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ng i
nto eachness begi
n
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fully is are ex
quisite theys of re
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fall which now drop who all dreamlike

(im

- e. e. cummings

Biography of e.e. cummings

Born as Edward Estlin Cummings in Cambridge, Massachusetts. His father was the first professor of Sociology at Harvard University and later became a minister of a Unitarian church. His mother taught him how to write poems, and his sister was born in 1896. Edward was only 12 when he entered high school. He went on to attend Harvard at which he aquired a B.A. and M.A and graduated Magna cum Laude. His first poems were published in the Harvard Monthly. In the Army in1917 he became an ambulance driver in France, and was imprisoned (for 3 months) in a concentration camp at La Ferte-Mace in Normandy for his outspoken anti-war convictions. The charge was treason, but was unproven.
The following year, he returned to America and settled in New York City. In 1919 he had a daughter with Elaine Orr Thayer. Between 1920 and 1923 he publishes in Dial, and two books The Enormous Room (based on his experience in the concentration camp) and Tulips and Chimneys. He marries Elaine in 1924 and divorces her in the same year. In 1925 he is given the Dial award, as he continues to publish in magazines. The same year, his father, Edward Cummings, passes away. In 1927 he marries Anne Barton. In 1931 his paintings are on display at Painters and Sculptors Gallery, New York City. Somewhere between 1932 and 1934 he divorces Anne and weds Marion Morehouse. In 1947 his mother, Rebecca Haswell Clarke Cummings passes away. He received Guggenheim fellowships in 1933 and 1951, an Academy of American Poets fellowship in 1950, the Harriet Monroe Poetry Award in 1950, and the Bollingen Prize in Poetry in 1958. On September 3, 1962 e.e. cummings dies of a brain hemorrhage in New Hampshire.
There is much work published and various career mentions in between these events, however it is so extensive that, (for a small biography) well, you get the idea, so I will instead provide a list at the bottom of this page of selected works. Note: Not only was cummings a poet, but also an abstract painter, novelist and playwright.

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unmea
ning
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ently)fal

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here)s

Now
- e. e. cummings

The lower capitalization in the poets name is apparently a small controversy. The use of lowercase on this site, is not a formal deduction, but a preference. Some of cummings own books presented his name this way.

Copyright Gina Miller 1998-2006 All rights reserved.