Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) was considered one of America's best poets during the 19th century, and his works are still a major part of our literary culture. "Paul Revere's Ride," which commemorates the actions of the famous American patriot, is perhaps his best known poem. The next poet also penned an epic.
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American expatriate Ezra Pound (1885-1972) is best known for his role in the modernist poetry movement, particularly Imagism. He was famous for helping advance the works of other major poets, including W. B. Yeats, Robert Frost, Ernest Hemingway and T. S. Eliot. For nearly 50 years, Pound focused almost exclusively on the epic poem "The Cantos," which is considered by some as one of the greatest achievements in 20th-century poetry.
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American poet Emily Dickinson (1830-1886) composed nearly 1,800 poems during her lifetime, though less than a dozen were published while she was alive. Although she'd been writing poetry since her teens, Dickinson's most prolific period came during the Civil War, when she wrote hundreds of poems examining pain, grief, joy, love, nature and art. The next female poet was known for her love sonnets.
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Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1806-1861) was one of the most well-known English poets of the Victorian era. Her Sonnets from the Portuguese, which was published in 1850, is one of the most popular collections of love poems in English, and is considered by critics to be Browning's best work. Up next, a modern namesake who composed a poem for a president.
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Elizabeth Alexander (1962- ) composed and recited "Praise Song for the Day" for the inauguration of President Barack Obama, becoming only the fourth poet ever to do so. She's published five books of poems, including The Venus Hottentot,Body of Life,Antebellum Dream Book and American Sublime, which was nominated for the Pulitzer Prize in 2005. The next popular poet never received a Pulitzer nod.
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E. E. Cummings (1894-1962) was born Edward Estlin Cummings in Cambridge, Mass., and wrote poetry as early as age 10. Throughout his life, he pushed the envelope of punctuation, spelling and syntax, creating his own means of expression and becoming one of the most widely read poets in the United States.
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Carl Sandburg (1878-1967) was a versatile poet whose book Chicago Poems earned him international acclaim when it was first published in 1916. In 1919, he earned his first Pulitzer Prize for Corn Huskers. He authored several more volumes of poems and children's stories, and earned two more Pulitzers, one for his six-volume biography on Abraham Lincoln in 1940, and a third for Complete Poems in 1951. Next up, a popular poet today who also focuses on everyday life.
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American poet Billy Collins (1941- ) has been called "the most popular poet in America" by the New York Times, for his witty poetry that can make humorous yet insightful observations about everyday life. He's hugely popular and his poetry readings always sell out. Collins has served two terms as the U.S. Poet Laureate, from 2001 to 2003, and was New York State Poet Laureate from 2004 to 2006. The next famous poet received a Nobel nod.
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T. S. (Thomas Stearns) Eliot (1888-1965) is considered one of the most significant English-language poets of the 20th century, despite the fact that his complete set of works is small. His poem "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock" took him five years to complete and is thought to be a masterpiece of the modernist movement. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1948 for his outstanding contribution to poetry.
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Irish poet William Butler Yeats (1865-1939) was the first Irish poet to be awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1923. Most critics believe Yeats' best works, however, were completed after he received the Nobel Prize, and include "The Tower," which was published in 1928, and "The Winding Stair and Other Poems" released the following year. Another poet on Yeats' continent probably started English romantic literature.
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English poet William Wordsworth (1770-1850) is widely credited with starting the Romantic Age in English literature in 1798, and many critics consider his most famous piece, "The Prelude" (1850), the very best of English romanticism. He worked on and revised the "The Prelude" throughout his lifetime, but the poem wasn't published until several months after his death.
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Born in England as George Noel Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824) was a leading poet in Romanticism, and is still considered one of the most important British poets. His most famous poems include "She Walks in Beauty," "When We Two Parted" and "So, we'll go no more a roving." But it's his epic piece "Don Juan" that many regard as one of the most important long poems published in England. The most important poet across the pond soon followed.
