http://www.friendshippoemsonline.com/ en Copyright 2011 Wed, 30 Mar 2011 09:56:54 -0800 http://www.sixapart.com/movabletype/ http://www.rssboard.org/rss-specification by Sylvia Plath What is this, behind this veil, is it ugly, is it beautiful? It is shimmering, has it breasts, has it edges? I am sure it is unique, I am sure it is what I want. When I am quiet at my cooking I feel it looking, I feel it thinking 'Is this the one I am too appear for, Is this the elect one, the one with black eye-pits and a scar? Measuring the flour, cutting off the surplus, Adhering to rules, to rules, to rules. Is this the one for the annunciation? My god, what a laugh!' But it shimmers, it does not stop, and I think it wants me. I would not mind if it were bones, or a pearl button. I do not want much of a present, anyway, this year. After all I am alive only by accident. I would have killed myself gladly that time any possible way. Now there are these veils, shimmering like curtains, The diaphanous satins of a January window White as babies' bedding and glittering with dead breath. O ivory! It must be a tusk there, a ghost column. Can you not see I do not mind what it is. Can you not give it to me? Do not be ashamed--I do not mind if it is small. Do not be mean, I am ready for enormity. Let us sit down to it, one on either side, admiring the gleam, The glaze, the mirrory variety of it. Let us eat our last supper at it, like a hospital plate. I know why you will not give it to me, You are terrified The world will go up in a shriek, and your head with it, Bossed, brazen, an antique shield, A marvel to your great-grandchildren. Do not be afraid, it is not so. I will only take it and go aside quietly. You will not even hear me opening it, no paper crackle, No falling ribbons, no scream at the end. I do not think you credit me with this discretion. If you only knew how the veils were killing my days. To you they are only transparencies, clear air. But my god, the clouds are like cotton. Armies of them. They are carbon monoxide. Sweetly, sweetly I breathe in, Filling my veins with invisibles, with the million Probable motes that tick the years off my life. You are silver-suited for the occasion. O adding machine----- Is it impossible for you to let something go and have it go whole? Must you stamp each piece purple, Must you kill what you can? There is one thing I want today, and only you can give it to me. It stands at my window, big as the sky. It breathes from my sheets, the cold dead center Where split lives congeal and stiffen to history. Let it not come by the mail, finger by finger. Let it not come by word of mouth, I should be sixty By the time the whole of it was delivered, and to numb to use it. Only let down the veil, the veil, the veil. If it were death I would admire the deep gravity of it, its timeless eyes. I would know you were serious. There would be a nobility then, there would be a birthday. And the knife not carve, but enter Pure and clean as the cry of a baby, And the universe slide from my side. http://www.friendshippoemsonline.com/a_birthday_present_21452.php http://www.friendshippoemsonline.com/a_birthday_present_21452.php Birthday birthday_poem sylvia_plath Wed, 30 Mar 2011 09:56:54 -0800 by Dylan Thomas In the mustardseed sun, By full tilt river and switchback sea Where the cormorants scud, In his house on stilts high among beaks And palavers of birds This sandgrain day in the bent bay's grave He celebrates and spurns His driftwood thirty-fifth wind turned age; Herons spire and spear. Under and round him go Flounders, gulls, on their cold, dying trails, Doing what they are told, Curlews aloud in the congered waves Work at their ways to death, And the rhymer in the long tongued room, Who tolls his birthday bell, Toils towards the ambush of his wounds; Herons, steeple stemmed, bless. In the thistledown fall, He sings towards anguish; finches fly In the claw tracks of hawks On a seizing sky; small fishes glide Through wynds and shells of drowned Ship towns to pastures of otters. He In his slant, racking house And the hewn coils of his trade perceives Herons walk in their shroud, The livelong river's robe Of minnows wreathing around their prayer; And far at sea he knows, Who slaves to his crouched, eternal end Under a serpent cloud, Dolphins dive in their turnturtle dust, The rippled seals streak down To kill and their own tide daubing blood Slides good in the sleek mouth. In a cavernous, swung Wave's silence, wept white angelus knells. Thirty-five bells sing struck On skull and scar where his loves lie wrecked, Steered by the falling stars. And to-morrow weeps in a blind cage Terror will rage apart Before chains break to a hammer flame And love unbolts the dark And freely he goes lost In the unknown, famous light of great And fabulous, dear God. Dark is a way and light is a place, Heaven that never was Nor will be ever is always true, And, in that brambled void, Plenty as blackberries in the woods The dead grow for His joy. There he might wander bare With the spirits of the horseshoe bay Or the stars' seashore dead, Marrow of eagles, the roots of whales And wishbones of wild geese, With blessed, unborn God and His Ghost, And every soul His priest, Gulled and chanter in young Heaven's fold Be at cloud quaking peace, But dark is a long way. He, on the earth of the night, alone With all the living, prays, Who knows the rocketing wind will blow The bones out of the hills, And the scythed boulders bleed, and the last Rage shattered waters kick Masts and fishes to the still quick starts, Faithlessly unto Him Who is the