In the smoky literary salons of early twentieth-century London, few figures loomed larger than John Collings Squire, a man whose influence extended far beyond his own considerable poetic output to shape an entire generation of English letters. Born on April 2, 1884, in Plymouth, Devon, Squire would become one of the most powerful literary editors of his age, a respected poet in his own right, and a lightning rod for…
“God heard the embattled nations sing and shout 'Gott strafe England' and 'God save the King!' God this, God that, and God the other thing—'Good God!' said God, 'I've got my work cut out!”
Neighbourhood:
Edwardian Poets, Georgian Poets, Modernist Poets
Emotional landscape: Spirituality, Sorrow, Wonder
Benjamin Franklin King Jr., known almost everywhere in print as Ben King, was born on 17 March 1857 in St. Joseph, Michigan, and died on 8 April 1894 in Bowling Green, Kentucky. His life lasted only thirty-seven years, and his reputation has never approached that of the best-known American poets of his generation. Yet King was far from insignificant in his own day. He belonged to the large, lively, and now too often…
“If I should die to-night, and you should come to my cold corpse and say, weeping and longing, I would not care.”
Neighbourhood:
American Poets, Light Verse Poets, Victorian Poets
Emotional landscape: Irony, Sorrow, Despair
