"Solitude" by Ella Wheeler Wilcox (1850 - 1919) - American

"Solitude" by Ella Wheeler Wilcox - one of the poets on my ever-growing List of Female Poets of the First World War. When she was in her late 60s, Ella travelled to the Western Front from America in 1917 to entertain the American Troops.  She read them her poems - some of which she composed specially once there - and lecturing them on the importance of 'moral hygiene' …

Travelling all that way and crossing the Atlantic and English Channel by boat in wartime, with the constant threat from enemy submarines and mines, would have been an achievement for a much younger woman.   

This poem, which was written long before the First World War, was one of my Father's favourites.  I feel it rings especially true today (9th January 2015) when the world is mourning the staff of the Paris-based satirical weekly magazine "Charlie Hebdo."

Laugh, and the world laughs with you;

    Weep, and you weep alone;

For the sad old earth must borrow its mirth,

    But has trouble enough of its own.

Sing, and the hills will answer;

    Sigh, it is lost on the air;

The echoes bound to a joyful sound,

    But shrink from voicing care.

Rejoice, and men will seek you;

    Grieve, and they turn and go;

They want full measure of all your pleasure,

    But they do not need your woe.

Be glad, and your friends are many;

    Be sad, and you lose them all,—

There are none to decline your nectared wine,

    But alone you must drink life’s gall.

Feast, and your halls are crowded;

    Fast, and the world goes by.

Succeed and give, and it helps you live,

    But no man can help you die.

There is room in the halls of pleasure

    For a large and lordly train,

But one by one we must all file on

    Through the narrow aisles of pain.

Anna DURIE (1856 - 1933) - Canada

With many thanks to Steve Cloutier from Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada, for bringing Ann Durie to my attention.

Born Anna Burgess Peel on 13th November 1856 Thornhill, Ontario, Anna's Father moved the family to New Orleans where he edited a newspaper.

After the Civil War the Peel family went to live in Europe where they witnessed the end of the Franco-Prussian War and the Paris Commune.  Anna studied French, German, art and music.

In 1880, at the age of 24, Anna married Lieutenant Colonel William Smith Durie in New York.  Durie was much older than Anna.   The Duries went to live in Toronto, Ontario, Canada and had two children - William Arthur born on 8th August 1881 and Helen Frances born in 1883.  William senior died in 1885, leaving Anna a widow at the age of 30 with two children to bring up.  She worked as a poet and writer for the publications "Canadian Magazine", the "Mail" and "Empire".  Anna also broadcast her poetry on the radio.  In her spare time she was a volunteer with the Red Cross.  She saw that both her children had private educations.

Arthur went to work for the Royal Bank, Toronto.  When war broke out in 1914, he volunteered for the 58th Battalion and was sent to France in 1916.  Whereupon Anna went to live in London, where she stayed in hotels and sent food parcels from Oxford Street shops to her son on the Western Front.

Arthur was wounded in the spine on 1st May 1916 near Sanctuary Wood, Ypres.  As was the custom in the First World War, civilian relatives of seriously wounded military personnel were permitted to visit them so Anna went to visit Arthur.   When he was well enough, Arthur was sent back to England to a convalescent home in Brighton.  Anna followed and Helen soon arrived from Canada.

Passed fit for military service and in spite of his mother's determination to get him a "safe" job, Arthur went back to the Western Front to rejoin his Battalion after Christmas 1916.  His mother sent him a copy of a collection of poems by Robert Service with which he regaled his fellow officers.   However, Arthur was not properly fit so he was sent to Menton in the South of France to further recuperate and his Mother went to Menton to be near him.

Arthur returned to his Regiment in March 1917 and, vowing that she would not return home until the war was over, Anna went back to London where Arthur joined  her for some R and R in September 1917.   After Christmas leave in 1917, Arthur returned to the Front, this time to Lens, France, where he was killed by a shell on 29th December 1917.

After the war Anna and Helen visited Arthur's grave but from the outset Anna was unhappy about leaving her son in France, so she set about rescuing his body.  It took several attempts and a great deal of letter-writing and arguing but she persevered, stole her son's body and took him back to Canada in August 1925, where he was buried in St. James Cemetery, Toronto.

According to the article in "The Toronto Star", a newspaper report in a British newspaper in 1930 reported that wealthy British people also stole the bodies of their loved ones buried on the Western France and there was a brisk trade in smuggling bodies home.

Anna died in 1933.  Her main published poetry collections are "Our Absent Hero", 1920 and "Wolfe and Other Poems", 1929.

A Soldier's Grave in France by Anna Peel Durie, 1920

Here lies a widowed mother's only son.

O gentle winds! temper the airs of heaven

That they blow softly where his young head rests

In friendly soil, rich-carpeted with bloom:

Scarlet and gentian blue and butter-gold,

Flecked with an English daisy here and there.

He was no dreamer, though he soundly sleeps;

Rather a man in whom the joy of life

Foamed sparkling to the brim;  and when great France

Sent fort her her bitter, wailing cry for help,

(That France which holds him here enclasped in earth)

Eastward he turned his face and crossed the seas,

Laid youth and glorious manhood in the dust,

And so stepped into immortality.

