Edgar Allan Poe
(1/19/1809 - 10/7/1849) A Magnificent American poet, short story writer, journalist, and literary critic, Edgar Allan Poe was born on January 19th, 1809 in Boston, Massachusetts. Edgar was orphaned at an early age, and was sent to live with a foster family, the Allans, in Richmond, Virginia. Young Poe was never officially adopted by the Allans, and was eventually disowned by the family after years of disputes. Poe won a short story contest at the age of 24 and therefore became a literary critic for the "Southern Literary Messenger". Shortly after that, he married his cousin, Virginia, who was 13 at the time, in 1836 at the age of 27. Edgar became famous around the United States upon the publication of "The Raven" in 1845. Edgar's life was marred with intense drinking bouts, giving him a bad reputation in 19th century society. He however continued to write wonderful short stories like "Murders in the Rue Morgue" and "The Gold Bug", which brought him fame in Europe. After the death of his wife in 1847, Poe fell apart emotionally and died two years later, at the age of forty. Edgar's life and reputation won him a few titles by other literary critics, not all of them good. With the aid of the nature of his stories, people have labeled him paranoid, neurotic, oversexed, addicted to various substances, until all the public is left with is an unstable man sitting in a dim room, with a raven over his door, a bottle at his table, a pipe full of opium, scribbling insane verses. |
James Langston
Hughes was born February 1, 1902, in Joplin, Missouri. His parents divorced when he was a small child, and his father moved to Mexico. He was raised by his grandmother until he was thirteen, when he moved to Lincoln, Illinois, to live with his mother and her husband, before the family eventually settled in Cleveland, Ohio. It was in Lincoln, Illinois, that Hughes began writing poetry. Following graduation, he spent a year in Mexico and a year at Columbia University. During these years, he held odd jobs as an assistant cook, launderer, and a busboy, and travelled to Africa and Europe working as a seaman. In November 1924, he moved to Washington, D.C. Hughes's first book of poetry, The Weary Blues, was published by Alfred A. Knopf in 1926. He finished his college education at Lincoln University in Pennsylvania three years later. In 1930 his first novel, Not Without Laughter, won the Harmon gold medal for literature. Hughes, who claimed Paul Lawrence Dunbar, Carl Sandburg, and Walt Whitman as his primary influences, is particularly known for his insightful, colorful portrayals of black life in America from the twenties through the sixties. He wrote novels, short stories and plays, as well as poetry, and is also known for his engagement with the world of jazz and the influence it had on his writing, as in "Montage of a Dream Deferred." His life and work were enormously important in shaping the artistic contributions of the Harlem Renaissance of the 1920s. Unlike other notable black poets of the period—Claude McKay, Jean Toomer, and Countee Cullen—Hughes refused to differentiate between his personal experience and the common experience of black America. He wanted to tell the stories of his people in ways that reflected their actual culture, including both their suffering and their love of music, laughter, and language itself. Langston Hughes died of complications from prostate cancer in May 22, 1967, in New York. |
Robert Frost
Born on March 26, 1874, Robert Frost spent his first 40 years as an unknown. He exploded on the scene after returning from England at the beginning of WWI. Winner of four Pulitzer Prizes and a special guest at President John F. Kennedy’s inauguration, Frost became a poetic force and the unofficial "poet laureate" of the United States. He died of complications from prostate surgery on January 29, 1963. |