The Harp-Weaver, and Other Poems (Magill’s Survey of American Literature, Revised Edition)
At a glance:
- Author: Edna St. Vincent Millay
- First Published: 1923
- Type of Work: Poetry
- Genres: Poetry, Lyric poetry, Sonnet
- Subjects: United States or Americans, Love or romance, Twentieth century, Gender roles, Nature, Marriage, Poetry or poets, Beauty, Feminism, Death or dying, Life, philosophy of, Seasons
Dedicated to Millay's mother, this collection of thirty-nine sonnets, “The Ballad of the Harp-Weaver,” and twenty-seven other short poems was awarded the Pulitzer Prize. It displays the poet at work in a more serious vein on the perplexities of life and love and particularly on the struggle of the artist to find eternal truths obscured by changing nature.
The eponymous ballad fathoms the currents of maternal love and self-sacrifice. Too poor to buy clothing for her son, a mother weaves on her harp clothes fit for a prince, singing in “a daft way” as she works her magic....
[The entire page is 752 words long]
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