Marianne Craig Moore (November 15, 1887 – February 5, 1972) was an American

modernist Modernism is both a philosophical and arts movement that arose from broad transformations in Western society during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The movement reflected a desire for the creation of new forms of art, philosophy, an ...

poet, critic, translator, and editor. Her poetry is noted for formal innovation, precise diction, irony, and wit.

Early life

Moore was born in

Kirkwood, Missouri Kirkwood is an inner-ring western suburb of St. Louis located in St. Louis County, Missouri. As of the 2010 census, the city's population was 27,540. Founded in 1853, the city is named after James P. Kirkwood, builder of the Pacific Railroad th ...

, in the manse of the

Presbyterian church Presbyterianism is a part of the Reformed tradition within Protestantism that broke from the Roman Catholic Church in Scotland by John Knox, who was a priest at St. Giles Cathedral (Church of Scotland). Presbyterian churches derive their nam ...

where her maternal grandfather, John Riddle Warner, served as pastor. Her father, John Milton Moore, a mechanical engineer and inventor, suffered a psychotic episode, as a consequence of which her parents separated before she was born; Moore never met him. She and her elder brother, John Warner Moore, were reared by their mother, Mary Warner Moore. The family wrote voluminous letters to one another throughout their lives, often addressing each other by playful nicknames based on characters from ''

The Wind in the Willows ''The Wind in the Willows'' is a children's novel by the British novelist Kenneth Grahame, first published in 1908. It details the story of Mole, Ratty, and Badger as they try to help Mr. Toad, after he becomes obsessed with motorcars and gets ...

'' and using a private language. Like her mother and her elder brother, Moore remained a devoted Presbyterian, strongly influenced by her grandfather, approaching her Christian faith as a lesson in strength vindicated through trials and temptations; her poems often deal with the themes of strength and adversity.Molesworth, Charles. Introduction. ''Marianne Moore: A Literary Life.'' New York: Macmillan, 1990. She thought "it was not possible to live without religious faith".Letter to Miss Gray (November 5, 1935), reproduced in Molesworth, Charles, ''Marianne Moore: A Literary Life.'' New York: Macmillan, 1990. Moore lived in the

St. Louis St. Louis () is the second-largest city in Missouri, United States. It sits near the confluence of the Mississippi and the Missouri Rivers. In 2020, the city proper had a population of 301,578, while the bi-state metropolitan area, which e ...

area until she was six. After her grandfather died in 1894, the three stayed with relatives near

Pittsburgh Pittsburgh ( ) is a city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, United States, and the county seat of Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, Allegheny County. It is the most populous city in both Allegheny County and Wester ...

for two years, then moved to

Carlisle, Pennsylvania Carlisle is a Borough (Pennsylvania), borough in and the county seat of Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, United States. Carlisle is located within the Cumberland Valley, a highly productive agricultural region. As of the 2020 United States census, ...

, where her mother found employment teaching English in a private girls school. Moore entered

Bryn Mawr College Bryn Mawr College ( ; Welsh: ) is a women's liberal arts college in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania. Founded as a Quaker institution in 1885, Bryn Mawr is one of the Seven Sister colleges, a group of elite, historically women's colleges in the United St ...

in 1905. She was graduated four years later with an A.B., having majored in history, economics, and political science.Leavell, Linda. ''Holding On Upside Down: The Life and Work of Marianne Moore''. New York: Farrar Straus and Giroux, 2014. The poet H.D. was among her classmates during their freshman year. At Bryn Mawr, Moore started writing short stories and poems for ''Tipyn O'Bob'', the campus literary magazine, and decided to become a writer. After graduation, she worked briefly at

Melvil Dewey Melville Louis Kossuth "Melvil" Dewey (December 10, 1851 – December 26, 1931) was an influential American librarian and educator, inventor of the Dewey Decimal system of library classification, a founder of the Lake Placid Club, and a chief lib ...

