The Poetry of Henry Kirke White

Henry Kirke White was born in Nottingham on 21st March 1785, the son of a butcher, a trade for which his family had hoped he would follow in his father’s footsteps. However, he was greatly attracted to book-learning. By age seven, he was giving reading lessons (unbeknownst to the rest of the family) to a family servant. After being briefly apprenticed to a stocking-weaver, he was articled to a lawyer. Whilst here he studied Latin and Greek. Seeing the results of White's study, his master offered