[The format of these notes has been slightly altered. Most notably, dates (hopefully correct, but not very certain for the lesser known poets) have been added — when available — in square brackets after each name, and the number of poems by that author in this anthology is in parentheses. These notes (first included in 1917, whereas the selections were made in 1913) combined with the searchability of electronic texts, renders the original Indexes of Authors and of First Lines obsolete, and so both have been dropped. Occasionally, further information follows in angled brackets. — A. L., 1998.]
Barker, Elsa. [1869-1954] (2) Born at Leicester, Vermont. Received her early education in that State. After a short period of teaching, she became a newspaper writer and contributed to various periodicals and syndicates. Her journalistic period closed with editorial work upon "Hampton's Magazine" in 1909 and 1910. Since that date she has published several books in different fields of literature: "The Son of Mary Bethel", a novel, putting the character of Christ in modern setting; "Stories from the New Testament, for Children"; "Letters of a Living Dead Man", psychic communications which have attracted much attention; and in poetry, "The Frozen Grail, and Other Poems", 1910; "The Book of Love", 1912; and "Songs of a Vagrom Angel", 1916. Mrs. Barker's poem, "The Frozen Grail", addressed to Peary, the explorer, did much, as he has testified, to inspire him, and was upon his person when he finally achieved the North Pole.
Braithwaite, William Stanley. [1878-1962] (1) Born at Boston, December 6, 1878. Educated in the public schools of that city. He has published two volumes of his own verse, "Lyrics of Life and Love", 1904, and "The House of Falling Leaves", 1908, but has given his time chiefly to editorial and critical work. Mr. Braithwaite edited three excellent anthologies: "The Book of Elizabethan Verse", "The Book of Restoration Verse", and "The Book of Georgian Verse", but has turned his entire attention, for several years past, to contemporary American poetry, having founded and edited "The Poetry Journal of Boston", "The Poetry Review of America", etc. Mr. Braithwaite summarizes each year for the "Boston Transcript" the poetic output of the American magazines, and publishes, in an "Anthology of Magazine Verse", what he regards as the best poems printed in our periodicals during the year.
Branch, Anna Hempstead. [1875-1937] (3) Born at Hempstead House, New London, Connecticut. Graduated from Smith College in 1897 and from the American Academy of Dramatic Art in New York City in 1900. While at college she began writing poetry, and the year after her graduation won the first prize awarded by the "Century Magazine" for a poem written by a college graduate. This poem, "The Road 'Twixt Heaven and Hell", was printed in the "Century Magazine" for December, 1898, and was followed soon after by the publication of Miss Branch's first volume, "The Heart of the Road", 1901. She has since published two volumes, "The Shoes that Danced", 1902, and "Rose of the Wind", 1910, both marked by imagination and beauty of a high order.
Brown, Alice. [1857-1948] (3) Born at Hampton Falls, New Hampshire, December 5, 1857. Educated at Robinson Seminary, Exeter. She is chiefly known as a novelist, having written with great art of the life of New England. Among her best-known volumes are "Meadow Grass", a collection of short stories; "Tiverton Tales"; "The Mannerings"; "Margaret Warrener"; "Rose MacLeod"; "My Love and I", etc. In 1915 Miss Brown received a prize of $10,000, given by Winthrop Ames, for the best play submitted to him by an American writer. This drama, "Children of Earth", was produced the following season at the Booth Theater in New York. In poetry Miss Brown has done but one volume, "The Road to Castaly", 1896, reprinted with new poems in 1917, but this is so fine in quality as to give her a distinct place among American poets.
Burton, Richard. [1861-1940] (3) Born at Hartford, Connecticut, March 14, 1859 [sic]. Received the degree of A.B. from Trinity College in 1883 and of Ph.D. from John Hopkins University in 1888. He entered journalism and became for a short time managing editor of "The Churchman", leaving this position to become literary editor of the "Hartford Courant", where he remained from 1890 to 1897. During this period he was also associate editor of the "Warner Library of the World's Best Literature". In 1902 he went to Boston as literary editor of the Lothrop Publishing Company, remaining until 1904. Previous to this time, Dr. Burton had been lecturing widely upon poetry and the drama and spent the succeeding two years chiefly engaged in this work. In 1906 he became the head of the English Department of the University of Minnesota, which position he still holds, although the scholastic year is broken annually by a lecture tour through the East. Dr. Burton has published many volumes of poetry and several upon the drama. Among the former one may cite as most representative: "Dumb in June", 1895; "Lyrics of Brotherhood", 1899; "Message and Melody", 1903; "Rahab: A Poetic Drama", 1906; "From the Book of Life", 1909; and "A Midsummer Memory", an elegy upon the untimely death of Arthur Upson, 1910.
