Edna St Vincent Millay

Early Poems

• Broschiertes Buch

Produktbeschreibung

Weaving intellect, emotion and irony into unexpected combinations, Edna St. Vincent Millay gave voice through her poetry to her post-World War I generation's claim to personal freedom -- and earned a reputation as a sexually liberated free-thinker who followed her own moral code. Known for her progressive convictions about women's rights and social equality, as well as her free-spirited Bohemian lifestyle, Millay surrounded herself in the 1920s with other artists and writers in Greenwich Village, including Eugene O'Neill, Floyd Dell, Djuna Barnes and Edmund Wilson. Her finely crafted poetry found its form mainly in traditional rhyming sonnets and lyric pieces, but her message declared her independence from convention, as in the often-quoted 1918 quatrain: My candle burn's at both ends; It will not last the night; But ah, my foes, and oh, my friends -- It gives a lovely light!" This edition comprises Millay's first three books, Renascence, Second April, and A Few Figs as well as a biographical and critical Introduction, and indexes both by title and by first line.

Produktdetails

• Verlag: Penguin Publishing Group
• Seitenzahl: 240
• Erscheinungstermin: 1. Dezember 1998
• Englisch
• Abmessung: 197mm x 128mm x 12mm
• Gewicht: 163g
• ISBN-13: 9780141180540
• ISBN-10: 0141180544
• Artikelnr.: 21704574

Autorenporträt

Edna St. Vincent Millay was born in 1892 in Rockland, Maine, and grew up in the seaside town of Camden. She published her first poems as a teenager and, at twenty, her long poem "Renascence" appeared in the anthology The Lyric Year. At Vassar, she developed her talents and reputation as a dramatist and actor. After graduating in 1917, Millay moved to Greenwich Village in New York City where she gave poetry readings and became known for her freedom of thought and feminist views. Her poetry was published in several magazines, including Vanity Fair, Poetry, and Forum. Her first book, Renascence and Other Poems (1917), was followed in 1920 by A Few Figs from Thistles (an expanded edition appeared in 1922) and in 1921 by Second April. In 1923, upon her return from two years of writing and traveling in Europe, Millay received the second annual Pulitzer Prize for Poetry and published a new collection, The Harp-Weaver and Other Poems. Millay published five more collections of poetry: The Buck in the Snow (1928), Fatal Interview (1931), Wine from These Grapes (1934), Huntsman, What Quarry? (1939), Make Bright the Arrows (1940); a prose collection under her pen name, Nancy Boyd, titled Distressing Dialogues (1924; its foreword carried Millay's byline); a translation, with George Dillon, of Baudelaire's Flowers of Evil (1936); the verse dramas Conversation at Midnight (1937) and The Murder of Lidice (1942); and several plays. Her final book was the posthumously published Mine the Harvest (1954), edited by her younger sister Norma. Edna St. Vincent Millay died in 1950. Holly Peppe, who holds a master of arts in teaching from Brown University and a Ph.D. in English from the University of New Hampshire, is a former professor and director of the English department at the American College of Rome and a National Endowment for the Humanities scholar. Dr. Peppe--whose doctoral dissertation focuses on Millay's critical reception and sonnet sequences, and who often lectures on Millay--has served as president of the Edna St. Vincent Millay Society since 1987. The Society is responsible for the preservation of Steepletop, the poet's home (designated a National Public Landmark) in Austerlitz, New York, and the placement of the poet's archives and family papers. Dr. Peppe is also involved with the Millay Colony for the Arts, an artists' retreat at Steepletop founded in 1973 by Norma Millay. Dr. Peppe's own poetry, translations, articles, and essays have appeared in numerous books and periodicals. She lives in New York City.