Gwendolyn Brooks (1917-2000) started writing poetry at a young age. From the repetition in the art of poetry her work is vast and well known. As an African American poet who grew up in Chicago, Illinois, during a time of strong racial contrasts, her work has become inspirational to a great many people. Her talents in poetry marked her as the first ...
American writer, poet and clergyman Henry Van Dyke was born in 1852 in Germantown, in the State of Pennsylvania. His father was a member of the Presbyterian church and, as a minister, was the main influence on the young Van Dyke in his formative years. As well as two nationally known stories for Christmas, The Other Wise Man and The ...
Irish novelist and poet James Joyce was born in Dublin in 1882, the oldest of ten children, and became one of the most influential writers of the 20th century. Probably best known for his novels Ulysses, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man and Finnegan’s Wake, he was also an accomplished poet. Joyce was considered a highly intelligent child although ...
Margaret Atwood is a poet, novelist, literary critic, essayist and environmental activist. The daughter of Carl Edmund, a forest entomologist and Margaret Dorothy, a nutritionist and dietician, she was born on the 18th of November, 1939 in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. The family moved to Toronto when she was seven years old. Her childhood was divided between English-speaking Ottawa and French-speaking Quebec. ...
Joyce Kilmer was born on 6 December 1886 and was christened Alfred Joyce Kilmer but he chose to shorten it when he became a published writer. Growing up in New Brunswick, New Jersey Kilmer enjoyed a comfortable, middle class existence. His father was an analytical chemist working for the big company Johnson and Johnson and it was his invention of a new ...
“The Northamptonshire Peasant Poet” was how John Clare is remembered. Born in 1793, the son of a farm labourer, he grew up in a small village called Helpston, close to the Cambridgeshire border. It was only six miles from Peterborough at a time when the old, agricultural ways were changing forever as the wheels of industry turned all over Europe. So many ...
Walter de la Mare is one of England’s best known writers, producing great works that were often atmospheric, slightly scary and with a touch of mystery. Born in south east London in 1873 into fairly privileged circumstances he was accorded, on his death in 1956, the honour of having his ashes buried in the crypt of St Pauls Cathedral. He had, ...
Perhaps one of the most well-known writers of the late 19th century, Oscar Wilde was born in Dublin in 1854 and his appeal has endured to the present day. Known mainly for his short satirical statements and cutting wit as well as the seminal novel The Picture of Dorian Gray, he was also a prolific poet. Wilde came from an intellectual family ...
Mirza Ghalib was the pen name of Urdu poet Mirza Asadullah Baig Khan who was born in colonial India in 1797. Considered one of the most popular and influential poets of the later days of the Persian Mughal Era before British rule took full hold, he wrote several ghazals – poetic forms that incorporate rhyming couplets with a refrain, each line ...
A contemporary novelist and poet, Vikram Seth spent his early years in India and London, graduating from the prestigious Corpus Christi College, Oxford. He went on to further studies at Stanford University where he achieved a master’s degree (economics) in 1978, following this up with some post-graduate study at Nanking University in China. After Nanking he embarked on the long ...
