The Poetical Works Of Aubrey De Vere Vol II - The Legends Of St Patrick And Other Poems

The Poetical Works of Aubrey de Vere, Vol. II – The Legends of St Patrick and Other Poems (1895)
By Aubrey de Vere | Macmillan
ISBN: none (printed when saints and sonnets walked the earth unaided by ISBNs)
Condition: Good (devoutly aged, structurally sound)
Offered by: Crappy Old Books

If you’ve ever thought, “I wish someone would retell the life of St Patrick in stately Victorian verse, and then throw in a load of extra poems for good measure,” Aubrey de Vere is here to assure you that your very specific niche has been catered for since 1895.

This is Volume II of his poetical works, proudly dedicating itself to:

• The Legends of St Patrick – Ireland’s patron saint, reimagined in rolling lines of high seriousness, spiritual struggle and occasional snake-related implications.

• Other Poems – because once you’ve done Patrick, you might as well keep going; the muse is warmed up now.

What’s actually inside?

You get a full poetic cycle that treats St Patrick not as:

• a cartoon with shamrocks

• or a reason to dye beer green

…but as a heroic, complex, luminous figure wandering through:

• pagan Ireland

• visions, conversions and confrontations

• misty hills, dark wells and very patient angels.

De Vere gives you:

• lofty invocations

• spiritual angst

• and that rich Victorian-Catholic-Celtic mashup of drama, reverence and landscape worship.

Then come the “Other Poems”, which may include:

• religious lyrics

• meditations on nature

• patriotic or historical pieces

• and probably at least one poem where someone gazes at a wild, lonely scene and has a crisis about eternity.

It’s the full late-19th-century poetic experience:
plenty of rhythm, capitalised Nouns (Grace, Faith, Night), and a firm belief that verse is a high and serious calling.

The tone

Expect:

• Grand, musical lines rather than modern minimalism; this is more cathedral than coffee shop.

• Occasional delicious overstatement: saints do not just “walk”, they “tread the waste of years beneath their feet”.

• That combination of piety and atmospheric Irishness that makes you want to lie on a bog and think about destiny (in a good way).

If you like Tennyson, Newman, or that general era where poets still believed in metre and God at the same time, you’ll feel at home here.

This particular copy

From the photo and listing:

• Condition: Good – which, for an 1895 volume, is quietly impressive.

  • Deep green cloth boards, still dignified, with gilt lettering on the spine that says “I belong in a serious library.”

  • Light wear to the corners and edges, small knocks here and there – the bookish equivalent of a few wrinkles on a venerable bishop.

  • A tiny scuff mark on the spine or board, like it once brushed too close to a candlestick.

• The binding is holding up, pages all present and readable, likely with that warm cream tone that only over a century of existing can produce.

No crumbling, no disaster—just an honest, well-kept Victorian volume that has clearly outlived several church committees.

Why you might actually want this

• You’re into Irish history, saints, or devotional literature, but with the drama dialled up and the prose broken into verse.

• You like the idea of St Patrick as epic protagonist, not just a figure on a tea towel.

• You’re collecting Macmillan poets in their original cloth and fancy something a little more obscure than the usual suspects.

• You enjoy opening a book and immediately feeling like you should lower your voice out of respect.

It’s also a fantastic conversation piece:

“Oh that? It’s The Legends of St Patrick and Other Poems, 1895. No, I don’t always read in Victorian religious verse, only on weekdays.”

The vibe

Reading this feels like:

• Sitting in a Victorian parlour with rain at the windows, while someone earnest and talented reads aloud by lamplight.

• Wandering through 5th-century Ireland as imagined by a 19th-century poet with strong feelings about Providence.

• Being gently reminded that there was a time when people truly believed poetry might bring you closer to God—or at least to a better sense of your place in the universe.

It’s not casual, throwaway reading. It’s slow-breath, long-line, let-me-just-reread-that-stanza territory.

Condition vs. Holiness

• Physically: Good – sturdy, handsome, perfectly ready for more reverent handling.

• Spiritually/literarily: intense, ornate, and very much from an era when poetry put on its best coat and went to church.

Ideal for:

• Devotees of Victorian and Irish literature

• People who like their saints with extra metre

• Anyone building a shelf of serious green-cloth Macmillans

• Readers who find it delightfully incongruous that a solemn 1895 volume of religious verse now circulates under the banner of Crappy Old Books

Offered by Crappy Old Books, where the bindings are green, the condition is Good, and the legends of St Patrick come with a generous side order of additional poems, all waiting patiently to be rediscovered.

Keep browsing: See more Poetry books Other books by Aubrey de Vere