Pick two poets who seem to have nothing to do with each other — a Gothic American and a pastoral Englishman, say — and see where the catalogue actually joins them: overlapping years, shared ground, distinctive themes, and the poems that secretly rhyme.
Alan Seeger
Lew R. Sarett
A random pair who overlapped in time and whose poems already rhyme in the catalogue — a way into poets you may not have met.
Alan Seeger was born in New York City on 22 June 1888, into an American family whose comfort, education, and international connections gave him unusual freedom while also placing before him the question of what a privileged young man ought to do with his life. He died on 4 July 1916, age twenty-eight, in the Battle of the Somme while serving in the French Foreign Legion. In the years between those dates he became, in…
“It is a wonderful experience to be actually in the midst of great events.”
Lew R. Sarett, the poet of the wilderness, was born Lewis Zaratzsky—later Saretsky—on May 16, 1888, in the crowded immigrant neighborhoods of Chicago, Illinois. His parents, Rudolph Zaratzsky, a clothing cutter from Poland, and Jeanette Bloch from Lithuania, had arrived in America seeking opportunity amid the waves of Eastern European migration. As their only child, young Lew grew up in a household shaped by both the…
About 1,144 km separate New York City, New York, USA from Chicago, Illinois, USA. Shared ground: United States.
Distinctive words drawn from each poet’s critiqued poems — what they keep writing about, not just what their biographies mention.
Alan Seeger: new york city, battle of the somme, french foreign legion, i have a rendezvous with death, the torture of cuauhtemoc, charles seeger sr., elsie simmons adams seeger, pete seeger. Lew R. Sarett: chicago, marquette, benton harbor, university of michigan, beloit college, harvard law school, many many moons, the box of god.
The closest poem-to-poem matches in critique space — the sort of kinship a listener hears before the catalogue admits it.
Notable events from the years they were both alive.
Alan Seeger: Longing, Tenderness, Wonder. Lew R. Sarett: Anger, Irony, Joy.
Install V2Melody
Add a home-screen icon for quicker listening in a simple app window.