Edna St. Vincent Millay - Playwright, Poet
Edna St. Vincent Millay Is Best Known as One of the Most Respected American Poets of the 20Th Century. She Coined the Popular Phrase, "My Candle Burns at Both...
Edna St. Vincent Millay is best known as one of the most respected American poets of the 20th century. She coined the popular phrase, "My candle burns at both ends."
Synopsis
Edna St. Vincent Millay was one of the most respected American poets of the 20th century. Millay was known for her riveting readings and feminist views. She penned Renascence, one of her most well known poems, and the book The Ballad of the Harp Weaver, for which she won a Pulitzer Prize in 1923. In her poem First Fig, she coined the popular phrase, "My candle burns at both ends." Millay died in 1950 on her farm in Austerlitz, New York.
Early Life
Edna St. Vincent Millay was an American poet and playwright born on February 22, 1892, in Rockland, Maine. Known to her family as "Vincent," she was named after St. Vincent Hospital in New York City, where her uncle had received care. Her father, Henry Tolman Millay, had a job in the insurance business and in education while her mother, Cora Buzzell Millay, worked as a nurse. At the age of 8, her parents divorced, and her mother raised Millay and her younger sisters.
Millay's family encouraged the children to value culture and literature. As such, Millay studied piano and theater, and spoke six languages. She had originally wished to pursue a concert pianist career, but her music instructor discouraged her, pointing out her small hands. She pursued writing instead.
Millay graduated from Camden High School in 1909 and lived in Camden, Maine, until age 20. The following year, she enrolled at Vassar College, and graduated in 1917 with a Bachelor of Arts degree.
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