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Fernando Pessoa Poems

 

Fernando Pessoa was a Portuguese poet of the early 20th century who lived and died with very little recognition from the general public although one critic in the literary business described him as “the most representative poet of the twentieth century, along with Pablo Neruda”. Perhaps he would have become better known in his lifetime had he actually signed off all ...

Countee Cullen Poems

 

Countee Cullen was a very private man and there are conflicting accounts of where and when he was born. Details of his early family life are sketchy but seem, by all accounts, to have been extremely traumatic for him. The fact that he, through his own efforts and tenacity, dragged himself up to a level where he gained a masters degree and ...

A. E. Housman Poems

 

Here is another of those poets who is generally known by his initials rather than by his full Christian names which were Alfred Edward. Housman is probably best known for his epic work A Shropshire Lad which was a collection of 63 different poems evoking the lost way of life of young men in rural areas towards the end of the 19th ...

Edgar Lee Masters Poems

 

Born in Kansas in 1868, Edgar Lee Masters was the author of a wide range of novels and books of poetry that set him up as one of the major literary voices of America. His collection of short poems, The Spoon River Anthology, is perhaps his most famous contribution to the art and was composed late on in life when ...

Wallace Stevens Poems

 

Born in Pennsylvania in 1879, American Wallace Stevens was an insurance executive turned poet and writer who won the Pulitzer in 1955. He went to public school and fell in love with the classics in Greek and Latin. He originally trained as a lawyer, attending Harvard initially and then a law school in New York. In his early twenties, Stevens married ...

Algernon Charles Swinburne Poems

 

Born in London in 1837, Algernon Swinburne became one of the most well-known poets of the Victorian age, producing verse that often shocked and shook the morals of the conservative elite of the city. The oldest of 6 children in a wealthy family, he was sent to Eton to begin his studies where he discovered his love of poetry and ...

Mahmoud Darwish Poems

 

At one time considered a poet of the resistance by Israel, Mahmoud Darwish was born in 1941 in the West of Galilee and was a potent voice for Palestine over the last 60 years. Though his mother was illiterate, his grandfather taught him to read at an early age. When his family were forced off their land by the Israelis they ...

Nikki Giovanni Poems

 

Born in Tennessee in 1943, Nikki Giovanni has been one of the most influential voices in American literature in the last 60 years, a poet and activist who was influenced by the Civil Rights movement of the 50s and 60s. She was also greatly influenced in her early years by the stories from her grandmother, introducing her a rich African-American heritage ...

Li Po Poems

 

Born in the middle of the Tang Dynasty in 701, Li Po was one of the most prominent writers of his time in China, developing poetic art and producing about 1000 poems in his life time. He and fellow poet Du Fu were responsible for a golden time in Chinese writing, exploring relationships, the natural world, as well as the ...

Bonnie Parker Poems

 

When most people hear the name Bonnie Parker their first thought is unlikely to be “this was a famous American poet of the early 20th century”. A more likely adjective to use is actually infamous because, of course, she was a part of one of the most notorious criminal gangs in history. Along with her partner Clyde Barrow she set off on ...