Amy Lowell (1874 – 1925) - American poet and writer

Amy was a Pullitzer Prize-winning, cigar-smoking poet from Bookline, Massachusets America. She coined the phrase “unrhymed cadence” for blank verse.   In London during 1913, it was Amy who asked Rupert Brooke to ‘speak up’ when he read his poems at The Poetry Bookshop.   

Amy's WW1 collection “Men, Women & Ghosts” was published by The MacMillan Co., New York, in 1916.

Another collection, with the title of “Sword Blades & Poppy Seed” was published in 1914 by Houghton Mifflin & Co., New York.

Amy died in 1925 and was buried in Mount Auburn Cemetery, Cambridge, Massachusets. 

https://archive.org/stream/menwomenandghos00lowegoog#page/n8/mode/2up

https://archive.org/stream/swordbladesandp00lowegoog#page/n6/mode/2up

 

Sources:  Wikipedia and Cecil Roberts "The Years of Promise" (Hodder & Stoughton, London, 1968)

List update

Many thanks to "In the Know" who pointed out that Hilary Douglas Clark Pepler (HDCP) should be on the list of Forgotten Poets and not Female Poets.  This will be put right forthwith.  I must admit that I did put a question mark against the name in Catherine W. Reilly's "English Poetry of the First World War A Bibliography" (St. Martin's Press, New York, 1978) and had not got around to researching Hilary.   Hilary, as "In the Know" points out is both a male and female name in the UK and indeed I have a cousin Hilary and a cousin Elliott, who are female and a neighbour called Cameron who unlike Cameron Diaz is male.

I am indeed grateful to the eagle eyes of those 'in the know' who are helping me compile a list of both male and female poets of the First World War.

My current project is the poets who were involved in WW1 in 1917 as it was the year in which my Great Uncle was killed.  He was lost on Easter Monday, 9th April 1917 at Arras.

Now to include Hilary on Forgotten Poets of the First World War.

Kathleen Ethel Burne (1879 - 1959) - British poet and school teacher

My grateful thanks to Lesley Young for providing the following information:

Kathleen Ethel Burne was born in Kensington on 11th May 1879.   Her father was Thomas Burne, who worked as a clerk in a colliery in Co. Durham, and her mother was Mary Isabella Burne, nee Simons.   The family moved to London in 1864 when Thomas worked for the Civil Service, re-organising the War Office accounts during the Boer War.  He then became an Officer's secretary at the Royal Hospital, Chelsea. Thomas and his wife had several children - Adeline, Godfrey, Cecil and Ormond who went to teach in Germany.  One of Thomas and Mary's sons and a grandson became mining engineers.  Thomas died on 22nd March 1903.

Kathleen attended boarding school in St Andrews, Fife  in 1891 and went on to study at Girton College, Cambridge in 1901.   From 1907 until 1925, Kathleen worked as private secretary to Edmund Lamb MP at his estate in Borden Wood, Essex, where she lived at 3 Garden Cottages, Borden Wood.   During that time Kathleen helped Edmund Lamb research his book ‘Some Annals of the Lambs: a Border Family’ published in 1926.

Kathleen was a teacher for a time and worked for over 25 years with Father Andrew in Plaistow, East London.  She never married.   Kathleen's nephew Harold Burne was killed in Palestine on 3rd November 1917.

Kathleen died after an illness aged 80 on 10th June 1959 at the Hostel of God, Clapham Common, but her WIll states her usual residence was Lake Cottage, Bobbolds Farm, Milland, LIPHOOK, West Sussex.

Kathleen's poetry collection "Poems by K.E.B." includes several poems written during the First World War.

Sources:  Information kindly supplied by Lesley Young who has carried out extensive research on the life and work of Kathleen, and members of Kathleen's family.

Christmas Eve, 1916 by Kathleen Ethel Burne

The little lamp burns bright; the Babe

Lies in the manger there;

The mother bends above; her hands

Are clasped in praise and prayer;

Her tender face a-light with love

Looks down upon Him there.

This little Child was born, they say,

To save the world from sin.

So still and peaceful lies the scene-

How crept the evil in?

What madness swept across the earth

And plunged the world in sin?

The Shepherds kneel, simple souls,

Beneath the open sky

They learn to read the signs of God

And humbly drawing nigh

They worship here the Sign that flamed

From out the midnight sky.

The Wise Men from the East with gifts

In adoration dumb

Bend low. Stern searchers after truth,

But yet in faith they come:

Before the Mother and the Child

Their restless doubts are dumb.

The gentle large-eyed ox, the ass,

Stand gazing without fear;

The camels through the open door,

and small wild things draw near-

Where all is love and peace and joy,

What room is there for fear?

  

So sweet and peaceful is the scene-

Ah, whence crept evil in?-

Give peace, O God, to weary hearts

And cleanse our souls from sin !

Stretch forth Thine arms, all-loving God

And draw Thy children in !

Female Poets of the First World War Volume 2 now out

In time for Christmas.   Volume 2 concentrates on British poets and features some of the lesser-known women writers.  Also featured is poetry written by Munitions Workers and Schoolgirls, plus a guest article about poetry and knitting in WW1 by Phil Dawes.

