Asked what problems most perplexed 'young men at present' Arthur Hugh Clough (1819-1861) replied 'a growing sense of discrepancy'. His wry, wise poetry explores the tensions of a time of radical changes in the religious, political and literary landscape. He has a sharp eye for absurdity. Clough was a writer of wide interests and liberal sympathies, vividly idiomatic and sensuous, delighting in the detail and variety of everyday life. The poems encompass satire, lyric, dialogue, plot and contemporary reference. His narrative poem The Bothie of Tober-Na Vuolich and the epistolary Amours de Voyage have the momentum and social precision of novels, capturing a precise image of the Victorian world of the 1840s.

This edition includes a generous selection of the full range of Clough's poetry, with a detailed introduction and annotations by Shirley Chew