by 1941 and completed in 1956.[18] A reading of The Psychology of the Unconscious by C. G. Jung showed Gammell a way in which he might give visual form to Thompson's poem.[19]

R. H. Ives Gammell

"The Hound of Heaven" is the fifth chapter in 's 1965 book The Gospel According to Peanuts where he describes Snoopy as a "little Christ" carrying out "Christ's ambivalent work of humbling the exalted and exalting the humble."[20]

Robert L. Short

In 's novel, A Pocketful of Rye (1969), the protagonist Carroll reads the poem as a young man, forgets it, and suffers from a recurring nightmare that finally leads to his conversion.

A. J. Cronin

In 1970, Canadian artist used lines from "The Hound of Heaven" as titles for his "Nature, Poor Stepdame, A Series of Sixteen Farm Paintings"

William Kurelek

In 1975 "The Hound of Heaven" was mentioned in the suicide note of , a geneticist who pioneered the evolutionary theory of altruism and suicide (among other things), before becoming a committed Christian and giving away all his possessions to the poor.[21]

George R. Price

The band Daniel Amos wrote a song titled Hound of Heaven on their 1978 album Horrendous Disc that is based on the Thompson poem.[22][23]

Christian alternative rock

artist Michael Card also wrote and recorded a song called "Hound of Heaven" based on Thompson's poem for his 1981 debut album First Light.

Contemporary Christian music

Lines from the poem are recited between the discussion during the last scene in "The last enemy", which is the 2nd episode, 3rd season of (1989).

Inspector Morse

In 2001 cites the poem admiringly in his novel The Guards.[24]

Ken Bruen

In 2002, Katherine A. Powers, literary columnist for the Boston Globe, called Hound of Heaven "perhaps the most beloved and ubiquitously taught poem among American Catholics for over half a century".

[25]

"The Hound of Heaven" is the first chapter in 's book Why I am a Christian (2003) in which he confesses that he is a Christian not because of the influence of his parents and teachers, nor to his own personal decision, but to being relentlessly pursued by 'the Hound of Heaven', that is, Jesus Christ himself.[26]

John Stott

The poem is mentioned and lines quoted in the novel Escape from Hell (2009) by and Jerry Pournelle

Larry Niven

The main character is reading a book by this name in the first episode of the Irish TV series .

Jack Taylor

In describing her journey from atheism and agnosticism to devout Christianity, Fox News commentator said, "The Hound of Heaven had pursued me and caught me...."[27]

Kirsten Powers

In 2014, wrote and directed a short film based upon the poem, titled "The Hound of Heaven".

N. D. Wilson

In April 2020, in an interview with on his show The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, Stephen Colbert told her that he thought the fox that appeared in her series Fleabag was the Hound of Heaven, which appeared to astound and delight Waller-Bridge.[28][29][30]

Phoebe Waller-Bridge

"The Hound of Heaven" sources

Traditional Fine Arts Organization

R. H. Ives Gammell: The Hound of Heaven by Elizabeth Ives Hunter

Librivox audio

The Hound of Heaven