Thread: W. W. I
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  #47  
Unread 05-09-2017, 09:30 PM
William A. Baurle William A. Baurle is offline
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Originally Posted by Woody Long View Post
I'm glad William posted Alan Seeger's poem (Post #41 here). Seeger was killed by machine gun fire while leading troops in an attack. It's a small curiosity that Seeger and T. S. Eliot, so different in style, were contemporaries—classmates at Harvard.

See the current New York Review of Books article here regarding WWI & the arts, including some about the poets.

— Woody
There were a lot of biggies surrounding Alan Seeger. His older brother was Charles Seeger, himself a notable and father of the even more notable Pete Seeger, the folk singer. When Alan was hanging out in Greenwich Village, he rubbed elbows with John Butler Yeats, father of William.

I was going to post another of Seeger's poems, figuring everyone knows the Rendezvous. But the ones I find online are either not exceptional, or not in keeping with the feel of the thread. He was proud and eager to serve (though an American by birth, he served in the French Foreign Legion, having moved to Paris as a young man) and had far more romantic views about war than his more famous contemporaries.

Well, he didn't fail that rendezvous.

I think had Seeger lived longer, he'd have written some exemplary poetry. I had a file of his complete poems I downloaded from somewhere, but have since lost it; but I do recall that some of his poems were quite excellent.

Last edited by William A. Baurle; 05-09-2017 at 09:33 PM.
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