What was E. E. Cummings' first published poem?
9591#23
Following his autobiographical novel, "The Enormous Room", Cummings' first published work was a collection of poems titled "Tulips and Chimneys" (1923). This work was the public's first encounter with his characteristic eccentric use of grammar and punctuation.
E. E. Cummings
9591#8
Cummings returned to Paris in 1921 and had lived there for two years before returning to New York. His collection "Tulips and Chimneys" was published in 1923 and his inventive use of grammar and syntax is evident. The book was heavily cut by his editor. "XLI Poems" was published in 1925. With these collections, Cummings made his reputation as an avant garde poet.
E. E. Cummings
9591#28
Cummings is known for controversial subject matter, as he wrote numerous erotic poems. He also sometimes included ethnic slurs in his writing. For instance, in his 1950 collection "Xaipe: Seventy-One Poems", Cummings published two poems containing words that caused outrage in some quarters.
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E. E. Cummings
9591#0
Edward Estlin "E. E." Cummings (October 14, 1894 – September 3, 1962), often styled as e e cummings, as he is attributed in many of his published works, was an American poet, painter, essayist, author, and playwright. He wrote approximately 2,900 poems, two autobiographical novels, four plays, and several essays.
E. E. Cummings
5565613#0
"anyone lived in a pretty how town" is a poem written by E. E. Cummings. First published in 1940, the poem details the lives of residents in a nameless town. Like much of Cummings's work, the poem is actually untitled, so critics use the first line to refer to the poem. Cummings often wrote in a manner that did not follow standard English syntax and punctuation. This style is evident in the poem's first line, which is written in all lowercase letters and contains the unlikely phrase "pretty how town".
Anyone lived in a pretty how town
1737755#0
No Thanks is a 1935 collection of poetry by E. E. Cummings. Cummings is also often referred to as e.e. cummings due to his creative use of orthography in some of his work, and his perceived bias for the lowercase form of his name. He self-published the collection with the help of his mother and dedicated it to the fourteen publishing houses who turned the collection down. The book is unconventionally bound not on the left but rather the top, like a stenographer's pad.
This was his most difficult collection of poems to publish and well-received due to its originality.
No Thanks (poetry collection)
9591#12
In 1952, his alma mater, Harvard University, awarded Cummings an honorary seat as a guest professor. The Charles Eliot Norton Lectures he gave in 1952 and 1955 were later collected as "i: six nonlectures".
Cummings spent the last decade of his life traveling, fulfilling speaking engagements, and spending time at his summer home, Joy Farm, in Silver Lake, New Hampshire. He died of a stroke on September 3, 1962, at the age of 67 in North Conway, New Hampshire at the Memorial Hospital. Cummings was buried at Forest Hills Cemetery in Boston, Massachusetts. At the time of his death, Cummings was recognized as the second most read author in the United States, behind Robert Frost. Even after his death in 1962, his work continues to be published. Some recent poems include: Cummings' papers are held at the Houghton Library at Harvard University and the Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas at Austin.
E. E. Cummings
9591#25
Cummings' work often does not proceed in accordance with the conventional combinatorial rules that generate typical English sentences (for example, "they sowed their isn't"). In addition, a number of Cummings' poems feature, in part or in whole, intentional misspellings, and several incorporate phonetic spellings intended to represent particular dialects. Cummings also made use of inventive formations of compound words, as in "in Just" which features words such as "mud-luscious", "puddle-wonderful", and "eddieandbill." This poem is part of a sequence of poems titled "Chansons Innocentes"; it has many references comparing the "balloonman" to Pan, the mythical creature that is half-goat and half-man. Literary critic R.P. Blackmur has commented that this use of language is "frequently unintelligible because [Cummings] disregards the historical accumulation of meaning in words in favour of merely private and personal associations."
E. E. Cummings
9591#30
Friends begged Cummings to reconsider publishing these poems, and the book's editor pleaded with him to withdraw them, but he insisted that they stay. All the fuss perplexed him. The poems were commenting on prejudice, he pointed out, and not condoning it. He intended to show how derogatory words cause people to see others in terms of stereotypes rather than as individuals. "America (which turns Hungarian into 'hunky' & Irishman into 'mick' and Norwegian into 'square- head') is to blame for 'kike,'" he said.
William Carlos Williams spoke out in his defense.
E. E. Cummings
9591#37
The use of lowercase for his initials was popularized in part by the title of some books, particularly in the 1960s, printing his name in lower case on the cover and spine. In the preface to "E. E. Cummings: The Growth of a Writer" by Norman Friedman, critic Harry T. Moore notes Cummings "had his name put legally into lower case, and in his later books the titles and his name were always in lower case." According to Cummings' widow, however, this is incorrect. She wrote to Friedman: "You should not have allowed H. Moore to make such a stupid & childish statement about Cummings & his signature." On February 27, 1951, Cummings wrote to his French translator D. Jon Grossman that he preferred the use of upper case for the particular edition they were working on. One Cummings scholar believes that on the rare occasions that Cummings signed his name in all lowercase, he may have intended it as a gesture of humility, not as an indication that it was the preferred orthography for others to use. Additionally, the "Chicago Manual of Style", which prescribes favoring non-standard capitalization of names in accordance with the bearer's strongly stated preference, notes "E. E. Cummings can be safely capitalized; it was one of his publishers, not he himself, who lowercased his name."
E. E. Cummings