Invictus

William Ernest Henly

Out of the night that covers me,

Black as the pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.

In the fell clutch of circumstance

I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeoning of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.

Beyond this place of wrath and tears

Looms but the Horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds and shall find me unafraid.

It matters not how strait the gate,

How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate,
I am the captain of my soul.
Unlocking Difficulties

Bludgeoning- beat (someone) repeatedly with a bludgeon or other heavy object.

Winced - give a slight involuntary grimace or shrinking movement of the body out of or in
anticipation of pain or distress.

Strait - a narrow passage of water connecting two seas or two other large areas of water.

Unbowed- not having submitted to pressure or demands.

Unafraid- feeling no fear or anxiety.

Looms- an apparatus for making fabric by weaving yarn or thread.

Clutch- grasp or seize (something) tightly or eagerly.

Menace- a person or thing that is likely to cause harm; a threat or danger.

Unconquerable- (especially of a place, people, or emotion) not conquerable.

Wrath- extreme anger.

William Ernest Henley

Born 23 August 1849

Gloucester, England

Died 11 July 1903 (aged 53)

Woking, England

Occupation Poet, critic, and editor

Nationality British

Education The Crypt School, Gloucester. St. Andrews

University, Saint Andrews, Scotland.

Period c. 1870–1903

Notable "Invictus"
works

Spouse Hannah Johnson Boyle

His mother, Mary Morgan, a descendant of poet and critic Joseph Warton, and father, William, a
bookseller and stationer. William Ernest was the oldest of six children, five sons and a daughter;
his father died in 1868, and was survived by his wife and young children. From the age of 12,
Henley suffered from tuberculosis of the bone that resulted in the amputation of his left leg
below the knee in 1868–69.

One of Henley’s brothers – Anthony Warton became a landscape painter and one called Edward
John was said to be an excellent actor.
During the years 1861- 1867, Henley attended the Crypt Crammer School at Gloucester,
England. He developed a deep friendship with the headmaster – Thomas Edward Brown who
was a well-known noted poet and author.

His positive influence encouraged Henley to read and learn literature. He was exceptionally
intelligent and this talent was recognized by Thomas Brown. Henley successfully cleared the
Oxford Entrance Examination with flying colors.

However, his ill health and poor financial conditions did not favor him to do so. He moved to
London from Gloucester and after several months of searching, he became a freelance journalist
in London.

Health Conditions of William Ernest Henley

At a tender age of 12, Henley was diagnosed with tuberculosis in the bone. This was quite a
serious condition for a young boy like him. Nevertheless, it does not make him stop or weaken
him mentally even a bit.

Tuberculosis led to the removal of the part below the knee of his left leg. A few years after that,
tuberculosis spread his other leg as well. Luckily, under the guidance of Dr. Joseph Lister and his
innovative techniques of surgery, there became no need for the removal of his leg. He used his
anti-septic surgical method for the surgery at the Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh.

Works of William Ernest Henley

Henley’s most famous and appreciated poem “Invictus” came out in 1875. It is based on the
medical struggle that he went through. However, his other poems based on his struggles and the
way he overcame them were not very much accepted by the Victorian readers at the time.
In 1888, he came up with “A book of Verses” which was a collection of all the poems he wrote
in the hospital. In 1892, “The Song of the Sword and other Verses” a revised version of the
previous volumes became a good seller.

William Ernest Henley was a great editor. He edited for four magazines over his lifetime. In
1877, he was the editor of the “London”, a magazine that didn’t last for very long. From 1882 –
1886, he edited for the “Magazine of Art”, which was an art magazine that came out every
month.

In 1889, he edited for the “Scots Observer” that later came to be known as “National Observer”
in 1891. He edited until 1893 when he published “The Barrack-Room Ballads”. He edited the
Tudor Translations that began with the “Montaign” by John Florio and ended with the Tudor
Bible.

He published the anthology along with the National Observer called “The Book of English
Prose”. He also edited “The Complete Poetical Works of Robert Burns in collab with Thomas
Henderson in 1897. In 1904 he edited a seven-volume dictionary called “Slang and its
Analogues Past and Present”.

Death of William Ernest Henley

Henley died when he was 52 years old in the year 1903 due to
tuberculosis. He died at his residence in Woking, London.

He was cremated and his ashes were put in his daughter’s

grave in Bedfordshire. His works are highly appreciated and
also referred to as a useful weapon in English literature.
Quotes by William Ernest Henley

“It matters not how strait the gate,

How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul.”
– William Ernest Henley in Echoes of Life and Death.
Invictus, meaning “unconquerable” or “undefeated” in Latin, is a poem by William Ernest
Henley. The poem was written while Henley was in the hospital being treated for tuberculosis of
the bone, also known as Pott’s disease. He had had the disease since he was very young, and his
foot had been amputated shortly before he wrote the poem. This poem is about courage in the
face of death, and holding on to one’s own dignity despite the indignities life places before us.

I will take you through the poem, and explain it stanzas by stanza to give you a clear idea of
what the poem is trying to tell you. The poem itself is very simple in form and devices, and as
such comes as a relief in a time where flowery and ambiguous writing ran wild. To start off a
little bit about the Background of the Poem.

Background:
At the age of 12, Henley contracted tuberculosis of the bone. A few years later, the disease
progressed to his foot, and physicians announced that the only way to save his life was to
amputate directly below the knee. It was amputated when he was 17. Despite his disability, he
survived with one foot intact and led an active life until his death at the age of 53.

This poem was written by Henley shortly after his leg was amputated and although he wrote
many poems while in hospital, this one is largely his claim to fame.

