Analysis Of When I Was One And Twenty By A. E. Housman

Once a pond a time, a boy met a girl and they fell madly in love, and they lived happily ever after. That was our perception of love, when we were kids because we did not know the difference between fairytales and reality. However, as we got older we realized that love is more complex than that, relationships require a lot of hard work. Sometimes, we do not realize the amount of effort that must be put forth in order for our relationship to thrive, that when we are warned away from entering one, we ignore the warning because we picture the perfect fairytale. In A.E. Housman’s poem, “When I Was One-and-Twenty,” Housman depicts a youthful the persona obtaining advice about love from, “a wise man” (2). While, reading this poem it is clear that …show more content…
That is why when my sister gave me relationship advice; when I was seventeen, I failed to take it, just like the persona in the poem. The wise man first tells the persona, “Give crowns and pounds and guineas / But not your heart away” (3-4) meaning even though you need money to survive, it would be better to go without the material necessities that keep you alive than to suffer from love. He continues by saying, “Give pearls away and rubies / But keep your fancy free” (5-6) meaning love always going to have a price, so while you are young it is going to better to keep your options open. This is relates back to the advice my sister gave me because she was in an on and off again relationship for about seven years, so when my two year relationship was starting to falter; she told that I did not want to go through what she did, for so long. That if the relationship was going to end, let it because there is more to life than the boy you fell in love with in high school. However, like the persona, I did not listen and I felt like my situation was different; and tried fighting for our relationship, even though it was clearly …show more content…
Therefore, the persona experienced love and heartbreak within a year. My relationship however, began when I was fifteen, and crumbled when I was seventeen. Making this poem relatable, because I did not recognize the wisdom of my older sister until I was older, just like the persona. Thus, even when we are warned away from entering a relationship or continuing one, we ignore the warning because we picture the perfect fairytale; ending up heartbroken and in misery realizing that those fairytale endings, were just that,