To order a copy please go to http://www.poshupnorth.com/2016/09/female-poets-of-first-world-war-volume-2_27.html

"Wonderful book - well researched. Definitely worth getting a copy" - Dominic Sheridan.

Exciting News from the May Sinclair Society!

Exciting news regarding May Sinclair, who was one of the most important and famous writers at the time of WW1 on both sides of the Atlantic.  May helped to fund, and accompanied, Dr. Hector Munro’s Flying Ambulance Unit to France in September 1914.  She stayed to help out for six weeks before returning to Britain to write about her experiences.  May Sinclair was the first poet I researched for the exhibition of Female Poets of the First World War at the Wilfred Owen Story Museum in Argyle Street, Birkenhead, Wirral, UK.  May is also one of the poets featured in Volume 1 of Female Poets of the First World War, available from http://www.poshupnorth.com/2013/08/new-title-female-poets-of-first-world.html - also available as a download.

From: Dr Rebecca Bowler (Keele University), Dr Claire Drewery (Sheffield Hallam), and Suzanne Raitt (William & Mary College)

“We received some exciting news yesterday: our proposal for a series of critical editions of May Sinclair's works has been approved by Edinburgh University Press!

The Edinburgh Critical Editions of the Works of May Sinclair will publish Sinclair’s collected prose works: twenty-one novels, six short story collections (bundled in two volumes of ‘shorter fiction’), two volumes of philosophy, one biography (of the Brontë sisters) and one memoir (of the First World War). There will also be one volume of Sinclair’s collected non-fiction, including The Way of Sublimation. Non-fiction and fiction will appear side by side so that the dialogues between each can be explored. Rebecca Bowler, Claire Drewery and Suzanne Raitt are the General Editors.

May Sinclair was an innovative and influential Modernist writer, and these critical editions will, we hope, attract further scholarship on her writings and revive interest in Sinclair as an important modernist writer and public intellectual.

We will be in touch in the New Year with a call for expressions of interest from scholars who wish to edit individual volumes.”

Find out more about The May Sinclair Society - http://www.maysinclairsociety.com

And follow them on Facebook here - http://www.facebook.com/maysinclairsociety

The Wilfred Owen Story, 34 Argyle Street, Birkenhead, Wirral, UK, CH41 6AE. Open Tuesday - Friday 11 am till 2 pm or by appointment o7903 337995.
http://www.wilfredowenstory.com/news.html

Also on Facebook https://www.facebook.com/wilfredowenstory

 

Ella Wheeler Wilcox (1850 – 1919) – American poet “The Poetess of Passion”

The Poetess of Passion

Ella Wheeler was born on 5th November 1850 in Johnstown, Wisconsin, USA.  Soon after her birth, the family moved to Madison.  Ella began writing poetry at an early age, and became known as "The Poetess of Passion".

You may have heard the line “Laugh and the world laughs with you” which is from Ella’s poem “Solitude”, first published in “The New York Sun” in 1898.   “Ella Wheeler Wilcox was probably the most widely read poet of the day”, selling 100,000 copies of her poetry collection entitled “One Hundred Poems” in the early years of the twentieth century (Hollis, 40). 

When planning his trip to America, Rupert Brooke suggested he might take a “message for the continent of America and for Ella Wheeler” (Hollis, 67).

Ella m arried Robert Wilcox of Meriden, Connecticut in 1884.  They travelled extensively throughout Europe and Asia.  Ella's husband died in 1916.

Ella travelled to France after America entered the First World War in order to read poetry to the American Troops - quite an unertaking for a woman of 67.  They were very pleased to see her and really appreciated her performances. Ella wrote poems for the troops while she was in France and published them in a volume entitled "Hello, Boys".

During her lifetime, Ella wrote and pulished more than 70 books, wrote thousands of poems and also wrote plays and magazine articles.

Ella died on 30th October 1919.  In spite of her fame, Ella Wheeler Wilcox is now one of the ‘forgotten’ poets of the First World War.

“War Mothers” by Ella Wheeler Wilcox

There is something in the sound of drum and fife
That stirs all the savage instincts into life.

In the old times of peace we went our ways,
Through proper days
Of little joys and tasks. Lonely at times,
When from the steeple sounded wedding chimes,
Telling to all the world some maid was wife—
But taking patiently our part in life
As it was portioned us by Church and State,
Believing it our fate.
     Our thoughts all chaste
Held yet a secret wish to love and mate
     Ere youth and virtue should go quite to waste.
But men we criticised for lack of strength,
And kept them at arm's length.
Then the war came—
The world was all aflame!
The men we had thought dull and void of power
Were heroes in an hour.
He who had seemed a slave to petty greed
Showed masterful in that great time of need.
He who had plotted for his neighbour's pelf,
Now for his fellows offers up himself.
And we were only women, forced by war
To sacrifice the things worth living for.

Something within us broke,
    Something within us woke,
        The wild cave-woman spoke.