Dedication:
Henley dedicated the poem to Robert Thomas Hamilton Bruce (1846-1899), a Scottish flour
merchant. After Hamilton Bruce’s death, published collections of Henley’s poems often included
either of these dedication lines preceding the poem: “I.M.R.T. Hamilton Bruce” or “In
Memoriam R.T.H.B.” (“In Memory of Robert Thomas Hamilton Bruce”). The
surname Hamilton Bruce is sometimes spelled with a hyphen (Hamilton-Bruce).
Title:
The strong, resilient enunciation of the poem’s title carries a remarkable effect from the outset,
emphasizing Henley’s intention to show might in the face of adversity. The Latin, powerful-
sounding Invictus‘s definition is no less noticeable: the “unconquerable.“

Theme:
The theme of the poem is the will to survive in the face of a severe test. Henley himself faced
such a test. After contracting tuberculosis of the bone in his youth, he suffered a tubercular
infection when he was in his early twenties that resulted in amputation of a leg below the knee.
When physicians informed him that he must undergo a similar operation on the other leg, he
enlisted the services of Dr. Joseph Lister (1827-1912), the developer of antiseptic medicine. He
saved the leg. During Henley’s twenty-month ordeal between 1873 and 1875 at the Royal
Edinburgh Infirmary in Scotland, he wrote “Invictus” and other poems. Years later, his friend
Robert Louis Stevenson based the character Long John Silver (a peg-legged pirate in the
Stevenson novel Treasure Island) on Henley.

In the first stanza, Henley refers to the “night that covers me, black as the pit from pole to pole”
(lines 1 and 2); this night is generally a metaphor for the hardships and problems of a worldly
existence, but the line could clearly be understood at the discretion of the reader by assigning the
night any of negative roles (any particular hardship that may encompass a person’s entire life,
such as a handicap like Henley’s; persistent, taxing responsibilities; or sustained emotional
injury). The next line, “the pit from pole to pole” is a basic way of likening the darkness (or the
difficulty) of the night to the lightless, deep desolation of the center of the earth, and its meaning
does not require any change as understanding of the poem changes. Lines 3 and 4, “I thank
whatever gods may be/for my unconquerable soul,” parallel the title and introduce the poem’s
primary focus. By suggesting that the soul is the creation of a higher power, the line reinforces
the theme of the unconquerable by associating the soul with the interminable. Some critics have
argued that line 3 is hard proof of the author’s agnosticism, but other interpretations have left the
statement as a choice in poetic device rather than a religious preference, even hailing the poem as
one not quite contradictory (as agnostic analyses contend) to conventional Christianity.
Regardless of this, Henley definitely intended to carry the meaning of his poetry to the spiritual
level, which is further explored in the third stanza.

The second stanza bears the image of a hapless victim whose predators are the violent
“circumstance” and “chance”; both abstract concepts are solidified by lines 6-9. Line 6, “In the
fell clutch of circumstance,” followed by line 7, “I have not winced nor cried aloud” immediately
instills an image of an animal captured by the “fell clutch” of a predatory bird. The circumstance,
in Henley’s case, was likely a reference to his unfortunate condition but, much like the many
parts of the poem, is manipulable to personal perspective. Though cursed with a great burden, he
did not “wince nor cry aloud,” that is, complain vociferously about his pain, as an animal carried
away would squeal to its demise. Then Chance, in lines 8-9, appears with a baseball bat to do his
damage: “Under the bludgeoning of chance/my head is bloody, but unbowed.” Henley’s choice
of imagery best describes any case of one downtrodden by misfortune who has not conceded due
to events that transpire beyond his control, much as a hardy prisoner beaten by his captors would
not allow his head to bow in defeat.

Both warning and consoling, the third stanza brings in something past that introduced in the
second, showing a more spiritual side of the poem: “Beyond this place of wrath and tears/looms
the Horror of the shade” (lines 11 and 12). The “place of wrath and tears” of which Henley
writes is the world we live in, the place where we are the prey of circumstance and the prisoners
of chance. Beyond it, however, Henley suggests that there is more by expressing his belief in an
afterlife, but he does not simply relegate the “Beyond” to simple optimism. Line 12’s “Horror of
the shade” is the unknown that is across the threshold of life and death that may hold more
hardships for the soul yet, and it is undoubtedly a concept explored by many poets. “The menace
of the years” (Line 13), of course, is the expiration of our worldly time, the end of which would
mark the beginning of the journey to the shade beyond. To this, Henley holds defiantly that this
imminent end “finds, and shall find him unafraid.” This disregard for fear is a declaration of
acceptance of all that will come at the expiration of the flesh.
Possibly the most famous and memorable of all, the fourth stanza is the poem’s final affirmation
of spiritual fortitude. Lines 16 and 17 are strongly associated with Christian ideas and images. “It
matters not how strait the gate” (line 16) contains a direct biblical allusion: “Strait is the gate,
and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it” (Matthew 7:13-14).
Line 16 is not a contradiction of the straight and narrow path, but rather an acceptance of its
challenge, similar to that in the third stanza. “Scroll,” in line 17, again alludes to heavenly
imagery; it does not matter what punishments one may bear from life and the afterlife as long as
one is confidently in control. The bold, fearless end to the poem is an affirmation that, as the
decision-makers in our lifetimes, we are the sole authorities over ourselves, and a powerful line
that seems to have a wide variety of applications for any situation. Left in context and even if
taken slightly out of context of the poem, its intense implications of power (“master” and
“captain”) in combination with its subjects (the fate and the soul, things that are normally
implied to be beyond our reach) give the final stanza an intrinsic quality found in all things
frequently quoted as words of strength, such as Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s “We have nothing
to fear but fear itself.” Coincidentally enough, FDR was known to quote the concluding couplet
of Invictus himself when asked how he dealt with his struggle with polio.