Harriet Monroe
| Harriet Monroe | |
|---|---|
 |
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| Born | December 23, 1860 Chicago, Illinois |
| Died | September 26, 1936 (aged 75) Arequipa, Peru |
| Occupation | Editor of Poetry magazine |
| Language | English |
Harriet Monroe (December 23, 1860 – September 26, 1936) was an American editor, scholar, literary critic, poet and patron of the arts. She is best known as the founding publisher and long-time editor of Poetry magazine, which made its debut in 1912. As a supporter of the poets Wallace Stevens, Ezra Pound, H. D., T. S. Eliot, William Carlos Williams, Carl Sandburg , Max Michelson and others, she played an important role in the development of modern poetry. Because she was a longtime correspondent of the poets she supported, her letters provide a wealth of information on their thoughts and motives.
Monroe was born in Chicago, Illinois. She read at an early age; her father had a large library that provided refuge from domestic discord. In her autobiography, A Poet's Life: Seventy Years in a Changing World, published two years after her death, Monroe recalls: "I started in early with Shakespeare, Byron, Shelley, with Dickens and Thackeray; and always the book-lined library gave me a friendly assurance of companionship with lively and interesting people, gave me friends of the spirit to ease my loneliness."
Monroe graduated from the Visitation Academy of Georgetown, D.C., in 1879. She was later recognized as a very talented author for her age. Her prose piece published in 1899 in the Atlantic Monthly, The Grand Canyon of the Colorado, was considered better poetry than her most notable poemI love my life
Driven by fears of posthumous anonymity, she proclaimed after graduation her determination to become "great and famous" as a poet or playwright. In the Dictionary of Literary Biography, Judith Paterson quoted her as saying, "I cannot remember when to die without leaving some memorable record did not seem to me a calamity too terrible to be borne." She afterward devoted herself to literary work. Monroe in her biography said, 'I have sense of consecration that made me think I would prefer art to life'.
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