Poet's Corner

Poetry Timeline

700-1799 | 1800-1899 | 1900-1924 | 1925-1949 | 1950-1974| 1975-

1900

• (-1999) The philosophy of Existentialism and the literature it inspires is highly influential throughout much of the 20th century.
• (-1950) Modernism remains a dominant literary force from the early part to the middle years of the 20th century.

1901

Thomas Hardy's "The Darkling Thrush" is published in his collection Poems of the Past and the Present.

Robert Francis is born.

French poet Sully Prudhomme is awarded the first Nobel Prize for Literature.

1902

Thomas Hardy's "The Man He Killed" is published in the November 8 edition of Harper's Weekly; later included in his collection Time's Laughingstocks and Other Verses, 1909.

John Masefield's "Sea Fever"is published in his collection Salt-Water Ballads.

Langston Hughes is born.

1903

Paul Laurence Dunbar's "Douglass" and "Life's Tragedy" are published in his collection Lyrics of Love and Laughter.

Countee Cullen is born.

French poet Frédéric Mistral is awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature.

1906

Paul Lawrence Dunbar dies.

Italian poet Giosue Carducci is awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature.

1907

Alfred Noyes's "The Highwayman" is published in his collection Forty Singing Seamen and Other Poems.

W. E. B. Du Bois's "The Song of the Smoke" is published in the February issue of Horizon.

W. H. Auden is born.

British poet and novelist Rudyard Kipling is awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature.

1907—1930

The Bloomsbury Group, a circle of English writers and artists, gathers regularly in the period from 1907 to around 1930.

1908

Theodore Roethke is born.

1910

Edwin A. Robinson's "Miniver Cheevy" is published in his collection The Town Down the River.

German poet, novelist, and dramatist Paul von Heyse is awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature.

1910s—1920s

The Georgian Poets, group of lyric poets, is active during the reign of George V of England.

1910s—1930s

New Humanism, a philosophy of literature, is influential for several decades, beginning around 1910.

1912

Walter de la Mare's "The Listeners" is published in his collectionThe Listeners and Other Poems.

1912—1925

The Chicago Literary Renaissance, a time of great literary activity, takes place from about 1912 to 1925.

1912—1920s

Imagism as a philosophy of poetry is defined in 1912 and remains influential for the next decade.

1913

Thomas Hardy's "Ah, Are You Digging on My Grave?" is published in his collection Satires of Circumstance: Lyrics and Reveries with Miscellaneous Pieces.

Robert E. Hayden is born.

Karl Shapiro is born.

Robert Bridges is named Poet Laureate of England.

Indian poet Rabindranath Tagore is awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature.

1914

Robert Frost's "The Death of the Hired Man" and "Mending Wall" are published in his collection North of Boston.

Randall Jarrell is born.

William Stafford is born.

Dylan Thomas is born.

José García Villa is born.

1915

Edgar Lee Masters's Spoon River Anthology is published.

Ezra Pound's "The River-Merchant's Wife: A Letter" is published in his collection Cathay: Translations by Ezra Pound, for the Most Part from the Chinese of Rihaku.

Rupert Brooke's "The Soldier" is published in his collection 1914 and Other Poems.

Rupert Brooke dies.

Américo Paredes is born.

Margaret Walker is born.

1916

Robert Frost's "Birches" and "The Road Not Taken" are published in his collection Mountain Interval.

Carl Sandburg's "Chicago" and "Fog" are published in his collection Chicago Poems.

Ezra Pound's "In a Station of the Metro" is published in his collection Lustra.

Walter de la Mare's "Silver" is published in his collection Peacock Pie: A Book of Rhymes.

Eve Merriam is born.

Swedish poet Verner von Heidenstam is awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature.

1916—1924

Dadaism, an artistic and literary movement, begins in Zurich, Switzerland, in 1916, and spreads throughout Europe and the United States through the early 1920s.

1917

T. S. Eliot's "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock" and "Preludes" are published in his collection Prufrock and Other Observations.

Samuel Allen is born.

