Thomas Paine, born 9 February 1737 and dead on 8 June 1809, was one of the most consequential writers of the revolutionary Atlantic world. He was not primarily a poet in the conventional sense, nor should his occasional verses be allowed to obscure the achievement for which he is remembered: he made political argument into a popular literary force. In pamphlets, newspaper essays, public letters, and philosophical tre…
“The world is my country, all mankind are my brethren, and to do good is my religion.”
Neighbourhood:
American Poets, Enlightenment Poets, Political Poets, Social Justice Poets
Emotional landscape: Wonder, Sensuality, Joy
In the fertile but unsettled literary soil of colonial America, the figure of Thomas Godfrey stands as both a beacon and a cautionary tale—the first native-born American poet to publish a volume of verse, yet a voice largely forgotten by the canon that followed. His brief life—spanning only twenty-seven years from 1736 to 1763—was marked by intellectual ambition, poetic sensitivity, and a tragic trajectory that encap…
Neighbourhood:
American Poets, Augustan Poets, Colonial American Poets, Death & Mortality, Love Poets, Social Justice Poets
Emotional landscape: Joy, Sensuality, Wonder
