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J C Squire - A Generation
Identifier
013331
Type of Spiritual Experience
Background
John Collings Squire was born in Plymouth in 1884.
He was educated at Blundell’s School and at St ]ohn’s College, Cambridge.
He was literary editor then acting editor of the New Statesman between 1913 and 1918.
He founded the London Mercury in I919 and edited it until 1934, combining his duties with a successful career as a poet, parodist, essayist and anthologist. He was knighted in 1993.
He died in 1958.
A description of the experience
A Generation (1917)
There was a time that’s gone
And will not come again,
We knew it was a pleasant time,
How good we never dreamed.
When, for a whimsy’s sake,
We’d even play with pain,
For everything awaited us
And life immortal seemed.
It seemed unending then
To forward-looking eyes,
No thought of what postponement meant
Hung dark across our mirth;
We had years and strength enough
For any enterprise,
Our numerous companionship
Were heirs to all the earth.
But now all memory
Is one ironic truth,
We look like strangers at the boys
We were so long ago;
For half of us are dead,
And half have lost their youth,
And our hearts are scarred by many griefs,
That only age should know.