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Thursday, February 20, 2020

Writing for 'Goodness' Sake


“Let us forget such words, and all they mean, as Hatred, Bitterness and Rancor, Greed, Intolerance, Bigotry; let us renew our faith and pledge to Man, his right to be Himself, and free.” – Edna St. Vincent Millay.

St. Vincent Millay, who was born in Maine on this day in 1892, won the Pulitzer Prize for poetry in 1923 – only the third woman to win the award in that category.  And just to show that she wasn’t a “one hit wonder,” she won the Frost Medal for her lifetime contribution to American poetry 20 years later.  In between, she wrote many, many great poems and earned the accolade from fellow poet Richard Wilbur that “She wrote some of the best sonnets of the century.”
      While she grew up in Maine, she was educated at Vassar and spent her writing life in New York City, Europe, and during WWII in Washington, DC, where she was active in creating writing supporting the U.S. war efforts. 

Millay also wrote plays and prose and once said, “A person who publishes a book willfully appears before the populace with his pants down.  If it is a good book nothing can hurt him.  If it is a bad book nothing can help him.” 

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