Lewis Carroll gives "1872" as the date of publication.) Its somewhat darker mood possibly reflects changes in Dodgson's life. His father's death in 1868 plunged him into a depression that lasted some years. In 1876, Dodgson produced his next great work, "The Hunting of the Snark", a fantastical "nonsense" poem exploring the adventures of a bizarre crew of nine tradesmen and one beaver, who set off to find the snark. It received largely mixed reviews from Carroll's contemporary reviewers, but was enormously popular with the public, having been reprinted seventeen times between 1876 and 1908, and has seen various adaptations into musicals,
The Garden of Love (poem) The Garden of Love (poem) "The Garden of Love" is a poem by the Romantic poet William Blake. It was published as part of his collection, "Songs of Experience". One reading on "The Garden of Love" is that it was written to express Blake's beliefs on the naturalness of sexuality and how organised religion, particularly the Christian church of Blake's time, encouraged repression of natural desires. If this is what Blake intended, it would have been a brave statement to make in his time due to the implied sexual reference, but much of the poetry of Blake and his contemporaries