Lake Placid Club The Lake Placid Club was a social and recreation club founded 1895, in a hotel on Mirror Lake in Lake Placid, New York, under Melvil Dewey's leadership and according to his ideals. It was instrumental in Lake Placid's development as an internatio ...

, then taught business subjects at the

Carlisle Indian Industrial School The United States Indian Industrial School in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, generally known as Carlisle Indian Industrial School, was the flagship Indian boarding school in the United States from 1879 through 1918. It took over the historic Carlisle ...

from 1911 to 1914.

Poetic career

Moore's first professionally published poems appeared in ''

The Egoist ''The'' () is a grammatical article in English, denoting persons or things already mentioned, under discussion, implied or otherwise presumed familiar to listeners, readers, or speakers. It is the definite article in English. ''The'' is the m ...

'' and ''

Poetry Poetry (derived from the Greek ''poiesis'', "making"), also called verse, is a form of literature that uses aesthetic and often rhythmic qualities of language − such as phonaesthetics, sound symbolism, and metre − to evoke meanings i ...

'' in the spring of 1915.

Harriet Monroe Harriet Monroe (December 23, 1860 – September 26, 1936) was an American editor, scholar, literary critic, poet, and patron of the arts. She was the founding publisher and long-time editor of ''Poetry'' magazine, first published in 1912. As a ...

, the editor of the latter, would describe them in her biography as possessing "an elliptically musical profundity". In 1916, Moore moved with her mother to

Chatham, New Jersey "The Chathams" is a term used in reference to shared services for two neighboring municipalities in Morris County, New Jersey, Morris County, New Jersey, United States – Chatham Borough, New Jersey, Chatham Borough and Chatham Township, New Jers ...

, a community with commuting transportation to

Manhattan Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the original counties of the U.S. state ...

. Two years later, the two moved to New York City's

Greenwich Village Greenwich Village ( , , ) is a neighborhood on the west side of Lower Manhattan in New York City, bounded by 14th Street to the north, Broadway to the east, Houston Street to the south, and the Hudson River to the west. Greenwich Village ...

, where Moore socialized with many ''avant-garde'' artists, especially those associated with ''Others'' magazine. The innovative poems she was writing at that time received high praise from

Ezra Pound Ezra Weston Loomis Pound (30 October 1885 – 1 November 1972) was an expatriate American poet and critic, a major figure in the early modernist poetry movement, and a Fascism, fascist collaborator in Italy during World War II. His works ...

William Carlos Williams William Carlos Williams (September 17, 1883 – March 4, 1963) was an American poet, writer, and physician closely associated with modernism and imagism. In addition to his writing, Williams had a long career as a physician practicing both pedia ...

, H.D., T. S. Eliot, and later,

Wallace Stevens Wallace Stevens (October 2, 1879 – August 2, 1955) was an American modernist poet. He was born in Reading, Pennsylvania, educated at Harvard and then New York Law School, and spent most of his life working as an executive for an insurance compa ...

. Moore's first book, ''Poems'', was published without her permission in 1921 by the Imagist poet H.D. and H.D.'s partner, the British novelist

Bryher Bryher ( kw, Breyer "place of hills") is one of the smallest inhabited islands of the Isles of Scilly, with a population of 84 in 2011, spread across . History The name of the island is recorded as ''Brayer'' in 1336 and ''Brear'' in 1500. Ge ...

. Moore's later poetry shows some influence from the

Imagists Imagism was a movement in early-20th-century Anglo-American poetry that favored precision of imagery Imagery is visual symbolism, or figurative language that evokes a mental image or other kinds of sense impressions, especially in a literar ...

' principles. Her second book, ''Observations'', won the Dial Award in 1924. She worked part-time as a librarian during these years; then from 1925 to 1929, she edited ''

The Dial ''The Dial'' was an American magazine published intermittently from 1840 to 1929. In its first form, from 1840 to 1844, it served as the chief publication of the Transcendentalists. From the 1880s to 1919 it was revived as a political review and ...

