Richard Le Gallienne

Richard Le Gallienne – Life, Poetry, and Memorable Quotes

An in-depth look at the life, work, and poetic voice of Richard Le Gallienne (1866–1947), the English romantic/fin-de-siècle poet and essayist. Explore his biography, literary style, legacy, and notable quotations.

Introduction

Richard Le Gallienne (born Richard Thomas Gallienne; 20 January 1866 – 15 September 1947) was an English poet, essayist, translator, and literary figure associated with the aesthetic and fin-de-siècle movements. Though less well known today, his work reflects a fusion of Romantic sensibility, metaphysical longing, and aesthetic devotion to beauty. His life spanned England, the United States, and France, and his writing engages with themes of nature, love, time, and spiritual mystery.

Early Life and Family

Richard Thomas Gallienne was born in Liverpool, England, on 20 January 1866. His father, Jean (later anglicized to John) Gallienne, worked in the Birkenhead Brewery, and his mother was Jane Smith. He had a large family — six sisters and three brothers (two of whom died young).

He was educated at Liverpool College, and early on worked in an accountant’s office. Eventually, he abandoned the accounting work to pursue writing.

As a young man, he adopted the name “Le Gallienne”, adding the “Le” to his birth surname.

Literary Career and Major Works

Early Publication & Aesthetic Circles

His first published book was My Ladies’ Sonnets and Other Vain and Amatorious Verses (1887). By 1889 he had published Volumes in Folio, which garnered attention in aesthetic circles. He moved in the fin-de-siècle literary milieu, associating with figures like Oscar Wilde, Aubrey Beardsley, and the Rhymers’ Club (which included W. B. Yeats). He was a contributor to The Yellow Book, a prominent aesthetic magazine (1894–1897).

Despite these affiliations, Le Gallienne resisted some aspects of Decadent aesthetics, and his style retained a strong Romantic influence.

Later Works, Translations, and Essays

Over his long career, he produced a wide array of works: poetry collections, essays, memoirs, translations, and fiction. Notable works include The Quest of the Golden Girl (1896, novel) The Lonely Dancer and Other Poems, Vanishing Roads and Other Essays, and From a Paris Garret (his memoirs)

He also engaged in translation, e.g. Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám (paraphrase) and works from Danish (via his second wife)

Personal Life & Later Years

Le Gallienne was married three times.

• His first wife, Mildred Lee, died in 1894, leaving a daughter, Hesper Joyce.

• In 1897 he married Julie Nørregaard, a Danish journalist; they had a daughter, Eva Le Gallienne (born 1899), who later became a prominent actress.

• Their marriage was troubled; they separated in 1903 and formally divorced in 1911.

In October 1911, he married Irma Perry (née Hinton), with whom he spent later years.

He lived in the United States for a time, then moved to Paris in the 1920s, and eventually settled in the French Riviera (Menton). During WWII, his house in Menton was commandeered by German troops, and his library was at risk, though he successfully appealed to recover his books. He died on 15 September 1947 in Menton, France.

Themes, Style & Literary Significance

Romanticism, Beauty, and Mystery

Le Gallienne’s poetic vision is suffused with longing for beauty, an embrace of nature, and a deep sense of mystery. Critics often note his devotion to “sensation” and a metaphysical bent. He maintained that mystery is more than half of beauty—that strangeness, the hiddenness in things, stirs the imagination.

He was skeptical of modernism’s starkness and defended idealism, aestheticism, and old-world sensibility.

Time, Transience & the “Vanishing Road”

One of his recurring metaphors is that of roads or paths fading as one travels — a way to express the fleetingness of life, memory, and experience:

“The road recedes as the traveler advances, leaving a continuous present.”

He also writes of “the vanishing road of a song in the air … the vanishing roads of the spring flowers and the winter snows.”

Love, Longing, and Spiritual Yearning

His poems often address love (earthly and ideal), loss, and spiritual longing. For example:

“The beauty we love is very silent. It smiles softly to itself, but never speaks.”

In Vanishing Roads and Other Essays, he reflects on the spiritual dimension, suggesting that true religion lies in what transcends time and space.

Criticism, Legacy & Obscurity

While he published some 90 books over his life, Le Gallienne’s reputation waned, partly because his style was out of step with the rising modernist trends. Critics often found his work overly sentimental or intentionally archaic.

Yet his work remains of interest to those exploring late Victorian aestheticism, symbolism, and those decadent/romantic interstices.

Famous Quotes by Richard Le Gallienne

Here are several notable quotes attributed to Le Gallienne, capturing his poetic sensibility:

• “It is the fine excesses of life that make it worth living.”

• “A wholesome oblivion of one’s neighbours is the beginning of wisdom.”

• “The beauty we love is very silent. It smiles softly to itself, but never speaks.”

• “Men talk of heaven, - there is no heaven but here; Men talk of hell, - there is no hell but here … O love, there is no other life — but here.”

• “If Romeo and Juliet make a tragedy of it nowadays, they have only to blame their own mismanagement, for the world is with them as it has never been before, and all sensible fathers and mothers know it.”

• “Modern science, then, so far from being an enemy of romance, is seen on every hand to be its sympathetic and resourceful friend … and an indulgent minister to its lighter fancies.”

• “We also maintain … that mystery is more than half of beauty, the element of strangeness that stirs the senses through the imagination.”

These lines show his preoccupation with beauty, mystery, the interior world, and the tension between modernity and romantic imagination.

Lessons & Reflections from Le Gallienne’s Life

1. Hold to one’s aesthetic integrity. He refused to be wholly swept by popular trends, choosing instead to maintain a poetic voice true to his sensibility.

2. Beauty and mystery are inseparable. For Le Gallienne, it was not enough to describe beautiful things—he sought to evoke their hidden depths.

3. The present is all we have. His metaphor of the vanishing road reminds us that life unfolds in the ephemeral now.

4. Art and personal struggle often intersect. His life involved loss, financial hardship, exile, and artistic marginalization—yet he continued to write.

5. Genre boundaries can blur. He moved between poetry, essays, memoirs, and translation, showing literary flexibility.

Conclusion

Richard Le Gallienne may not be a household name today, but his work embodies a bridge between Romantic and aesthetic traditions, at a time when poetry was transforming. His devotion to beauty, his sensitivity to mystery, and his lyrical voice remain appealing to those who seek poetry that resonates with longing, introspection, and a quietly spirited intensity.