Poet, historian. Elegy reflective, calm and stoic tone. Contemplates such themes as death and afterlife (foreshadowed the upcoming Gothic movement).

Sharp observation and playful sense of humour. Combined traditional forms and poetic diction with new topics and modes of expression, and may be considered as a classically focused precursor of the romantic revival.

"Too poor for a bribe and too proud to importune, He had not the method of making a fortune: Could love and could hate, so was th...
Read Moreought somewhat odd; No very great wit, he believed in a God. A post or a pension he did not desire, But left church and state to Charles Townshend and Squire."   Thomas Gray was born on December 26 1716 in  London., in what was then his mother’s and aunts’ small milliner`s shop. He was one of twelve children born to Dorothy and Philip Gray. . The marriage was an unhappy one, and Thomas had a troubled childhood because of it. His mother paid to send him to Eton College in 1725, where his maternal uncle, then assistant master at Eton, took  King`s College, Cambridge, and also an assistant master at Eton. From 1725 to 1734 Gray attended Eton College, located opposite Windsor Castle. Although Thomas was a studious and literary boy who took little part in the boyish amusements of his class-mates, he was extremely happy there.

When Gray returned from abroad and became established at Cambridge marked his first and most astounding period of creativity. It was during that time that he wrote “Hymn to Ignorance”, to mark his return to university, “Ode to Spring”, a piece reminicient to Buckinghamshire, and the death of his only intimate friend,West, age 25, he wrote in his sadness the poems “Ode on a Distant Prospect of Eton College” as well as “Ode to Adversity.” 

Gray got a degree of Bachelor of Civil Law in 1743, but he preferred the study of Greek literature to that of either civil or common law.. In 1754 he took Holy Orders and moved to York. "Ode on the Death of a Favourite Cat, Drowned in a Tub of Gold Fishes" was one of Gray`s most light-hearted poems in memory of Walpole`s drowned pet cat, Selima.

Gray wrote "Elegy in a Country Churchyard" over the death of his Aunt Mary, in 1749. West`s and Aunt Mary`s deaths had affected him profoundly.

His relationship to heiress Lady Cobham was the only  suggestion of a conventional romance in Gray`s life and is sketchy as well. He never married. Recently have scholars focused on the  homoeroticism in his poems and letters. His faith and laws of the land at that time forbade such discussion previously as to such.After his return to Cambridge in November 1761, Gray became attached to Norton Nicholls (1742-1809), an undergraduate at Trinity Hall. Nicholls was ordained in 1767 and afterwards became rector of Lound and Bradwell, Suffolk. He had attracted Gray`s attention by his knowledge of Dante. During Gray`s later years Nicholls was among his best friends, and he left some valuable reminiscences of Gray, and an interesting correspondence with him. 

Gray had other relationships , which would include in 1769 with Gray’s meeting Charles Victor de Bonstetten (1745-1832), a young Swiss nobleman, who had met Norton Nicholls at Bath in December 1769, and was by him introduced to Gray. Gray developed for him a romantic, homoerotic devotion, and it was said to be  the most profound emotional experience of his life. Gray`s health had been declining for some years. He was planning a trip to Switzerland to visit the younger de Bonstetten when, in  1771, he was seized with a sudden illness . Gray was  in London, but soon went back  to Cambridge, feeling very ill. He was  attended by his friend and joint executor of Gray`s will, the Rev James Brown, master of Pembroke, and his friend Stonhewer came from London to take over with his care. Gray died in his rooms at Pembroke on 30 July 1771.

As a poet Gray was admired out of all proportion to his  modest output of verse. The whole of his anthumously published poetry amounts to less than 1,000 lines. He was unquestionably one of the least productive poets, though highly regarded.