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.
Bayard Taylor
George Henry Boker
A random pair who overlapped in time and whose poems already rhyme in the catalogue — a way into poets you may not have met.
James Bayard Taylor was born on 11 January 1825 in Kennett Township, near Kennett Square in Chester County, Pennsylvania, and died on 19 December 1878 in Berlin, Germany. During his lifetime he was among the most visible American men of letters: a poet, novelist, journalist, lecturer, travel writer, editor, translator, and, briefly, a diplomat. His fame was immense by the standards of his day. Audiences crowded his l…
“To Truth's house there is a single door, which is experience.”
In the glittering literary salons of nineteenth-century Philadelphia, where gas lamps cast their warm glow over earnest conversations about poetry and politics, one figure stood at the intersection of art and public service with uncommon grace. George Henry Boker was born on October 6, 1823, into a world of privilege and promise that would shape his destiny as one of America's most accomplished—if underappreciated—po…
“There are no such subjects for historical tragedy on earth as are to be found in the Spanish history of that period.”
About 52 km separate Kennett Square, Pennsylvania, USA from Camden, New Jersey, 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.
Bayard Taylor: kennett township, chester county, ximena; or, the battle of the sierra morena, views a-foot, eldorado; or, adventures in the path of empire, the story of kennett, the bedouin song, quaker farming family. George Henry Boker: philadelphia, the book of the dead, the lessons of life, calaynos, francesca da rimini, bayard taylor, richard henry stoddard, union league club.
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.
Bayard Taylor: Despair, Sorrow, Spirituality. George Henry Boker: Sorrow, Despair, Fear.
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