'' magazine, a literary and cultural journal. This position in the literary and arts community extended her influence as an arbiter of modernist taste; much later, she encouraged promising young poets, including

Elizabeth Bishop Elizabeth Bishop (February 8, 1911 – October 6, 1979) was an American people, American poet and short-story writer. She was Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress from 1949 to 1950, the Pulitzer Prize winner for Poetry in 1956, the N ...

Allen Ginsberg Irwin Allen Ginsberg (; June 3, 1926 – April 5, 1997) was an American poet and writer. As a student at Columbia University in the 1940s, he began friendships with William S. Burroughs and Jack Kerouac, forming the core of the Beat Gener ...

John Ashbery John Lawrence Ashbery (July 28, 1927 – September 3, 2017) was an American poet and art critic. Ashbery is considered the most influential American poet of his time. Oxford University literary critic John Bayley wrote that Ashbery "sounded, in ...

, and

James Merrill James Ingram Merrill (March 3, 1926 – February 6, 1995) was an American poet. He was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for poetry in 1977 for ''Divine Comedies.'' His poetry falls into two distinct bodies of work: the polished and formalist lyri ...

. When ''The Dial'' ceased publication in 1929, she moved to 260 Cumberland Street in the

Fort Greene Fort Greene is a neighborhood in the northwestern part of the New York City borough of Brooklyn. The neighborhood is bounded by Flushing Avenue and the Brooklyn Navy Yard to the north, Flatbush Avenue Extension and Downtown Brooklyn to the west, ...

neighborhood of

Brooklyn Brooklyn () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Kings County, in the U.S. state of New York. Kings County is the most populous county in the State of New York, and the second-most densely populated county in the United States, be ...

, where she remained for thirty-six years. She continued to write while caring for her ailing mother, who died in 1947. For nine years before and after her mother's death, Moore translated the ''Fables of

La Fontaine Jean de La Fontaine (, , ; 8 July 162113 April 1695) was a French fabulist and one of the most widely read French poets of the 17th century. He is known above all for his ''Fables'', which provided a model for subsequent fabulists across Euro ...

''.

In 1933, Moore was awarded the Helen Haire Levinson Prize by ''Poetry'' magazine. In 1951, her ''Collected Poems'' won the

National Book Award The National Book Awards are a set of annual U.S. literary awards. At the final National Book Awards Ceremony every November, the National Book Foundation presents the National Book Awards and two lifetime achievement awards to authors. The Nat ...

,"National Book Awards – 1952"

National Book Foundation The National Book Foundation (NBF) is an American nonprofit organization established, "to raise the cultural appreciation of great writing in America". Established in 1989 by National Book Awards, Inc.,Edwin McDowell. "Book Notes: 'The Joy Luc ...

. Retrieved 2012-03-02.
(With acceptance speech by Moore and essay by Lee Felice Pinkas from the Awards' 60-year anniversary blog.) the

Pulitzer Prize The Pulitzer Prize () is an award for achievements in newspaper, magazine, online journalism, literature, and musical composition within the United States. It was established in 1917 by provisions in the will of Joseph Pulitzer, who had made h ...

, and the

Bollingen Prize The Bollingen Prize for Poetry is a literary honor bestowed on an American poet in recognition of the best book of new verse within the last two years, or for lifetime achievement.

. In the book's introduction, T. S. Eliot wrote, "My conviction has remained unchanged for the last 14 years that Miss Moore's poems form part of the small body of durable poetry written in our time." After years of seclusion, she emerged as a celebrity, speaking at college campuses across the country and appearing in photographic essays in ''

Life Life is a quality that distinguishes matter that has biological processes, such as signaling and self-sustaining processes, from that which does not, and is defined by the capacity for growth, reaction to stimuli, metabolism, energ ...