Bynner, Witter. [1881-1968] (3) Born at Brooklyn, New York, August 10, 1881. Graduated at Harvard University in 1902. After his graduation he became assistant editor of "McClure's Magazine" and literary editor of McClure, Phillips & Company until 1906. Since that period he has devoted himself chiefly to the writing of poetry and poetic drama. His first volume, "An Ode to Harvard, and Other Poems", was published in 1907. This has been followed by the poetic dramas, "Tiger", 1913, and "The Little King", 1917, both of which have had stage presentation, and by "The New World", 1915, amplified from his Phi Beta Kappa Poem delivered at Harvard in 1911.
Carman, Bliss. [1861-1929] (4) Although so long a resident of America that he belongs among our poets, Bliss Carman was born at Fredericton, New Brunswick, April 15, 1861. He received the degree of A.B. from the University of New Brunswick in 1881 and of A.M. in 1884. He studied also at Harvard and at the University of Edinburgh. Like most poets, Mr. Carman served his period in journalism, being office editor of "The Independent" from 1890 to 1892, and editor of "The Chap-Book" in 1894. He has, however, given almost his sole allegiance to poetry and has published many books, chiefly of nature, interspersed now and then with volumes dealing with myth or mysticism. His first volume was "Low Tide on Grand Pre", which appeared in 1893, and revealed at the outset his remarkable lyric gift and his sensitive feeling for nature. In collaboration with Richard Hovey he did the well-known "Vagabondia Books", — "Songs from Vagabondia", 1894; "More Songs from Vagabondia", 1896; and "Last Songs from Vagabondia", 1900, — which introduced a new note into American poetry, and appearing, as they did, in the nineties, formed a wholesome contrast to some of the work then emanating from the "Decadent School" in England. Among the finest of Mr. Carman's volumes, aside from his work with Richard Hovey, are "Behind the Arras: A Book of the Unseen", 1895; "Ballads of Lost Haven", 1897; "By the Aurelian Wall, and Other Elegies", 1899; "The Green Book of the Bards", 1898; "Pipes of Pan", 5 volumes, first number in 1902; "Sappho: One Hundred Lyrics", 1903. Among his later books may be cited "Echoes from Vagabondia", 1912, and "April Airs", 1916.
Cather, Willa Sibert. [1873-1947] (1) Born at Winchester, Virginia, December 7, 1875 [sic]. During her childhood the family moved to Nebraska, and in 1895 Miss Cather was graduated from the University of that State. Coming East to engage in newspaper work, she became associated with the staff of the "Pittsburgh Daily Leader", where she remained from 1897 to 1901. Soon after, she became one of the editors of "McClure's Magazine", doing important feature articles until 1912. Miss Cather is now writing fiction, and has published three novels, "Alexander's Bridge", "O Pioneers!" and "The Song of the Lark". In poetry, she has done but one small volume, "April Twilight", 1903, but several poems from this collection seem likely to make for themselves a permanent place.
Cawein, Madison. [1865-1914] (3) Born at Louisville, Kentucky, March 23, 1865. Educated in the public schools of that city. He began writing very early and published his first book of verse, "Blooms of the Berry", 1887, when but twenty-two years of age. From that time until his death, December 7, 1915 [sic], he published many volumes of poetry inspired chiefly by the theme of nature. As most of these volumes are out of print, it is unnecessary to list them all, but among the more important may be cited: "Intimations of the Beautiful", 1894; "Undertones", 1896; "The Garden of Dreams", 1896; "Myth and Romance", 1899; "Weeds by the Wall", 1901; "Kentucky Poems", with an Introduction by Edmund Gosse, London, 1902; "A Voice on the Wind", 1902; "The Vale of Tempe", 1905; "Complete Poetical Works", 5 volumes, 1907; "New Poems", London, 1909; "Poems — A Selection from the Complete Work", 1911; "The Poet, the Fool, and the Fairies", 1912; "Minions of the Moon", 1913; "The Poet and Nature", 1914; and "The Cup of Comus", posthumous publication, 1915. Mr. Cawein was distinctly the creator of his own field. From the publication of his first little volume, "Blooms of the Berry", he had made himself the intimate, almost the mystic, comrade of nature. He had an ecstatic sense of the visible world. Beauty was his religion, and he spent his life learning the ways and moods of nature and declaring them in poetry rich in imagination. He had the naturalist's eagerness for truth, and one might explore the Kentucky woods and fields with a volume of his poetry as a handbook and find the least regarded flower minutely celebrated. In his most affluent fancy his eye never left the fact, and the accuracy of his observation gives his nature work a background which adds greatly to its value.