Cecil Northrop "Me: With Apologies to R. Haggard," 1923, title page
Transcription
"Me"With Apologies to R. Haggard
"But to thine ownself be true"
Shakespear[e]
I hold it true that thoughts are things,
Endowed with bodies, breath, and wings;
And after you have quite forgot
Or all outgrown some vanished thought.
Back to your mind to make its home
A doe or raven it will come.
Notes
Northrop's title is a play on H. Rider Haggard's She: A History of Adventure (1887). Rider (1856 – 14 May 1925) was an English writer of Adventure fiction and a pioneer of the "Lost World" subgenre. The novel was adapted for the screen in 1917 (the version Cecil Northrop presumably could have seen), 1935, and 1965. The reference to Haggard signals Northrop's interest in adventure and travel as motivating factors for his career choices and writing."I hold it true..." lines of poetry are by American poet Ella Wheeler Wilcox (November 5, 1850 – October 30, 1919), a popular poet in the late 19th century. According to A Woman of the Century: Fourteen Hundred-Seventy Biographical Sketches Accompanied by Portraits of Leading American Women in All Walks of Life (1893), she "had the satisfaction of being a widely read author and of receiving a good price and ready sale for all she produces."