light of old And air shaped Heaven where souls grow wild As horses in the foam: Oh, let me midlife mourn by the shrined And druid herons' vows The voyage to ruin I must run, Dawn ships clouted aground, Yet, though I cry with tumbledown tongue, Count my blessings aloud: Four elements and five Senses, and man a spirit in love Tangling through this spun slime To his nimbus bell cool kingdom come And the lost, moonshine domes, And the sea that hides his secret selves Deep in its black, base bones, Lulling of spheres in the seashell flesh, And this last blessing most, That the closer I move To death, one man through his sundered hulks, The louder the sun blooms And the tusked, ramshackling sea exults; And every wave of the way And gale I tackle, the whole world then, With more triumphant faith That ever was since the world was said, Spins its morning of praise, I hear the bouncing hills Grow larked and greener at berry brown Fall and the dew larks sing Taller this thunderclap spring, and how More spanned with angles ride The mansouled fiery islands! Oh, Holier then their eyes, And my shining men no more alone As I sail out to die. http://www.friendshippoemsonline.com/poem_on_his_birthday__21451.php http://www.friendshippoemsonline.com/poem_on_his_birthday__21451.php Birthday birthday poem dylan thomas Wed, 30 Mar 2011 09:55:18 -0800 by Emily Dickinson Birthday of but a single pang That there are less to come -- Afflictive is the Adjective But affluent the doom -- http://www.friendshippoemsonline.com/birthday_of_but_a_single_pang_21450.php http://www.friendshippoemsonline.com/birthday_of_but_a_single_pang_21450.php Birthday Emily Dickinson birthday poem Emily_ Dickinson Wed, 30 Mar 2011 09:54:06 -0800 May there always be work for your hands to do. May your purse always hold a coin or two. May the sun always shine on your windowpane. May a rainbow be certain to follow each rain. May the hand of a friend always be near you. May God fill your heart with gladness to cheer you. http://www.friendshippoemsonline.com/may_there_always_be_work_21436.php http://www.friendshippoemsonline.com/may_there_always_be_work_21436.php Traditional Irish Blessings Sat, 12 Mar 2011 08:09:43 -0800 Bless this house, o Lord, we pray. Make it safe by night and day. Bless these walls so firm and stout, Keeping want and trouble out. Bless the roof and chimney tall, Let thy peace lie over all. Bless the doors that they may prove Ever open to joy and love. Bless the windows shining bright, Letting in God's heavenly light. Bless the hearth a-blazing there, With smoke ascending like a prayer. Bless the people here within... Keep them pure and free from sin. Bless us all, that one day, we May be fit, O lord, to dwell with Thee. http://www.friendshippoemsonline.com/bless_this_house_21435.php http://www.friendshippoemsonline.com/bless_this_house_21435.php Traditional Irish Blessings Sat, 12 Mar 2011 08:08:14 -0800 May the blessing of light be on you-- light without and light within. May the blessed sunlight shine on you and warm your heart till it glows like a great peat fire. http://www.friendshippoemsonline.com/celtic_blessing_21434.php http://www.friendshippoemsonline.com/celtic_blessing_21434.php Traditional Irish Blessings Sat, 12 Mar 2011 08:07:32 -0800 May God give you... For every storm, a rainbow, For every tear, a smile, For every care, a promise, And a blessing in each trial. For every problem life sends, A faithful friend to share, For every sigh, a sweet song, And an answer for each prayer. http://www.friendshippoemsonline.com/an_irish_prayer_21433.php http://www.friendshippoemsonline.com/an_irish_prayer_21433.php Traditional Irish Blessings Sat, 12 Mar 2011 08:06:12 -0800 May the road rise up to meet you. May the wind always be at your back. May the sun shine warm upon your face, and rains fall soft upon your fields. And until we meet again, May God hold you in the palm of His hand. http://www.friendshippoemsonline.com/may_the_road_rise_up_to_meet_you_21432.php http://www.friendshippoemsonline.com/may_the_road_rise_up_to_meet_you_21432.php Traditional Irish Blessings Sat, 12 Mar 2011 08:05:14 -0800 May God be with you and bless you. May you see your children's children. May you be poor in misfortunes and rich in blessings. May you know nothing but happiness from this day forward. http://www.friendshippoemsonline.com/irish_marriage_blessing_21431.php http://www.friendshippoemsonline.com/irish_marriage_blessing_21431.php Traditional Irish Blessings Sat, 12 Mar 2011 08:03:52 -0800 Nature. As a result of this ground breaking work he gave a speech entitled The American Scholar in 1837, which was considered to be America's "Intellectual Declaration of Independence". Emerson was considered one of the great orators of his time; his enthusiasm and respect for his audience enraptured crowds. His support for abolitionism late in life also created controversy, and, at times, he was subject to abuse from crowds while speaking on the topic; however, this was not always the case. Emerson was born in Boston, Massachusetts on May 25, 1803, the son of Ruth Haskins and the Rev. William Emerson, a Unitarian minister who descended from a well-known line of ministers. Ralph Waldo was the second of five sons who survived into adulthood; the others were William, Edward, Robert Bulkeley and Charles. Three other siblings Phoebe, John Clarke, and Mary Caroline all died in childhood. Ralph Waldo Emerson was traumatized as a youngster when his father died from stomach cancer on May 12, 1811, less than two weeks before his eighth birthday. Emerson was raised by his mother