Thomas Hood (1799-1845)
Born in London, May 1799. He was involved in editing the London Magazine (1821-3), The Gem (1829), the Comic Annual (1830), the New Monthly Magazine (1841-3), and Hood's Magazine (1843), and contributed to them a number of his own poetical works. His humorous satires and parodies on contemporary sensational topics sold well, which made him widely known as a first-rate humorist. "The Dream of Eugene Aram, the Murder" (1829) is based on the real story of Eugene Aram (1704-59), an English philologist hanged for the murder of his friend, a subject which Bulwer-Lytton (1803-73) took up in the form of novel, Eugene Aram (1832). Hood's most famous compositions, written on his sickbed, are "The Song of the Shirt" (1844) and "The Bridge of Sighs" (1844), both of which took up the contemporary serious issues, such as the problems facing poor factory workers and the suicide of a harlot. (Y. Y.)