When we heard the sound of drumming,
    As our soldiers went to camp,
    Heard them tramp, tramp, tramp;
As we watched to see them coming,
    And they looked at us and smiled
    (Yes, looked back at us and smiled),
As they filed along by hillock and by hollow,
    Then our hearts were so beguiled
    That, for many and many a day,
    We dreamed we heard them say,
'Oh, follow, follow, follow!'
    And the distant, rolling drum
    Called us 'Come, come, come!'
    Till our virtue seemed a thing to give away.

War had swept ten thousand years away from earth.
    We were primal once again.
    There were males, not modern men;
We were females meant to bring their sons to birth.
    And we could not wait for any formal rite,
    We could hear them calling to us, 'Come to-night;
For to-morrow, at the dawn,
We move on!'
    And the drum
    Bellowed, 'Come, come, come!'
And the fife
Whistled, 'Life, life, life!'

So they moved on and fought and bled and died;
Honoured and mourned, they are the nation's pride.
We fought our battles, too, but with the tide
Of our red blood, we gave the world new lives.
Because we were not wives
We are dishonoured. Is it noble, then,
To break God's laws only by killing men
To save one's country from destruction?
We took no man's life but gave our chastity,
And sinned the ancient sin
To plant young trees and fill felled forests in.

Oh, clergy of the land,
Bible in hand,
All reverently you stand,
    On holy thoughts intent
    While barren wives receive the sacrament!
Had you the open visions you could see
    Phantoms of infants murdered in the womb,
    Who never knew a cradle or a tomb,
Hovering about these wives accusingly.

Bestow the sacrament! Their sins are not well known—
Ours to the four winds of the earth are blown.


Source: "Poems of Purpose" (1919)

Ella features in Volume 1 of Female Poets of the First World War available from www.poshupnorth.com

Also available as a download.

Source:  “Now all Roads lead to France  The Last Years of Edward Thomas” by Matthew Hollis (Faber & Faber, London, 2012)

Carolyn Wells (1862 - 1942) - American writer, poet and journalist

Carolyn was born on 18th June 1862 in Rahway, New Jersey, USA.   Her parents were William Edmund Wells and his wife Anna Wells nee Potter Woodruff.  Two of Carolyn's sisters died in childhood.

At the age of six, Carolyn contracted Scarlet Fever and as a result suffered a loss of hearing.  She nevertheless overcame the handicap and went on to graduate from school and was then taught at home by private tutors, studying the humanities and science.  Carolyn worked as a librarian at Rahway Library Association.  During her life-time, Carolyn wrote and had published over 170 books including detective stories, children's books, humour, parody and poetry.  Her work was published in "Punch" magazine and she also wrote for various newspapers and contributed to "The Yellow Book".   Her detective books were particularly popular.  In 1913, she published "The Technique of the Mystery Story".

In 1918, at the age of 55, Carolyn married 62-year old widower Hadwin Houghton who was heir to the Houghton-Mifflin publishing company.  The couple went to live in an apartment block in Manhatten where Hadwin died the following year.  Carolyn lived in New York until her death on 26th March 1942.

Carolyn's life-story "The Rest of my Life" was published in 1937.

With grateful thanks to Dr. Margaret Stetz, May and Robert Carter Professor of Women's Studies and Professor of Humanities, Delaware University, USA for bringing Carolyn Wells to my attention and for suggesting I look at the following poem written by Carolyn and published in 1919:

BALLADE OF WAR BOOKS BY CAROLYN WELLS

I seem to wander in a world of books,
With titles such as, "'Neath the Trumpet's Blare",
And "Sammy Fire-Away!" and "Private Snooks", And "Hank, the Yank", and "Danny Do-and-Dare!" And though the war is over, Over There,
Yet must be published books already penned They pour from presses daily I declare
Of making many war books there's no end!
And, somehow I opine-the way it looks - That for an aftermath we must prepare:
Adventure yarns of wartime cranks and crooks, And lives of heroes who have done their share. True tales of noble deeds of courage rare;
Histories of events, as yet unkenned: Journals and diaries, and such small ware-
Of making many war books there's no end !
And there'll be messages from soldier spooks, Transmitted through a wily medium's care;
Telling of waving trees and limpid brooks
Where rove the souls who've climbed the Golden Stair: And poems "Lyric Lines To France, the Fair",
"Red Poppy Fields", "My Faithful Four Years' Friend", "Heroic Feet", "A Lock of Lemuel's Hair"-
Of making many war books there's no end ! L'Etoile:
Publisher, Printer, Editor, forbear !
Nor longer than you must, your lists extend :
Do let this gushing output stop somewhere Of making many war books there's no end !

First published in "The Bookman", January 1919, page 643

Sources:  

Dr. Margaret Stetz "The Transatlantic" and late Nineteenth-Century American Women's Humor" published in "Studies in American Humor", Volume 1, 2015, Pensylvania State University, PA.

"Encyclopedia of American Humorists" Edited by Stephen H. Gale, Routledge, Abingdon, Oxford, 1988

"Mysteries Unlocked Essays in Honour of Douglas G. Greene, edited by Curtis Evans, published by McFarland and Company, Jefferson, 2014