Vincent Millay (February 22, 1892 – October 19, 1950) was an American lyrical poet and playwright. Encouraged to read the classics at home, she was too rebellious to make a success of formal education, but she won poetry prizes from an early age, including the Pulitzer Prize in 1923, and went on to use verse as a medium for her feminist activism.
Cora and her three daughters – Edna (who called herself "Vincent"), Norma Lounella (born 1893), and Kathleen Kalloch (born 1896) – moved from town to town, living in poverty and surviving various illnesses.
Cora and her three daughters – Edna (who called herself "Vincent"), Norma Lounella (born 1893), and Kathleen Kalloch (born 1896) – moved from town to town, living in poverty and surviving various illnesses.
The family's house was "between the mountains and the sea where baskets of apples and drying herbs on the porch mingled their scents with those of the neighboring pine woods." In 1904, Cora officially divorced Millay's father for financial irresponsibility and domestic abuse, but they had already been separated for some years.
However, he remained a loyal friend. ==Career== Millay's fame began in 1912 when, at the age of 20, she entered her poem "Renascence" in a poetry contest in The Lyric Year.
Nicholas, the Camden Herald, and the high-profile anthology Current Literature. Millay entered Vassar College in 1913 when she was 21 years old, later than usual.
While at school, she had several relationships with women, including Edith Wynne Matthison, who would go on to become an actress in silent films. ==New York City== After her graduation from Vassar in 1917, Millay moved to New York City.
In 1919, she wrote the anti-war play Aria da Capo, which starred her sister Norma Millay at the Provincetown Playhouse in New York City.
Dow heard Millay reciting her poetry and playing the piano at the Whitehall Inn in Camden, Maine, and was so impressed that she offered to pay for Millay's education at Vassar College. Millay's 1920 collection A Few Figs From Thistles drew controversy for its exploration of female sexuality and feminism.
She refused. In January 1921, she went to Paris, where she met and befriended the sculptors Thelma Wood and Constantin Brancusi, photographer Man Ray, had affairs with journalists George Slocombe and John Carter, and became pregnant by a man named Daubigny.
Vincent Millay—Biography and 18 poems ("Ashes of Life", "The Betrothal", "Departure", "Dirge", "Ebb", "Feast", "First Fig", "[Four Sonnets 1922]", "Grown Up", "Humoresque", "Lament", "The Penitent", "Recuerdo", "Second Fig", "Sonnets 1923", "Sonnets from an Ungrafted Tree", "Sorrow", "Spring") Archive and images at the Smithsonian Institution. New York Times Obituary October 20, 1950 "Edna St.
Vincent Millay (February 22, 1892 – October 19, 1950) was an American lyrical poet and playwright. Encouraged to read the classics at home, she was too rebellious to make a success of formal education, but she won poetry prizes from an early age, including the Pulitzer Prize in 1923, and went on to use verse as a medium for her feminist activism.
In 1923 she became the first woman to win the Pulitzer prize in poetry.
Millay won the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry in 1923 for "The Ballad of the Harp-Weaver"; she was the third woman to win the poetry prize, after Sara Teasdale (1918) and Margaret Widdemer (1919). Millay also wrote short stories for the magazine Ainslee's - but she was a canny protector of her identity as a poet and an aesthete, and insisted on publishing this more mass-appeal work under a pseudonym, Nancy Boyd.
Possibly as a result, Millay was frequently ill and weak for much of the next four years. After experiencing his remarkable attentions to her during her illness, in 1923 she married 43-year-old Eugen Jan Boissevain (1880–1949), the widower of the labor lawyer and war correspondent Inez Milholland, a political icon Millay had met during her time at Vassar.
Vincent Millay—Biography and 18 poems ("Ashes of Life", "The Betrothal", "Departure", "Dirge", "Ebb", "Feast", "First Fig", "[Four Sonnets 1922]", "Grown Up", "Humoresque", "Lament", "The Penitent", "Recuerdo", "Second Fig", "Sonnets 1923", "Sonnets from an Ungrafted Tree", "Sorrow", "Spring") Archive and images at the Smithsonian Institution. New York Times Obituary October 20, 1950 "Edna St.
In 1924 Millay and others founded the Cherry Lane Theater "to continue the staging of experimental drama." Magazine articles under a pseudonym also helped support her early days in the Village.
Their relationship inspired the sonnets in the collection Fatal Interview (published 1931). In 1925, Boissevain and Millay bought Steepletop near Austerlitz, New York, which had once been a blueberry farm.
For Millay, one such significant relationship was with the poet George Dillon, a student 14 years her junior, whom she met in 1928 at one of her readings at the University of Chicago.
Vincent Millay papers, 1928–1941, at Columbia University.
Harper and Brothers published the poem in 1942. In 1943, Millay was the sixth person and the second woman to be awarded the Frost Medal for her lifetime contribution to American poetry. Despite the excellent sales of her books in the 1930s, her declining reputation, constant medical bills, and frequent demands from her mentally-ill sister Kathleen meant that for most of her last years, Millay was in debt to her own publisher.
Their relationship inspired the sonnets in the collection Fatal Interview (published 1931). In 1925, Boissevain and Millay bought Steepletop near Austerlitz, New York, which had once been a blueberry farm.
They are not really human beings at all." In the summer of 1936, Millay was riding in a station wagon when the door suddenly swung open, and Millay “was hurled out into the pitch-darkness...and rolled for some distance down a rocky gully" The accident severely damaged nerves in her spine, requiring frequent surgeries and hospitalizations, at least daily doses of morphine.
During World War I, Millay had been a dedicated and active pacifist; however, in 1940 she advocated for the U.S.