'' and '' Look'' magazines. Moore became a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters in 1955. She was elected a Fellow of the

American Academy of Arts and Sciences The American Academy of Arts and Sciences (abbreviation: AAA&S) is one of the oldest learned societies in the United States. It was founded in 1780 during the American Revolution by John Adams, John Hancock, James Bowdoin, Andrew Oliver, and ...

in 1962 and in 1967 she was awarded The

Edward MacDowell Medal The Edward MacDowell Medal is an award which has been given since 1960 to one person annually who has made an outstanding contribution to American culture and the arts. It is given by MacDowell, the first artist residency program in the United Sta ...

The MacDowell Colony MacDowell is an artist's residency program in Peterborough, New Hampshire, United States, founded in 1907 by composer Edward MacDowell and his wife, pianist and philanthropist Marian MacDowell. Prior to July 2020, it was known as the MacDowell ...

for outstanding contributions to American culture. Moore continued to publish poems in various magazines, including, ''

The Nation ''The Nation'' is an American liberal biweekly magazine that covers political and cultural news, opinion, and analysis. It was founded on July 6, 1865, as a successor to William Lloyd Garrison's '' The Liberator'', an abolitionist newspaper tha ...

'', ''

The New Republic ''The New Republic'' is an American magazine of commentary on politics, contemporary culture, and the arts. Founded in 1914 by several leaders of the progressive movement, it attempted to find a balance between "a liberalism centered in hum ...

'', ''

Partisan Review ''Partisan Review'' (''PR'') was a small-circulation quarterly "little magazine" dealing with literature, politics, and cultural commentary published in New York City. The magazine was launched in 1934 by the Communist Party USA–affiliated John ...

'', and ''

The New Yorker ''The New Yorker'' is an American weekly magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. Founded as a weekly in 1925, the magazine is published 47 times annually, with five of these issues ...

'', as well as publishing various books and collections of her poetry and criticism. She moved to 35 West Ninth Street in Manhattan in 1965. After she moved back to Greenwich Village, she was widely recognized around town for her tricorn hat and black cape. She liked athletics and was a great admirer of

Muhammad Ali Muhammad Ali (; born Cassius Marcellus Clay Jr.; January 17, 1942 – June 3, 2016) was an American professional boxer and activist. Nicknamed "The Greatest", he is regarded as one of the most significant sports figures of the 20th century, a ...

, for whose spoken-word album ''I Am the Greatest!'' she wrote the liner notes. She became known as a baseball fan, first of the

Brooklyn Dodgers The Brooklyn Dodgers were a Major League Baseball team founded in 1884 as a member of the American Association (19th century), American Association before joining the National League in 1890. They remained in Brooklyn until 1957, after which the ...

and then of the

New York Yankees The New York Yankees are an American professional baseball team based in the Boroughs of New York City, New York City borough of the Bronx. The Yankees compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member club of the American League (AL) Amer ...

. She threw out the ball to open the season at

Yankee Stadium Yankee Stadium is a baseball stadium located in the Bronx, New York City. It is the home field of the New York Yankees of Major League Baseball, and New York City FC of Major League Soccer. Opened in April 2009, the stadium replaced the origi ...

in 1968. At the age of 81, Moore received the 1968 National Medal for Literature. The committee overseeing the award stated: "One of the few true inventors of poetry in our time, Marianne Moore, the first lady of poetry, gives us intimations of exquisite perfection." Moore suffered a series of strokes in her last years. She died in 1972, and her ashes were interred with those of her mother at the family's burial plot at the Evergreen Cemetery in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. By the time of her death, she had received many honorary degrees and virtually every honor available to an American poet. The ''

New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...

'' printed a full-page obituary. In 1996, she was inducted into the

St. Louis Walk of Fame The St. Louis Walk of Fame honors notable people from St. Louis, Missouri, who made contributions to the culture of the United States. All inductees were either born in the Greater St. Louis area or spent their formative or creative years ther ...

