T.E. Brown - His Life and Legacy

Thomas Edward Brown lived a double life. Born on the Isle of Man and educated at King William's College and Christ Church, Oxford, he proved to have a brilliant intellect and was the first person to be awarded first classes in 'Greats' and 'History with Jurisprudence', two separate courses which he read concurrently. After this triumph he became a Fellow of Oriel College but soon returned to the Isle of Man as a youthful Vice-Principal at King William's. In 1861 he moved to be Headmaster of the Crypt School, in Gloucester, and in 1863 became Second Master of Clifton College, under John Percival. He was also Head of the Modern Side and a boarding housemaster and he retained all these positions until he retired in 1892, making him the most influential of Clifton's masters during this period. On top of all this he was a poet whose inspiration was his homeland, the Isle of Man, and he wrote many dialect poems about ordinary folk in the Island, starting with Betsy Lee, published in 1871. This and other poems was published by Macmillan as Fo'c's'le Yarns in 1881, establishing him as the poetic voice of the Island. After his death in 1897 his reputation steadily grew and he was formally declared to be the Island's National Poet in 1930.

Published in hardback (238pp) by The Manx Experience, Douglas, in 1997, the centenary of Brown's death. ISBN 1 873120 29 X