E. E. Cummings

Introduction

Every so often an artist emerges in his field whose ideas are refreshingly different, and breaks the mold set out by society. Such a man was E. E. Cummings. Not only did he break the mold, he shattered it with a monstrous wrecking-ball. He is known for his idiosyncratic and typographically inventive poetry. Cummings firmly believed in his ideas and strived to be an individual in all aspects of life. As he himself said, "It takes courage to grow up and turn out to be who you really are.” (Norman 76)

Thesis Statement

Satirists use lyricism to intensify their satirical thrusts, there is often no hard line between satiric and lyric poetry. The distinction for Cummings in particular is more a matter of emphasis than a clear-cut distinction.

Critical life events

Edward Estlin Cummings was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in 1894. His father was the Reverend Edward Cummings, who taught English at Harvard University and Radcliffe College and was a well-known preacher and lecturer. E. E. Cummings also attended Harvard, receiving his bachelor's degree in 1915 and his master's degree in 1916. A year later he and Slater Brown, a Harvard friend, enlisted in the ambulance service and served as drivers for six months in France. Because of an error of the military censor, Cummings spent three months in a French prison. From this experience came The Enormous Room, a prose account of life in a military prison that contains none of the bitterness and self-pity commonly found in such works. Instead, Cummings looked at the daily life and the strange characters in the enormous room with the saucy eye and original wit so evident in his poems. The Enormous Room may not be the most powerful book to come out of World War I, but it is certainly one of the most original and interesting. It was written because his father offered to pay him a thousand dollars if he would write it. The book was Cummings's first remarkable achievement. (Sawyer-Lauçanno 34-41)

After his release from the French prison, Cummings served as a private in the American infantry until the armistice. He then returned to New York for two years. He subsequently spent some time in Paris, where he won recognition both as a poet and as a painter. Cummings shuttled between these two cities for many years and finally settled in New York. (Marjorie 34)

Between Cummings's first book of poems, Tulips and Chimneys, and his Poems, 1923-1954, there is a sort of consistent inconsistency. His recurring themes are conventional: nature, which he treats with charming lyricism; love, which for Cummings can be idyllic or brutally sensual; the underdogs, both men and women, whom he tenderly champions; and the blatant materialism of the times, at which he scoffs in witty satire. In the presentation of these themes Cummings turns into a fearless experimenter, using every trick of typography to heighten the visual image. At his best he can depict his scene with the arrangement of words (as in “Sunset”) or use ...