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American poet Walt Whitman (1819-1892) is among the most influential poets in American literature, and is known by many as the "Father of Free Verse." Much of his work was considered controversial during his lifetime, especially the collection Leaves of Grass, which includes sexual references many deemed obscene at the time. Up next, one of America's best-known poets.
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The pieces of America's Robert Frost (1874-1963) often scrutinized complex social and philosophical themes, and included lifelike descriptions of 20th-century rural life in New England. Frost was honored with four Pulitzer Prizes for Poetry, and he read his poem, "The Gift Outright" at the 1961 inauguration of President John F. Kennedy. One of his best-known poems is "The Road Not Taken." About 30 years later, the next female poet penned an inaugural poem.
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Maya Angelou (1928- ) is one of the most recognized female poets. Her life's work spans decades and her poetry volume "Just Give Me a Cool Drink of Water 'fore I Diiie" was nominated for the Pulitzer Prize in 1972. President Bill Clinton invited Angelou to compose and recite a poem for his 1993 inauguration, and she recited "On the Pulse of the Morning." Angelou was not the first popular African American poet, however.
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American Langston Hughes (1902-1967) is known as one of the early trendsetters in jazz poetry, and for the works he created during the Harlem Renaissance. His best-known poem, "The Negro Speaks of Rivers" was part of his first book of poetry, The Weary Blues, which was published in 1926.
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This painting depicts Hughes and likely the first African American poet to rise to national eminence: Paul Dunbar. Dunbar, who lived from 1872 to 1906, was the son of former slaves and a prolific poet and author of short stories, plays, songs and essays.
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Countee Cullen (1903-1946) was another leading poet of the Harlem Renaissance. Cullen began writing poetry while still in high school, and went on to win more literary prizes during the 1920s than any other black writer. Cullen's work was not as lauded as that of many other Harlem Renaissance poets for many years, but has become more appreciated in recent years. Next up, an English poet whose work also was not appreciated until after he died.
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The works of English poet John Keats (1795-1821) are among the most popular and analyzed in English literature. Despite his short career, he was an instrumental poet in the in the second generation of the Romantic Movement. His works -- most notably his series of six odes -- feature sensual imagery, but were never well-received until after his death. Darkness and death often were the subject matter of the next poet's work.
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Edgar Allan Poe (1809-1849) was made famous by his poem, "The Raven," which was published in 1845 to instant success. But he was also renowned for his fascination with the morbid and macabre, and helped further the emerging genre of science fiction. Up next, a famous innovator of another kind.
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Best known as a playwright, William Shakespeare (1564-1616) was also a successful poet. He is often referred to as England's national poet, and his surviving works include 154 sonnets, two long narrative poems and several other poems. Shakespeare likely influenced the next Romantic English poet.
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English poet Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792- 1822) was a key Romantic poet during his lifetime. Today his works are considered some of the most popular in the English language, including anthologies like "Ode to the West Wind," "To a Skylark" and "The Masque of Anarchy." His life and work was not without controversy, however, much like the next American poet.
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Allen Ginsberg (1926-1997) was known for his poetry and for his involvement in the Beat Generation during the 1950s. He used drugs, studied under gurus and stayed involved in political activities such as protesting the Vietnam War and campaigning for free speech. He published numerous poetry collections, and was a friend of the next poet.
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Jack Kerouac wrote the first draft of "On The Road" by taping sheets of paper into one long continuous scroll and then going on a three-week Benzedrine bender. The draft topped out at nearly 120 feet (37 meters) in length. Kerouac often was miserable, however, the final poet in this list was happy and childlike.
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"The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame, came whiffling through the tulgey wood, and burbled as it came!" Those are the poetic words of poet and author Lewis Carroll, better known for his novels Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (1865) and Through the Looking Glass (1872). Jabberwocky's nonsensical words were one example of Carroll's happy, childish writing style.
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