In the smoky jazz clubs of 1920s Harlem, where the saxophone's wail mingled with the clatter of typewriter keys, James Mercer Langston Hughes emerged as one of America's most vital poetic voices. Born on February 1, 1902, in Joplin, Missouri, and passing away on May 22, 1967, in New York City, Hughes spent his sixty-five years crafting a literary legacy that would fundamentally reshape American poetry and give voice…
“For my best poems were all written when I felt the worst. When I was happy, I didn't write anything.”
Neighbourhood:
African American Poets, American Poets, Harlem Renaissance, Political Poets, Social Justice Poets
Emotional landscape: Longing, Sorrow, Despair
Fernando António Nogueira Pessoa was born in Lisbon on 13 June 1888 and died there on 30 November 1935, leaving behind a body of work so various, unfinished, and deliberately dispersed among invented authors that it altered the possibilities of modern literature. During his lifetime he published relatively little in book form and knew neither broad public fame nor financial ease. After his death, however, the vast ar…
“Literature is the most agreeable way of ignoring life.”
Neighbourhood:
Edwardian Poets, Modernist Poets, Symbolist Poets
Emotional landscape: Sorrow, Spirituality, Longing
