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.”
Neighbourhood:
American Poets, Dramatic Poets, Pre-Raphaelite Poets, Symbolist Poets, Victorian Poets
Emotional landscape: Sorrow, Despair, Fear
Harold Witter Bynner, who published almost always as Witter Bynner and was known to friends as “Hal,” was born on 10 August 1881 in Brooklyn, New York, and died on 1 June 1968 in Santa Fe, New Mexico. His long career carried him through several distinct literary eras: the cultivated, metrically formal verse of the early twentieth century; the disruptions and provocations of modernism; the American enthusiasm for Asia…
“If a metaphor is used, it is a metaphor directly relating to the theme, not something borrowed from the ends of the earth.”
Neighbourhood:
American Poets, Imagist Poets, LGBTQ+ Poets, Modernist Poets
Emotional landscape: Wonder, Longing, Spirituality