Gwendolyn Brooks is born.

1918?

Wilfred Owen's "Dulce et Decorum Est" is written by this time, and first published posthumously in his collection Poems, 1920.

1918

Wilfred Owen dies.

Sara Teasdale is awarded the Pulitzer Prize in poetry for her collection Love Songs.

1919

Amy Lowell's "Generations" is published in her collectionPictures of the Floating World.

William Butler Yeats's "An Irish Airman Foresees His Death" and "The Wild Swans at Coole" are published in his collection The Wild Swans at Coole.

May Swenson is born.

1919—1943

The Algonquin Round Table, a circle of American writers, begins meeting in 1919 and continues to gather until 1943.

1919—1960

The Scottish Renaissance in literature begins around 1919 and continues for about forty years.

1919

Swiss poet and novelist Carl Spitteler is awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature.

Carl Sandburg and Margaret Widdemer are each awarded Pulitzer Prizes in poetry, Sandburg for his collection Corn Huskers, and Widdemer for her collection Old Road to Paradise.

1920

• James Weldon Johnson's "The Creation" is published in the Freeman; later included in his collection God's Trombones: Seven Negro Sermons in Verse, 1927.
• Carl Sandburg's "Jazz Fantasia" is published in his collection Smoke and Steel.

1920s

• The Fugitive Poets, a Southern American literary group, is active during the decade of the 1920s.
• The Harlem Renaissance, a flowering of African American literary activity, takes place in the 1920s.
• (-1930s) The label Lost Generation is applied to writers working in the decades following World War I.
• (-1930s) The Montreal Group, a circle of Canadian poets, begins in the late 1920s and flourishes for the next decade.
• (-1970s) New Criticism as a philosophy of literature arises in the 1920s and continues to be a significant approach to writing for more than fifty years.
• (-1960s) Surrealism, an artistic and literary technique, arises in the 1920s and remains influential for the next half century.

1921

Langston Hughes's "The Negro Speaks of Rivers" is published in the June edition of Crisis; later included in his collection The Weary Blues, 1926.

Marianne Moore's "Poetry" is published in her collection Poems.

William Butler Yeats's "The Second Coming" is published in his collection Michael Robartes and the Dancer.

Elinor Wylie's "Puritan Sonnet" and "Velvet Shoes" are published in her collection Nets to Catch the Wind.

William Carlos Williams's "Winter Trees" is published in his collection Sour Grapes.

Richard Wilbur is born.

1922

Langston Hughes's "Mother to Son" is published in the December edition of Crisis; later included in his collection The Weary Blues, 1926.

Claude McKay's "The Tropics in New York" is published in his collection Harlem Shadows: The Poems of Claude McKay.

Edwin Arlington Robinson is awarded the Pulitzer Prize in poetry for his Collected Poems.

1923

Wallace Stevens's "Anecdote of the Jar" is published in his collection Harmonium.

e. e. cummings's "in Just-" is published in his collection Tulips & Chimneys.

Jean Toomer's "November Cotton Flower" and "Reapers" are published in his collection Cane.

William Carlos Williams's "The Red Wheelbarrow" is published in his collection Spring and All.

D. H. Lawrence's "Snake" is published in his collection Birds, Beasts and Flowers.

Robert Frost's "Fire and Ice," "Nothing Gold Can Stay," "The Runaway" and "Stopping by Woods On a Snowy Evening" are published in his collection New Hampshire.

Denise Levertov is born.

Naomi Long Madgett is born.

Edna St. Vincent Millay is awarded the Pulitzer Prize in poetry for her collection The Ballad of the Harp Weaver.

Irish poet William Butler Yeats is awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature.

1924

Langston Hughes's "Dream Variations" is published in the September edition of Current Opinion; later included in his collection The Weary Blues, 1926.

Robert Frost is awarded the Pulitzer Prize in poetry for his collection New Hampshire.

Source: Exploring Poetry, Gale, 1997.

700-1799 | 1800-1899 | 1900-1924 | 1925-1949 | 1950-1974| 1975-