Ralph Waldo Emerson, born in Boston, Massachusetts, on 25 May 1803 and dead in Concord, Massachusetts, on 27 April 1882, became one of the defining voices of nineteenth-century American literature. He was at once a poet, essayist, lecturer, editor, religious dissenter, and public moralist, though no single title entirely contains him. His greatest influence lay in his ability to make philosophical inquiry sound urgen…
“Every revolution was first a thought in one man's mind, and when the same thought occurs to another man, it is the key to that era.”
Neighbourhood:
American Poets, Mystical & Spiritual Poets, Nature Poets, Transcendentalists
Emotional landscape: Wonder, Spirituality, Peace
In the heart of nineteenth-century American letters stands a figure who defied easy categorization, a man who straddled two seemingly incompatible worlds with remarkable grace. Edmund Clarence Stedman, born on October 8, 1833, in Hartford, Connecticut, would become known as the "Bard of Wall Street," a sobriquet that captured both the paradox and the peculiar achievement of his life. For forty-five years, he navigate…
“The poet who does not revere his art, and believe in its sovereignty, is not born to wear the purple.”
Neighbourhood:
American Poets, Edwardian Poets, Light Verse Poets, Victorian Poets
Emotional landscape: Sorrow, Tenderness, Longing