. Moore corresponded with Ezra Pound from 1918 and visited him regularly during his incarceration at St. Elizabeth's. She opposed

Benito Mussolini Benito Amilcare Andrea Mussolini (; 29 July 188328 April 1945) was an Italian politician and journalist who founded and led the National Fascist Party. He was Prime Minister of Italy from the March on Rome in 1922 until his deposition in 194 ...

and

Fascism Fascism is a far-right, authoritarian, ultra-nationalist political ideology and movement,: "extreme militaristic nationalism, contempt for electoral democracy and political and cultural liberalism, a belief in natural social hierarchy an ...

from the start and objected to Pound's

antisemitism Antisemitism (also spelled anti-semitism or anti-Semitism) is hostility to, prejudice towards, or discrimination against Jews. A person who holds such positions is called an antisemite. Antisemitism is considered to be a form of racism. Antis ...

. Moore was a

Republican Republican can refer to: Political ideology * An advocate of a republic, a type of government that is not a monarchy or dictatorship, and is usually associated with the rule of law. ** Republicanism, the ideology in support of republics or agains ...

and supported

Herbert Hoover Herbert Clark Hoover (August 10, 1874 – October 20, 1964) was an American politician who served as the 31st president of the United States from 1929 to 1933 and a member of the Republican Party, holding office during the onset of the Gr ...

in 1928 and 1932. She was a lifelong ally and friend of the American poet Wallace Stevens, as demonstrated in her review of Stevens's first collection, ''

Harmonium The pump organ is a type of free-reed organ that generates sound as air flows past a vibrating piece of thin metal in a frame. The piece of metal is called a reed. Specific types of pump organ include the reed organ, harmonium, and melodeon. T ...

'', and, in particular, by her comment about the influence of

Henri Rousseau Henri Julien Félix Rousseau (; 21 May 1844 – 2 September 1910)
at the Floral Decorations for Bananas". She also corresponded, from 1943 to 1961, with the reclusive collage artist

Joseph Cornell Joseph Cornell (December 24, 1903 – December 29, 1972) was an American visual artist and film-maker, one of the pioneers and most celebrated exponents of Assemblage (art), assemblage. Influenced by the Surrealists, he was also an avant-garde e ...

, whose methods of collecting and appropriation were much like her own. In 1955, Moore was invited informally by David Wallace, manager of marketing research for

Ford Ford commonly refers to: * Ford Motor Company, an automobile manufacturer founded by Henry Ford * Ford (crossing), a shallow crossing on a river Ford may also refer to: Ford Motor Company * Henry Ford, founder of the Ford Motor Company * Ford F ...

's "E-car" project, and his co-worker Bob Young, to suggest a name for the car. Wallace's rationale was "Who better to understand the nature of words than a poet?" In October 1955, Moore was approached to submit "inspirational names" for the E-car, and on November 7, she offered her list of names, which included such notables as "Resilient Bullet", "Ford Silver Sword", "Mongoose Civique", "Varsity Stroke", "Pastelogram", and "Andante con Moto". On December 8, she submitted her last and most famous name, "Utopian Turtletop". The E-car was christened by Ford as the

Edsel Edsel is a discontinued division and brand of automobiles that was marketed by the Ford Motor Company from the 1958 to the 1960 model years. Deriving its name from Edsel Ford, son of company founder Henry Ford, Edsels were developed in an effort ...

. Moore never married. Her living room has been preserved in its original layout in the collections of the

Rosenbach Museum and Library The Rosenbach is a Philadelphia museum and library located within two 19th-century townhouses. The historic houses contain the collections and treasures of Philip Rosenbach and his younger brother Dr. A. S. W. Rosenbach. The brothers owned the ...

in Philadelphia. Her entire library, knick-knacks (including a baseball signed by

Mickey Mantle Mickey Charles Mantle (October 20, 1931 – August 13, 1995), nicknamed "the Commerce Comet" and "the Mick", was an American professional baseball player. Mantle played his entire Major League Baseball (MLB) career (1951–1968) with the New York ...