Sources:  "Canadian Poetry from World War 1 An Anthology" edited by Joel Baetz, published by Oxford University, Don Mills, Ontario, Canada, 2009.

http://www.thestar.com/news/walking_the_western_front/2014/05/one_brave_soldier__three_cemeteries_and_a_mother_who_never_stopped_plotting.html

Canada's Early Women Writers - http://content.lib.sfu.ca/cdm/ref/collection/ceww/id/201

Photos:  Google Images

Alys Fane Trotter (c.1863-1916) British Artist & Poet

Thank you to Sara Colegrave an art dealer who has researched Alys’s work for inspiring me to seek further information about the First World War poet and artist Alys Fane Trotter.  This is what I have found so far.  If anyone has any further information please get in touch. 

Alys was born Alys Fane Keatinge in Dublin on 16th December 1863.  Her parents were Maurice Keatinge, a Civil Servant and Ellen Flora Keatinge, nee Mayne, from Wiltshire.   The family lived in London before Maurice retired then they went to live in the Manor House at Teffont Evias, Wiltshire, where Ellen Flora was born.   Alys had a sister called Eleanor Fane Keatinge; her brothers were - Richard Augustus, Gerald Francis and Maurice Walter.  In all Maurice and Ellen Flora had seven children.

The Manor House passed to Alys’s mother after the death of Ellen Flora’s elder sisters - Emily who married William Fane de Salis, who owned the estate in Wiltshire and Margaret, who first inherited the property when Emily died.   After the death of their mother, the property passed to Alys' brother Richard Keatinge, who sold it on to his brothers Maurice Walter and Gerald Francis.

Alys married Alexander Pelham Trotter on 25th June 1886 at the Parish Church in Paddington in London. 

Alys and her husband went to live in South Africa for a time, where Alexander was employed by the Cape Colonial Government.  They explored the countryside on bicycles and Alys was inspired by the beautiful Dutch colonial houses. She made copious notes and sketches and wrote and illustrated several books on the subject, among them "Old Cape Colony" which was published in 1903.  

Alys and her husband had two children - Alexander Nigel, who was born in London in 1894, and Gundred Eleanor Trotter born in1889. 

During the First World War, Alexander Nigel joined the Royal Scots (Lothian Regiment) 3rd Reserve Battalion with the rank of Lieutenant. He was killed on 12th October 1914.   

Alys's poetry collections were published as follows:  "Houses and Dreams" by Blackwell, Oxford, 1924 and "Nigel, and other verses" by Burns & Oates in 1918.  

Alys was also an accomplished artist and there are several references to her sketches in books about South Africa.   You will find examples of her artistic work on the website of Sarah Colegrave, an art dealer from London who has researched Alys and her work:  http://www.sarahcolegrave.co.uk/paintings/d/7th-century-chinese-bowl/178467

and here is a sketch drawn while Alys was living in  Africa:  http://www.africamediaonline.com/search/preview/764_28

Alys also had poems printed in magazines such as "Punch" and "The Cornhill Magazine" and in several WW1 poetry anthologies - "Poems from Punch 1909 – 1920”, published by Macmillan, 1922;  Valour and Vision:  Poems of the War, 1914 - 1918", published by Longmans, Green, 1920 and edited by Jacqueline Theodora Trotter and "Valour and Vision" Poems of the War, 1914 - 1918. A new edition, published by Hopkinson, 1923.  On the 1939 Census, Alys described herself as an Artist.

Alys died at the age of 99 in Wiltshire on 21st December 1961.

Alys's poem "There's a Pathway" in which she remembered a holiday in happier times with her son Nigel in Picardie, has been set to music by Wiltshire composer/musician Frank Harvey.

“There's a Pathway”

There's a pathway through a forest in the Picardie I know,

A port where girls haul up the boats with men and fish in tow,

And the hills run down to the market town where the country-women go.

And behind it is the village, and the coast-line lies below,

And down the road, the dusty road, the carts ply to and fro

By the stately frieze of forest trees beyond the old Chateau.

There were three of us on bicycles upon the road that day,

You wore your coat of hunting green, and vanished down the way.

"Le petit Chasseur, la mere et soeur", we heard the women say.

You vanished as a speck of green among the shadows blue,

And children trudging up the hill stood still and called to you:

"Le petit Chasseur, qui n'a pas peur", they laughed and called to you.

O boys, you wield a bayonet now and lift the soldier's load !

O girls you've learnt to drive the plough and use the bullock-goad !

But the hunter's laid, still unafraid, near the trodden Bethune road.

There's a pathway through the forest in the Picardie I know,

And O I'll dream and wander there; and poppy fields will glow;

And I'll watch the glare of the dusty air where the market wagons go..

From: "Poems of Spirit and Action" ed. W M Smyth, Edward Arnold (Publishers) Ltd (London, 1957), pp. 87-8

Jacqueline Theodora Trotter (born London 1894), who edited both editions of the WW1 Anthology "Valour and Vision: Poems of at the War, 1914 - 1918" was related to Alys - she was the daughter of Alys's husband's step-brother.   