Merle Rubin noted, "She seems to have caught more flak from the literary critics for supporting democracy than Ezra Pound did for championing fascism." In 1942 in The New York Times Magazine, Millay mourned the destruction of the Czechoslovak town of Lidice.
Millay wrote: The whole world holds in its arms today The murdered village of Lidice, Like the murdered body of a little child. This article would serve as the basis of her 32-page poem, "Murder of Lidice", in 1942 and loosely served as the basis of the 1943 MGM movie Hitler's Madman.
Harper and Brothers published the poem in 1942. In 1943, Millay was the sixth person and the second woman to be awarded the Frost Medal for her lifetime contribution to American poetry. Despite the excellent sales of her books in the 1930s, her declining reputation, constant medical bills, and frequent demands from her mentally-ill sister Kathleen meant that for most of her last years, Millay was in debt to her own publisher.
Millay wrote: The whole world holds in its arms today The murdered village of Lidice, Like the murdered body of a little child. This article would serve as the basis of her 32-page poem, "Murder of Lidice", in 1942 and loosely served as the basis of the 1943 MGM movie Hitler's Madman.
Harper and Brothers published the poem in 1942. In 1943, Millay was the sixth person and the second woman to be awarded the Frost Medal for her lifetime contribution to American poetry. Despite the excellent sales of her books in the 1930s, her declining reputation, constant medical bills, and frequent demands from her mentally-ill sister Kathleen meant that for most of her last years, Millay was in debt to her own publisher.
Boissevain died in 1949 of lung cancer, and Millay lived alone for the last year of her life.
It aired live as an episode of Academy Theatre in 1949 on NBC. "Euclid alone has looked on Beauty bare" (1922) is an homage to the geometry of Euclid.
Vincent Millay (February 22, 1892 – October 19, 1950) was an American lyrical poet and playwright. Encouraged to read the classics at home, she was too rebellious to make a success of formal education, but she won poetry prizes from an early age, including the Pulitzer Prize in 1923, and went on to use verse as a medium for her feminist activism.
The title sonnet recalls her career: Those hours when happy hours were my estate, — Entailed, as proper, for the next in line, Yet mine the harvest, and the title mine — Those acres, fertile, and the furrows straight, From which the lark would rise — all of my late Enchantments, still, in brilliant colours, shine, ==Death and legacy== Millay died at her home on October 19, 1950.
Vincent Millay—Biography and 18 poems ("Ashes of Life", "The Betrothal", "Departure", "Dirge", "Ebb", "Feast", "First Fig", "[Four Sonnets 1922]", "Grown Up", "Humoresque", "Lament", "The Penitent", "Recuerdo", "Second Fig", "Sonnets 1923", "Sonnets from an Ungrafted Tree", "Sorrow", "Spring") Archive and images at the Smithsonian Institution. New York Times Obituary October 20, 1950 "Edna St.
Vincent Millay: "Women Have Loved Before as I Love Now", "Hyacinth", "Even in the Moment", "Feast", "I Know My Mind" and "What Lips My Lips Have Kissed". In the 1971 All in the Family episode "Judging Books by Covers", the character Archie Bunker erroneously refers to the poet as "Edna St.
Louis Millay." In 1972 the Poem 'Conscientious Objector' by Edna, was put to music by Mary Travers (of Peter, Paul and Mary) on her album 'Morning Glory'. In the 1975 The Waltons episode "The Woman", a female poet visiting the college attended by John Boy quotes Edna St.
In 1973, they established the Millay Colony for the Arts on seven acres near the house and barn.
Louis Millay." In 1972 the Poem 'Conscientious Objector' by Edna, was put to music by Mary Travers (of Peter, Paul and Mary) on her album 'Morning Glory'. In the 1975 The Waltons episode "The Woman", a female poet visiting the college attended by John Boy quotes Edna St.
After the death of her husband in 1976, Norma continued to run the program until her death in 1986. At 17, the poet Mary Oliver visited Steepletop and became a close friend of Norma.
Vincent Millay, reciting "The First Fig": "My candle burns at both ends/ It will not last the night/ But ah, my foes and oh my friends/ It gives a lovely light" In July 1981, the United States Postal Service issued an 18-cent stamp depicting Edna St.
After the death of her husband in 1976, Norma continued to run the program until her death in 1986. At 17, the poet Mary Oliver visited Steepletop and became a close friend of Norma.
Fundraising efforts continue as do considerations for the future of this museum house. Parts of the grounds of Steepletop, including the Millay Poetry Trail that leads to her grave, are now open for occasional scheduled events. Details of Millay's life were compiled by biographer Nancy Milford in the book titled Savage Beauty: The Life of Edna St Vincent Millay, published in 2001.
Mary Oliver herself went on to become a Pulitzer Prize-winning poet, greatly inspired by Millay's work. In 2006, the state of New York paid $1.69 million to acquire of Steepletop, to add the land to a nearby state forest preserve.
The museum opened to the public in the summer of 2010, and guided tours of Steepletop and Millay's gardens were available from the end of May through the middle of October.
Accessed 2010-09-13 Miriam Gurko-Floyd Dell Papers at The Newberry Library Guide to the Edna St.
Her performing self made people feel they had seen the muse alive and just within reach." In 2015, Millay was named by Equality Forum as one of their "31 Icons" of the 2015 LGBT History Month. Millay has been the inspiration for several plays and musicals, including the biographical play Words Like Fresh Skin, written by Megan Lohne and produced at Adelphi University. American composer Margaret Bonds arranged Six Songs on Poems by Edna St.
Effective November 2018 Steepletop closed to the public due to financial challenges and restoration needs.
Vincent Millay. In October 2020, Scottish harpist Maeve Gilchrist produced an album entitled The Harpweaver, that owes its origin to a poem by Edna St.
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