), all of her correspondence, photographs, and poetry drafts are available for public viewing. Like

Robert Lowell Robert Traill Spence Lowell IV (; March 1, 1917 – September 12, 1977) was an American poet. He was born into a Boston Brahmin family that could trace its origins back to the ''Mayflower''. His family, past and present, were important subjects i ...

, Moore revised many of her early poems in later life. Most of these revised works appeared in the ''Complete Poems'' of 1967. Facsimile editions of the theretofore out-of-print 1924 ''Observations'' became available in 2002. Since that time, there has been no critical consensus about which versions are authoritative. As Moore wrote, as a one-line epigraph to ''Complete Poems'', which offered her well-known work "Poetry" cut down from twenty-nine lines to three: "Omissions are not accidents." In a foreword to ''A Marianne Moore Reader'' in 1961, Moore said her favorite poem was the

Book of Job The Book of Job (; hbo, אִיּוֹב, ʾIyyōḇ), or simply Job, is a book found in the Ketuvim ("Writings") section of the Hebrew Bible (Tanakh), and is the first of the Poetic Books in the Old Testament of the Christian Bible. Scholars ar ...

.Molesworth, Charles, ''Marianne Moore - A Literary Life'', New York: Macmillan, 1990. Prospect Park Camperdown elm and Envrions

Moore's novel and an unfinished memoir have not been published. In her will, she established a fund for the support of the

Camperdown Elm Camperdown may refer to: Places ;Australia * Camperdown, New South Wales, a suburb of Sydney * Camperdown, Victoria, a town in Western Victoria ;Canada * Camperdown Signal Station, operated 1797–1925, located on Portuguese Cove, Nova Scotia ...

in Brooklyn's Prospect Park, a rare and ancient tree that she had celebrated in a poem. In 2012, she was inducted into the New York State Writers Hall of Fame.

Poetic style

Moore's most famous poem is perhaps the one entitled, appropriately, "Poetry", in which she praises poets who create "imaginary gardens with real toads in them". It also expressed her idea that

meter The metre (British spelling) or meter (American spelling; see spelling differences) (from the French unit , from the Greek noun , "measure"), symbol m, is the primary unit of length in the International System of Units (SI), though its prefi ...

, or anything else that claims the exclusive title "poetry", is not so important as delight in language and precise, heartfelt expression in any form. Moore's meter was radically separate from the English tradition; writing her syllabic poems after the advent of

free verse Free verse is an open form of poetry, which in its modern form arose through the French ''vers libre'' form. It does not use consistent meter patterns, rhyme, or any musical pattern. It thus tends to follow the rhythm of natural speech. Definit ...

, she was encouraged thereby to try previously unusual meters. She credited the poetry of

Edith Sitwell Dame Edith Louisa Sitwell (7 September 1887 – 9 December 1964) was a British poet and critic and the eldest of the three literary Sitwells. She reacted badly to her eccentric, unloving parents and lived much of her life with her governess ...

as "intensifying her interest in rhythm and encouraging her rhythmic eccentricities". In response to a biographical sketch in 1935, Moore indicated "a liking for unaccented rhyme, the movement of the poem musically is more important than the conventional look of lines upon the page, and the stanza as the unit of composition rather than the line". Later in her ''Selected Poems'' of 1969, she also commented in regard to her poetic form, that "in anything I have written, there have been lines in which the chief interest is borrowed, and I have not yet been able to outgrow this hybrid method of composition". Moore often composed her poetry in syllabics; she used stanzas with a predetermined number of syllables as her "unit of sense", with indentation underlining the parallels, the shape of the stanza indicating the syllabic disposition, and her reading voice conveying the syntactical line. These syllabic lines from "Poetry" illustrate her position: poetry is a matter of skill and honesty in any form whatsoever, while anything written poorly, although in perfect form, cannot be poetry:

Involvement in the American suffrage movement

Moore was involved in the American suffrage movement starting in her university years at Bryn Mawr, from 1905 to 1909. During this time in the American suffrage movement,

Anna Howard Shaw Anna Howard Shaw (February 14, 1847 – July 2, 1919) was a leader of the women's suffrage movement in the United States. She was also a physician and one of the first ordained female Methodist ministers in the United States. Early life Shaw ...

had just taken over as president of the

National American Woman Suffrage Association The National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA) was an organization formed on February 18, 1890, to advocate in favor of women's suffrage in the United States. It was created by the merger of two existing organizations, the National ...

