W. H. Davies focused much of his work on the conflict between masculinity and femininity and, in particular, on the impossibility of achieving an idealised masculine form. This is the subject with which his prose work is most concerned, to the extent that the very act of writing itself becomes a gendered concern. Mangan and Walvin, in their discussion of transatlantic masculinity, inadvertently encapsulate Davies's experiences of masculinity:

Davies, who of course lived on both sides of the Atlantic, is a proponent of this kind of manly ideal insomuch as his writing celebrates a distinctly pre-war masculine mode. However, the impact of his amputated leg restricts him from ever attaining such an ideal. Davies's writing demonstrates a persistent tension between these two facts, the result of which is that neither Davies nor many of his male characters can ever qualify for his own form of masculinity.

Davies's nomadic life nevertheless betrays a desire to fulfil societal expectations concerning masculinity. The Victorian male ‘needed to demonstrate to himself […] that he could live without the comforts of home’. Davies indeed exemplified this, but his tramping life eventually led to the amputation of his leg. He consistently trivialised and understated his physical condition,10 convincing George Bernard Shaw that it was of little consequence to his life: ‘[Davies loses] a limb with no more to-do than a lobster loses a claw or a lizard his tail.’ The injury receives scant attention in Autobiography and it is cited on just one occasion in his autobiographical Later Days, as Davies recounts his first impression of Max Beerbohm. Beerbohm makes an ambiguous reference to a ‘lame dog’, which Davies understands to be directed at him personally. He takes offence to this (‘for I was lame’), but that is the extent to which his amputation is mentioned in the book.