Masefield, John Edward

Masefield, John Edward (1878–1967), British poet. He was educated as a cadet on board the training ship HMS Conway and went to sea at the age of 15 as an apprentice in a square-rigged ship in which he rounded Cape Horn. A few years later his health failed while his ship was in New York and he went ashore, supporting himself by taking any job, however humble, through which he could earn his keep. On his return to England he became a journalist and joined the staff of the Manchester Guardian.

He had already started to write poetry and was one of the pioneers in the revival of narrative poetry, of which his Dauber, published in 1913, was based in part on his early experience at sea. He settled in London during the early 1900s, and a volume of poems, Salt Water Ballads, came out in 1902, and was an instant success. Among the poems in it was ‘Sea Fever’, one of the best-loved ballads of the sea, which was later set to music by John Ireland.I must go down to the sea again, to the lonely sea and the sky,
And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by,
And the wheel's kick and the wind's song and the white sail's shaking,
And a grey mist on the sea's face and a grey dawn breaking.
Another book of poetry, Ballads and Poems, followed in 1910. At the same time he was writing short stories of the sea, published in A Mainsail Haul (1905) and A Tarpaulin Muster (1907), and he also wrote several plays.

His first novel was Captain Margaret, published in 1908, and among the dozen or so that he wrote, the two most connected with the sea were The Bird of Dawning (1933), a story of the tea clippers, and Victorious Troy (1935) which tells the story of a sailing ship dismasted and officerless, but brought back to safety by an apprentice on board.

However, it is by his poetry that he is best remembered, especially by such nostalgic and even sentimental poems as ‘Sea Fever’, and by his many verses in praise of the merchant navy in which he spent his early years, perhaps exemplified by his ‘Cargoes’ type of ballad. They were simple, direct, and held the true flavour of the sea.Dirty British coaster with a salt-caked smoke stack,
Butting through the Channel in the mad March days,
With a cargo of Tyne coal,
Road-rails, pig lead,
Firewood, ironware, and cheap tin trays.
Masefield was appointed Poet Laureate in 1930 and was awarded the Order of Merit in 1935.

See also marine literature.