Wallace Stevens, Harmonium

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Although Wallace Stevens began writing poetry seriously around the beginning of the century, when he was a student at Harvard,

Harmonium

(1923) was his first collection of poems, which he published at the age of forty-four. Despite being heavily influenced by English Romanticism and the French symbolists, the poems in the volume nevertheless represent a serious attempt to forge a distinctively American voice, an American vernacular for poetry both in themes and poetic diction. It collects seventy-four poems of various metres, from the short, four-line poem “To the Roaring Wind” to the long, six-section “The Comedian as the Letter C”, most of which had been already published between 1914 and 1923 in various magazines. Most of Stevens’ often anthologised and celebrated poems…

3422 words

Citation: Jiménez Muñoz, Antonio José. "Harmonium". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 25 October 2012 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=4849, accessed 19 March 2024.]

4849 Harmonium 3 Historical context notes are intended to give basic and preliminary information on a topic. In some cases they will be expanded into longer entries as the Literary Encyclopedia evolves.

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