Putting the No in November

An ironic poem in a month typically associated with gratitude

Welcome to “Off the Clock,” the fortnightly Saturday edition of Timeless & Timely, where we have fun with history and language.

Thomas Hood by unknown artist, circa 1832-1834 (National Portrait Gallery - CC BY-NC-ND 3.0)

By all rights, Thomas Hood could have focused on the negatives in his life.

His misfortunes were probably no worse than others of his time, yet he managed to keep his sense of humor throughout, sharing it with the world.

Thomas Hood was born in London in 1799 and was only 12 years old when his father died. He left school shortly thereafter and went to work in a counting house — in what we would call accounting.

The uncongenial profession wasn’t good for his already frail health, so took up engraving. After that didn’t prove any better for his , he traveled to Scotland to his father’s native town of Errol from 1815–1817 and lived with his maternal grandmother and aunt.

Hood began to write poetry and humorous articles, which he submitted to various regional publications. After returning to London, he fell in with a literary crowd and became deputy editor of London Magazine.

He became known for his puns and sense of humor after publishing a series of comic odes in 1825. Even at home, his playfulness was apparent: he told his wife Jane to beware of red spots on the plaice she might buy from a local door-to-door fishmonger, as the spots were “a sure sign of an advanced stage of decomposition.” (Plaice are naturally red-spotted.)

His continued illness meant he fell behind on bills, and Prime Minister Sir Robert Peel, an admirer of Hood’s, organized a state-sponsored pension for his family of 100 per year, which extended to his children, aged 10 and 15, at the time of his death.

Even as his and his wife’s health declined, he still thought of others. In his later work, he wrote protest poems such as “The Song of the Shirt,” that addressed labor rights and the plight of women, particularly impoverished women.

Thomas Hood died in London in 1845, just shy of his 46th birthday. His wife followed just 18 months later.

William Makepeace Thackeray summed up the good-natured Hood:

“Oh sad, marvellous picture of courage, of honesty, of patient endurance, of duty struggling against pain!... Here is one at least without guile, without pretension, without scheming, of a pure life, to his family and little modest circle of friends tenderly devoted.”

It seems entirely appropriate to remember Hood with his poem “No!” from 1844.

        No sun—no moon!
        No morn—no noon—
No dawn—
        No sky—no earthly view—
        No distance looking blue—
No road—no street—no “t’other side the way”—
        No end to any Row—
        No indications where the Crescents go—
        No top to any steeple—
No recognitions of familiar people—
        No courtesies for showing ’em—
        No knowing ’em!
No traveling at all—no locomotion,
No inkling of the way—no notion—
        “No go”—by land or ocean—
        No mail—no post—
        No news from any foreign coast—
No park—no ring—no afternoon gentility—
        No company—no nobility—
No warmth, no cheerfulness, no healthful ease,
   No comfortable feel in any member—
No shade, no shine, no butterflies, no bees,
No fruits, no flowers, no leaves, no birds,
        November!

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Such privations! A stark reminder of the gratitude we can express for what we do have in November.

Thank you for being here and making me a part of your routine.

There’s so much to learn,