This chapter evidences how Hardy’s poetry celebrates the works of past artists, architects, poets, and musicians, while indicating how his poems will become part of a developing artistic process. These poems connect most powerfully to the central theme of joy and hope which underpins my book. I highlight how this was informed by what Hardy in 1901 termed an “Idealism of Fancy” (PV, 210). This aspect of Hardy’s poetic optimism encompasses two general groups, centred firstly on art and architecture and secondly on literature and music. Several of Hardy’s poems indicate how art and architecture can help creatively preserve the memory of loved ones while bringing to life in the present historical figures who may have inhabited specific sites. More optimistically, many poems, such as “In a Museum” (1917), demonstrate the ongoing inspirational effect of non-spatiotemporal art such as literature and music. Hardy’s speakers participate in a process by which fresh art is made from old, ensuring a constant sense of vibrant new life which appears potentially limitless. I show the ways in which these hopeful poems reflect Hardy’s interest in writers such as Matthew Arnold, William Wordsworth, John Keats, Walter Pater, Herbert Spencer, and Arthur Symons.