;

Harriot Stanton Blatch Harriot Eaton Blatch ( Stanton; January 20, 1856–November 20, 1940) was an American writer and suffragist. She was the daughter of pioneering women's rights activist Elizabeth Cady Stanton. Biography Harriot Eaton Stanton was born, the sixt ...

formed the Equality League of Self Supporting Women, which started the practice of suffrage parades; and soon (in 1910) women in the state of Washington were granted the right to vote. Moore's combined major in history, politics, and economics and the suffrage involvement of professors and other students at Bryn Mawr exposed her to the women's suffrage movement, especially because it was a "unique period in the history of women’s college, as the values of progressivism, women’s education, and the ideology of separate spheres came together in a kind of perfect storm that created a climate for cultural change". Moore was involved in a "suffrage society", a chapter of the National College Equal Suffrage League, and she was present at most of their events. Notably, Moore wrote in her personal letters to her family that she attended lectures at Bryn Mawr by the well-known feminist

Jane Addams Laura Jane Addams (September 6, 1860 May 21, 1935) was an American settlement activist, reformer, social worker, sociologist, public administrator, and author. She was an important leader in the history of social work and women's suffrage ...

and the British suffragette

Anne Cobden-Sanderson Julia Sarah Anne Cobden-Sanderson (; 26 March 1853 – 2 November 1926) was an English socialist, suffragette and vegetarian. Life Cobden was born in London in 1853 to Catherine Anne and the radical politician Richard Cobden. After her father ...

. Of the American suffragist Anna Howard Shaw, she wrote: "Miss Shaw spoke last night on the Modern Democratic ideal. I couldn't say how she delighted me. No decent, half-kind, creature could possibly think of fighting suffrage if he or it had heard her arguments." Moore went on a trip to New York City in 1909 with another Bryn Mawr student, where she heard a lecture by the Colorado suffragist Judge Ben Lindsey, went to a suffrage mass meeting, and saw

J. M. Barrie Sir James Matthew Barrie, 1st Baronet, (; 9 May 1860 19 June 1937) was a Scottish novelist and playwright, best remembered as the creator of Peter Pan. He was born and educated in Scotland and then moved to London, where he wrote several succ ...

's classic suffragist-themed play ''What Every Woman Knows''. There is speculation that Moore also participated in the women's suffrage parade of 1913 in Washington, D.C., one day before

Woodrow Wilson Thomas Woodrow Wilson (December 28, 1856February 3, 1924) was an American politician and academic who served as the 28th president of the United States from 1913 to 1921. A member of the Democratic Party, Wilson served as the president of ...

's presidential inauguration. Although in her personal letters she told her brother, Warner, that she did not participate in the parade after he cautioned her about the possible dangers she would face from the opponents of the parade, " r scrapbook includes programs and newspaper clippings about the march", and she later told the poet

that she "paraded with the suffragettes, led by

Inez Milholland Inez Milholland Boissevain (August 6, 1886 – November 25, 1916) was a leading American suffragist, lawyer, and peace activist. From her college days at Vassar, she campaigned aggressively for women’s rights as the principal issue of a wide ...

