POETS OF AMERICA WITH INTERESTING BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES AND CHOICE SELECTIONS FROM OVER ONE THOUSAND LIVING AMERICAN POETS. THE ONLY COMPLETE BIOGRAPHICAL DICTIONARY OF LOCAL AND NATIONAL PROFUSELY ILLUSTRATED WITH OVER FIVE HUNDRED EDITED AND COMPILED UNDER THE SUPERVISION OF THOS. W. HERRINGSHAW, AUTHOR OF "HOME OCCUPATIONS," "PROMINENT MEN AND WOMEN OF THE DAY," "AIDS TO "GREAT OAKS FROM LITTLE ACORNS GROW." CHICAGO, ILL.: AMERICAN PUBLISHERS' ASSOCIATION. PREFACE. AS ONE of the fine arts, Poetry has not received the encouragement and appreciation in America that is deservedly due to such an important and beautiful branch of literature an art that has indisputably played a significant part as one of the factors in shaping the destiny of so great a nation. "No one," says George Parsons Lathrop, "is so bold as to affirm that, as a nation, we are poetic. With Germans Poetry is a part of daily life: it lives not only on their lips but in their hearts as well. Not so with us. Our appreciation of it is generally too theoretical, conventional, perfunctory, and involves a trice of apology for being interested in anything so unpractical. One thing is cer tain. Whatever the American people think of poetry and as to this they themselves still appear to be quite vague-it is perfectly clear that they do not think enough about it. If they did, they would know good poetry when they saw it; they would sometimes honor the chief makers thereof, wisely and soberly; they would cause the art and the perception of genuine poetry to be as carefully studied in every school and college as arithmetic and drawing and modeling now generally are studied. They would sustain literature in a generous spirit, make poetry a vital factor in the family and national life; and give to the accredited. poet a distinguished place in the social and political order." But, perhaps, when defective rhyme, rhythm, measure, and crude work generally (once allowable and still so prevalent in almost every nation) are no more tolerated; when vowel composition (the arrange. ment of one vowel in regard to another) receives proper attention and M595706 H567 loc |