"When I Was One-and-Twenty" is a poem by British writer A.E. Housman, published in his extremely popular first collection A Shropshire Lad (1896). It is a short poem made up of two stanzas, in which the young speaker talks about the experience of falling in—and out—of love. At age 21, the speaker was told by a wise man that it was better to give all one's money away than one's heart. The speaker, of course, didn't listen, and by the ripe old age of 22 has come to know the painful truth of the wise man's words.
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The Full Text of “When I Was One-and-Twenty”
1When I was one-and-twenty
2 I heard a wise man say,
3“Give crowns and pounds and guineas
4 But not your heart away;
5Give pearls away and rubies
6 But keep your fancy free.”
7But I was one-and-twenty,
8 No use to talk to me.
9When I was one-and-twenty
10 I heard him say again,
11“The heart out of the bosom
12 Was never given in vain;
13’Tis paid with sighs a plenty
14 And sold for endless rue.”
15And I am two-and-twenty,
16 And oh, ’tis true, ’tis true.
The Full Text of “When I Was One-and-Twenty”
1When I was one-and-twenty
2 I heard a wise man say,
3“Give crowns and pounds and guineas
4 But not your heart away;
5Give pearls away and rubies
6 But keep your fancy free.”
7But I was one-and-twenty,
8 No use to talk to me.
9When I was one-and-twenty
10 I heard him say again,
11“The heart out of the bosom
12 Was never given in vain;
13’Tis paid with sighs a plenty
14 And sold for endless rue.”
15And I am two-and-twenty,
16 And oh, ’tis true, ’tis true.
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“When I Was One-and-Twenty” Summary
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“When I Was One-and-Twenty” Themes
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Youth, Naivety, and Experience
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Love and Pain
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Line-by-Line Explanation & Analysis of “When I Was One-and-Twenty”
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Lines 1-4
When I was one-and-twenty
I heard a wise man say,
“Give crowns and pounds and guineas
But not your heart away; -
Lines 5-8
Give pearls away and rubies
But keep your fancy free.”
But I was one-and-twenty,
No use to talk to me. -
Lines 9-14
When I was one-and-twenty
I heard him say again,
“The heart out of the bosom
Was never given in vain;
’Tis paid with sighs a plenty
And sold for endless rue.” -
Lines 15-16
And I am two-and-twenty,
And oh, ’tis true, ’tis true.
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“When I Was One-and-Twenty” Poetic Devices & Figurative Language
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Alliteration
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Assonance
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Caesura
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Enjambment
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Repetition
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Consonance
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Metaphor
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“When I Was One-and-Twenty” Vocabulary
Select any word below to get its definition in the context of the poem. The words are listed in the order in which they appear in the poem.
- One-and-twenty
- Crowns and pounds and guineas
- Keep your fancy free
- Bosom
- In vain
- Rue
- Two-and-twenty
- 'Tis
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Form, Meter, & Rhyme Scheme of “When I Was One-and-Twenty”
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Form
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Meter
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Rhyme Scheme
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“When I Was One-and-Twenty” Speaker
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“When I Was One-and-Twenty” Setting
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Literary and Historical Context of “When I Was One-and-Twenty”
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More “When I Was One-and-Twenty” Resources
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External Resources
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The Poem Out Loud — The poem read by Jason Shelton.
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"The Invention of Love" — A clip from a play by Tom Stoppard, which imagines A.E. Housman visiting the classical underworld.
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Ezra Pound's Parody — In this poem, American modernist poet Ezra Pound mocks Housman's tendency towards "woe."
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"A Shropshire Lad" — The full text of Housman's most popular book of poems, from which "When I Was One-and-Twenty" is taken.
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Housman's Life and Work — A valuable resource from the Poetry Foundation.
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LitCharts on Other Poems by A. E. Housman
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