on her white horse". Moore was never as public about her involvement in the suffrage movement after that parade in 1913, because afterward she began participating anonymously, mostly through writing, using a pseudonym. During her stay in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, she admitted years later, she "wrote suffrage pieces for the Carlisle newspaper", which at the time appeared to be authored anonymously. Dr. Mary Chapman (University of British Columbia) argues that Moore was the writer of suffragist writings of the time in Carlisle news publications and that could be analyzed by examining her specific writing style alongside suffragist prose and poetry that were published in the ''Carlisle Evening Herald'' in 1915: "Many of the prosuffrage articles that appeared in the ''Herald'' exhibit Moore's characteristic reliance on quotation." Additionally, a letter appealing for the women's suffrage movement in the ''Carlisle Evening Sentinel'' is signed "Miss M.M.", which scholars believe could stand for Marianne Moore because "the absence of any other documented unmarried female suffragists in the Carlisle area with the initials M.M. make it likely that the ''Sentinel'' reader who coyly constructs a letter to the editor almost entirely from quotation is Marianne Moore". Moore's poem "Silence" (1924) also resembles the writing style that was seen in the ''Sentinel'' letter. Moore established herself on the surface as a modernist poet, and the common practice within the modernist circle of poets was to not engage with the politics of the time; but her writings displayed a "sophisticated political subtext".

Selected works

* ''Poems'', 1921 (Published in London by H.D. and

. Moore disapproved of the timing, editing, selections, and format of this collection. See ''The Selected Letters of Marianne Moore'', ed. Bonnie Costello et al. (New York: Knopf, 1997), p. 164. In a letter to Bryher, Moore notes, "I wouldn't have the poems appear now if I could help it and would not have some of them ever appear and would make certain changes.") * ''Observations'', 1924 * ''Selected Poems'', 1935 (introduction by T. S. Eliot) * ''The Pangolin and Other Verse'', 1936 * ''What Are Years'', 1941 * ''Nevertheless'', 1944 * ''A Face'', 1949 * ''Collected Poems'', 1951 * ''Fables of La Fontaine'', 1954 (verse translations of

fables Fable is a literary genre: a succinct fictional story, in prose or verse, that features animals, legendary creatures, plants, inanimate objects, or forces of nature that are anthropomorphized, and that illustrates or leads to a particular moral ...

) * ''Predilections: Literary Essays'', 1955 * ''Like a Bulwark'', 1956 * ''Idiosyncrasy and Technique'', 1958 * '' O to Be a Dragon'', 1959 * ''The Marianne Moore Reader'', 1961 * ''Eight Poems,'' 1962, with illustrations by Robert Andrew Parker * ''The Absentee: A Comedy in Four Acts'', 1962 (dramatization of

Maria Edgeworth Maria Edgeworth (1 January 1768 – 22 May 1849) was a prolific Anglo-Irish novelist of adults' and children's literature. She was one of the first realist writers in children's literature and was a significant figure in the evolution of the n ...

's novel) * ''Puss in Boots, The Sleeping Beauty and Cinderella'', 1963 (adaptations from Perrault) * ''Dress and Kindred Subjects'', 1965 * ''Poetry and Criticism'', 1965 * ''Tell Me, Tell Me: Granite, Steel and Other Topics'', 1966 * ''The Complete Poems of Marianne Moore'', 1967 * ''The Accented Syllable'', 1969 *''Selected Poems'', 1969 (selected by Marianne Moore, published by Faber & Faber, London ) * ''Homage to Henry James'', 1971 (essays by Moore,

Edmund Wilson Edmund Wilson Jr. (May 8, 1895 – June 12, 1972) was an American writer and literary critic who explored Freudian and Marxist themes. He influenced many American authors, including F. Scott Fitzgerald, whose unfinished work he edited for publi ...

, et al.) * ''The Complete Poems'', 1982 * ''The Complete Prose'', 1986, edited by Patricia C. Willis * ''Complete Poems'', 1994 * ''The Selected Letters of Marianne Moore'', edited by Bonnie Costello, Celeste Goodridge, and Cristanne Miller, 1997 * ''Becoming Marianne Moore: The Early Poems, 1907–1924'', edited by Robin G. Schulze, 2002. . * ''Poems of Marianne Moore'', edited by Grace Schulman, 2003

References

External links

Audio recordings

Marianne Moore reading her poem "Bird-Witted"

Yale College Lecture on Marianne Moore
audio, video and full transcripts from Open Yale Courses *