You can view the full text of that First World War Anthology here: http://www.archive.org/stream/cu31924027944358/cu31924027944358_djvu.txt   Alice's poems are on pages 12 and 102.

Sources:  

Lancashire-born Catherine W. Reilly's "English Poetry of the First World War A Bibliography", (published by St.Martin's Press, New York, 1978) Find my Past 

and Internet searches: 

http://www.sarahcolegrave.co.uk/paintings/d/7th-century-chinese-bowl/178467

http://allpoetry.com/Alys-Fane-Trotter
http://www.wrightmusic.net/pdfs/frank-harvey.pdf
http://www.archive.org/stream/cu31924027944358/cu31924027944358_djvu.txt
http://www.scribd.com/doc/80231699/The-MAYNE-families-of-Exeter-Marwood-Shirwell-DEVON
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teffont_Evias

List of Female Poets of the First World War

I am currently going through my list and trying to add any poets I have so far missed.   You will find the list on the bar at the top of the page.

As always, if anyone knows of a poet not yet on the list please get in touch.   Thank you.

German Female Poets of the First World War

It is always a pleasure to receive e-mails regarding this project and I am very grateful to all the people who are helping me to track down lesser known poets of the First World War.

Martin Zieren from Germany recently contacted Nicolas Detering on my behalf regarding statistics of First World War poetry anthologies.

I have received the following reply from Nicolas Detering and would like to thank Nicolas and Martin for their help in finding more Germany female poets of the First World War.

From Nicolas Detering

Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg

"I have just finished a paper on Ina Seidel and Agnes Sapper, both of which are listed on your blog. The article will appear in a collected volume on Female War Poets from Germany, which is due to be published some time in early 2015. 

Three female poets which you might want to add to your list are Ilse Frank (later Ise Gropius, see http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ise_Gropius), Clara Blüthgen (http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clara_Bl%C3%BCthgen), and Margarete Susman (http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Margarete_Susman), all of them wrote a number of war poems.   Blüthgen published a moving poem called 'Vermisst' ('Lost') about the loss of her son Victor. Frank wrote a couple of poems about trench warfare from the perspectives of the soldiers. 

Incidentally, the most successful German female war poets by far were Ina Seidel and Isolde Kurz, at least judging from the number of their poems in anthologies. "

I will be following up these leads and adding the poets to my ever growing list. I hope to report back to you shortly with details of the poets suggested by Nicolas, as well as details of the book he mentions.

A Review of Volume 1 of "Female Poets of the First World War"

To read a review of Volume 1 of  "Female Poets of the First World War" please follow the link
http://www.bestkeptsecrets.biz/2014/12/book-review-female-poets-of-first-world.html

I wondered why I'd been asked all those question.

Now - back to work on the list of poets, etc.

Marina Tsvietaieva (1892 - 1941) - Russian

Marina was born in Moscow on 8^th October 1892.  Her parents were Ivan Vladimirovich Tsvetaev, a university lecturer and Maria Alexandrovna Meyn, who was a concert pianist of Polish and German origin.  Marina had a privileged upbringing.

Marina’s mother, who was her husband’s second wife, became ill with TB and in 1902 the family began to travel hoping that her health would improve.  The family lived in Italy near Genoa for some time.  Marina was sent to boarding school in Lausanne in 1904 and her mother, who wanted Marina to become a concert pianist, insisted that she study music.   After her mother’s death in 1906, Marina at last felt she could concentrate on her poetry writing.  1908 Marina went to the Sorbonne in Paris to study the history of literature.   She published her first volume of poetry herself in 1910.

In 1912, Marina married Sergei Yakovlevich Efron, an officer in the Russian Army. The same year, Marina’s Father’s project The Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts was opened. The opening ceremony of the museum was attended by Tsar Nicholas II.  Until the Russian Revolution, the couple used to travel to The Crimea every summer.

Sergei went to fight on the Russian Front in 1914.   In 1917 he joined the White Army and Marina went to Moscow.  There was a famine in Moscow after the  Revolution and Marina’s health suffered and her daughter Irina starved to death.

In 1922, Marina and her daughter Ariadna, who had survived the famine, went to Berlin where they were reunited with Efron who Marina was convinced had been killed by the Bolsheviks.  In 1923, she began to correspond with Rainer Maria Riike.   The family moved to Prague and in 1925 to Paris.   Marina continued with her writing.   In 1939, the family returned to Moscow.  Her husband and daughter were arrested on spying charged and her husband was shot.

Marina died in Yelabuga on 31^st August 1941.  Russian composer Dmitri Shostakovich set some of Marina’s poems to music and in 2003 an opera about her was performed in New York – “Marina:  A Captive Spirit.” 

Here is a translation of one of Marina's poems:

I Know the Truth

This truth I know – all other truths must cease

Our useless struggle no longer can appease.

For it is evening and the earth by night will soon be covered

What are you discussing?  Poets? Generals?  Lovers?

The wind has softened and the earth is damp with dew

The galaxy of stars above will soon be but a few

And together we beneath the earth will slumber -

We, who gave no others peace but constant thunder.

Photo:  Google Images