Alfred, Lord Tennyson

Alfred Tennyson, first Baron Tennyson (1809 to 1892), was an English poet who served as Poet Laureate of the United Kingdom through most of Queen Victoria's reign, holding the post from 1850 until his death and so longer than any other laureate. He won the Chancellor's Gold Medal at Cambridge in 1829 and published his first solo collection, Poems, Chiefly Lyrical, in 1830, which included Claribel and Mariana. His early verse, with its medievalism and strong visual imagery, strongly influenced the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. He is known for short lyrics such as Break, Break, Break, The Charge of the Light Brigade and Crossing the Bar, for poems built on classical myth such as Ulysses and The Lotos-Eaters, for the elegy In Memoriam A.H.H. written for his friend Arthur Hallam, and for blank verse including Idylls of the King. His plays had little success. Phrases from his work, among them Nature, red in tooth and claw, have passed into everyday English.