Compare Poets

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.

Poet A

Edgar A. Guest Edgar A. Guest

Poet B

Max Ehrmann Max Ehrmann
Compare two related contemporaries

A random pair who overlapped in time and whose poems already rhyme in the catalogue — a way into poets you may not have met.

Strongly related
Their work already rhymes in the catalogue. The rest of this page is the story around that rhyme.
Biography 72% Blended 72%
Swap sides Another related pair
Edgar A. Guest

Edgar A. Guest

20 August 1881 – 5 August 1959 (~78)
21 live poems · English

Edgar Albert Guest was born in Birmingham, England, on 20 August 1881, and died in Detroit, Michigan, on 5 August 1959, fifteen days before his seventy-eighth birthday. During much of his long life, he was among the most familiar poets in the United States. His name appeared daily in newspapers, his verses were memorized in schools and recited at civic meetings, and his books sold in quantities that many more critica…

“It sounds preachy, I know, to say that all buildings depend for their real beauty upon the spirit of the people who inhabit them. But it is true.”

Neighbourhood: American Poets, Children's Verse, Edwardian Poets, Light Verse Poets
Emotional landscape: Joy, Tenderness, Peace
Max Ehrmann

Max Ehrmann

26 September 1872 – 9 September 1945 (~73)
1 live poem · English

Max Ehrmann was born on 26 September 1872 in Terre Haute, Indiana, and died there on 9 September 1945, seventeen days before his seventy-third birthday. He is remembered almost everywhere as the author of “Desiderata,” the compact prose poem beginning, “Go placidly amid the noise and haste,” but that single work represents only the most widely circulated part of a long, earnest, and sometimes overlooked literary life…

Neighbourhood: American Poets, Death & Mortality, Devotional Poets, Hymn Writers, Mystical & Spiritual Poets
Emotional landscape: Peace, Spirituality, Joy

In time

Edgar A. Guest
Max Ehrmann
1872 1959
They overlapped for 65 years (1881–1945). When Edgar A. Guest was born, Max Ehrmann was about 9. Edgar A. Guest was about 64 when Max Ehrmann died.

On the map

About 6,369 km separate Birmingham, England from Terre Haute, Indiana, USA. Shared ground: United States.

Themes they return to

Distinctive words drawn from each poet’s critiqued poems — what they keep writing about, not just what their biographies mention.

Shared

From the biographies

culture

Edgar A. Guest: birmingham, detroit, people's poet, a heap o' livin', just folks, the path to home, it couldn't be done, nellie crossman. Max Ehrmann: terre haute, desiderata, bertha pratt king, depaul university, harvard university, delta tau delta, a fearsome riddle, the wife of marobius.

Poems that secretly rhyme

The closest poem-to-poem matches in critique space — the sort of kinship a listener hears before the catalogue admits it.

Had Youth Been Willing to Listen
Edgar A. Guest
80% wisdom
Compare
Desiderata
Max Ehrmann
There Are No Gods
Edgar A. Guest
79%
Compare
Desiderata
Max Ehrmann
My Goals
Edgar A. Guest
78% life
Compare
Desiderata
Max Ehrmann
See It Through
Edgar A. Guest
77%
Compare
Desiderata
Max Ehrmann
Keep Your Dreams
Edgar A. Guest
75% life
Compare
Desiderata
Max Ehrmann
Myself
Edgar A. Guest
73% life
Compare
Desiderata
Max Ehrmann

The world around them

While their lives overlapped

Notable events from the years they were both alive.

Emotional landscapes

Edgar A. Guest: Joy, Tenderness, Peace. Max Ehrmann: Peace, Spirituality, Joy.

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