The English-born writer James Henry Leigh Hunt was a controversial figure who attracted the patronage of more successful writers than himself while, on occasions, appearing to openly criticise his benefactors in print. Hunt wrote and had published a great deal of poetry but he also turned his hand to plays, some of which were staged in the London theatres. Besides this he ...
Born in 1883 in Saxony, German poet, writer and artist Joachim Ringelnatz worked variously as a sailor on a World War I mine sweeper and as a comic before landing on the wrong side of the rising Nazi government and finding himself banned from performing. He is more widely known in Germany than in the rest of the world where only a ...
Born in 1897 in Philadelphia, Joseph Auslander was a novel writer and poet who was probably best known for the collection of lyric verses he wrote with his Pulitzer Prize winning wife during the Second World War that were designed to increase the sale of war bonds. Auslander was gripped by writing from an early age and was greatly encouraged by ...
One of the great conservationists of the 19th Century, John Burroughs was also a prolific essayist on the natural world and author of poems such as The Bobolink and Waiting. He was born the seventh of ten children in Roxbury, New York, in 1837 and spent much of his youth out in the wilds near the Catskills Mountains. From an early age ...
Considered one of the most influential scientists of the 19th Century, James Clerk Maxwell also composed his own poetry. He was born into a family of decent means in Edinburgh in 1831, the son of an advocate, and was known to possess an inquiring mind from a very young age. By the time he was 8, under the tutelage of ...
Better known as an iconic film star of the 50s, James Dean also wrote poetry, particularly in the 5 year period before his untimely death. He was born in Marion, Indiana, in 1951, the son of a farmer who later retrained to work in dentistry. The family moved to California where Dean went to school in Brentwood, Los Angeles until he ...
Jami was a 15th century Persian poet and theologian from the school of Ibn Arabi. A great scholar and mystical man, Jami also composed lyrics and idylls and was a respected historian. Jami was born in August 1414 and most accounts put his place of birth as Jam which is now known as Ghor Province in Afghanistan. An alternative place of birth is a ...
James Shirley (sometimes spelled Sherley) was a 17th century English poet and playwright. His output of plays was considerable during the period 1625-42 and only came to an abrupt halt because of the puritanical government edict that all theatres should be closed. This was a golden age for writers of dramatic verse and most of the plays that he penned were performed ...
The Irish poet James Clarence Mangan rose from a fairly humble background in the early 19th century to become one of his country’s most accomplished writers. He wasn’t privileged enough to enjoy a great education and, in fact, attended a number of different schools. While at a Jesuit school he studied languages to the point where he would eventually produce decent translations ...
Joel Barlow was an American poet who was well known for two epic, somewhat controversial, pieces of work concerning Christopher Columbus. Vision of Columbus ran to nine books and later he expanded on the original to produce The Columbiad which was ten books in length. None of this work was particularly popular at the time and, in fact, attracted ridicule from many ...
