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- TriviaEdna St. Vincent Millay was the first woman to win the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry, and sold 50,000 copies of a book of poems in the middle of the Great Depression. Yet, at the end of her life she was a recluse, an alcoholic and a morphine addict whose scandalous affairs were all but forgotten.
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Tornado through Greenwich Village
Early in this video, the distinguished critic Sandy McClatchy remarks on how little of Millay's poetry is read or remembered today. As the poet herself testified, her work was drawn directly from her own experience, often reflecting erotic encounters that render it too personal to be shared.
Her impact came principally from her theatrical tours of America, reciting her own works in a vivid dramatic style, with that blaze of red hair that could light up even the biggest theatre. She was really an actress more than a poet. None of her printed poems have registered deeply on me, lacking either a satisfying rhythm or the power to surprise with an unexpected final word or phrase. But millions who know nothing about her work know plenty about her life. She was really Greenwich Village on two legs - bohemian creativity and free love incarnate. Even her house, the narrowest in the city, wittily numbered as 75½ Bedford Street, reflects her defiance of convention.
And how she defied it - openly promiscuous from her arrival at the all-female Vassar College, and then cutting a swathe through Greenwich Village, which she largely helped to create. But promiscuity seldom seems to go with deep happiness, and I feel that she probably spread more joy than she experienced, alcohol and morphine steadily bulking up bigger in the picture (though we curiously don't hear about the road accident and hospitalisation that started her on morphine).
The commentators here are particularly well-chosen and well-used. McClatchy is full of original insight and never wastes a word. Millay's biographer, Nancy Milford, holds the attention effortlessly through her deep knowledge of the subject. But star of the show is the Canadian actress Jennifer Lines performing as Millay herself, reciting the poems and some of the diary entries, with immense conviction from beginning to end.
Her impact came principally from her theatrical tours of America, reciting her own works in a vivid dramatic style, with that blaze of red hair that could light up even the biggest theatre. She was really an actress more than a poet. None of her printed poems have registered deeply on me, lacking either a satisfying rhythm or the power to surprise with an unexpected final word or phrase. But millions who know nothing about her work know plenty about her life. She was really Greenwich Village on two legs - bohemian creativity and free love incarnate. Even her house, the narrowest in the city, wittily numbered as 75½ Bedford Street, reflects her defiance of convention.
And how she defied it - openly promiscuous from her arrival at the all-female Vassar College, and then cutting a swathe through Greenwich Village, which she largely helped to create. But promiscuity seldom seems to go with deep happiness, and I feel that she probably spread more joy than she experienced, alcohol and morphine steadily bulking up bigger in the picture (though we curiously don't hear about the road accident and hospitalisation that started her on morphine).
The commentators here are particularly well-chosen and well-used. McClatchy is full of original insight and never wastes a word. Millay's biographer, Nancy Milford, holds the attention effortlessly through her deep knowledge of the subject. But star of the show is the Canadian actress Jennifer Lines performing as Millay herself, reciting the poems and some of the diary entries, with immense conviction from beginning to end.
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- Apr 21, 2022
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What is the English language plot outline for Burning Candles: The Life of Edna St. Vincent Millay (2009)?
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