and other intellectual and spiritual women in his family who had a profound impact on the young Emerson. Emerson's formal schooling began at the Boston Latin School in 1812 when he was nine years old. In October 1817, at age 14, Emerson went to Harvard College and was appointed freshman messenger for the president, a job which required Emerson to fetch delinquent students and send messages to faculty. He did not stand out as a student and graduated in the exact middle of his class of 59 students. After graduating from Harvard, Emerson assisted his brother in the finishing school for young ladies that they established in their mother's house. Emerson took charge of the school and, over the next several years, Emerson made his living as a schoolmaster, and then went to Harvard Divinity School. Boston's Second Church invited Emerson to serve as its junior pastor and he was ordained on March 11, 1829. Emerson soon met his first wife, Ellen Louisa Tucker, in Concord, New Hampshire and married her when she was 18. The couple then moved to Boston; Emerson's mother, Ruth, moved with them to help take care of Ellen, who already had with tuberculosis. Sadly less than two years later, Ellen died at the age of 20 on February 8, 1831. Emerson was deeply affected by her death and often visited her grave. He toured Europe in 1832 and later wrote of his travels in English Traits , which was published in 1856. Emerson returned to the United States on October 9, 1833, and lived with his mother in Newton, Massachusetts until November 1834. He married his second wife, Lydia Jackson, in her home town of Plymouth, Massachusetts on September 14, 1835. Their four children were Waldo, Ellen, Edith and Edward Waldo Emerson. Ellen was named for his first wife, at Lydia's suggestion. It was during this time of happiness and stability that Emerson focused on his prolific writing career. His body of work became immense as he wrote about several subjects of interest. Beginning as early as the summer of 1871 or in the spring of 1872, Emerson began losing his memory and suffered from aphasia. By the end of the decade, he would forget his own name at times and, when anyone asked how he felt, he responded, "Quite well; I have lost my mental faculties, but am perfectly well". The problems with his memory had become increasingly embarrassing to Emerson and. by 1879, he stopped appearing in public. On April 19, 1882, Emerson went out walking despite having an apparent cold and was caught in a sudden rain shower. Two days later, he was diagnosed with pneumonia. He died on April 27, 1882 and is buried in Sleepy Hollow Cemetery, Concord, Massachusetts. He was placed in his coffin wearing a white robe given to the family by American sculptor Daniel Chester French. ]]> http://www.friendshippoemsonline.com/ralph_waldo_emerson_biography_18591.php http://www.friendshippoemsonline.com/ralph_waldo_emerson_biography_18591.php Biographies Ralph Waldo Emerson biography_ of_ Ralph _Waldo_ Emerson Emerson life_ of_ Ralph_ Waldo_ Emerson Ralph _Waldo_ Emerson Transcendentalism Fri, 18 Sep 2009 20:44:55 -0800 He had very little regular schooling and got much of his education from his father, who taught his children reading, writing, arithmetic, geography, and history and also wrote for them A Manual Of Christian Belief. After a few years of home schooling, Burns was sent to Dalrymple Parish School during the summer of 1772 before returning at harvest time to full-time farm laboring until 1773. By the age of 15, Burns was the principal laborer at Mount Oliphant. He became old enough to try his hand at several different professions-none which worked out for him. In addition during this time he began writing poetry that reflected the people and events that were important in his life. He continued to write poems and songs and began a Commonplace Book in 1783. His continued on as well with half-hearted attempts at farming. His casual love affairs did not endear him to the elders of the local community and created for him a reputation for dissoluteness amongst his neighbors. His first illegitimate child, Elizabeth Paton Burns was born to his mother's servant, Elizabeth Paton as he was embarking on a relationship with Jean Armour. Jean bore him twins in 1786, and although her father initially forbade their marriage, they were eventually married in 1788. She bore him nine children in total, but only three survived infancy. During a rift in his relationship with Jean Armour in 1786, and as his prospects in farming were declined, he began an affair with Mary Campbell to whom he dedicated the poems The Highland Lassie O, Highland Mary and To Mary in Heaven. Their relationship has continued to be the subject of much conjecture, and it has been suggested that they may have married. They are reported to have planned to immigrate to Jamaica, where it has been widely claimed Burns would have worked as a bookkeeper on a slave plantation. Before the plans could be acted upon, Mary Campbell died suddenly of a fever in Greenock, Scotland. That summer, he published the first of his collections of verse, Poems, Chiefly in the Scottish dialect, which created a sensation and has been recognized as a significant literary event. Burn's next romantic conquest was Jenny Clow who bore him a son, Robert Burns Clow in 1788. His relationship with Nancy concluded in 1791 with a final meeting in Edinburgh before she sailed to Jamaica for what transpired to be a short-lived reconciliation with her estranged husband. Before she left, he sent her the manuscript of Ae Fond Kiss as a farewell to her. It was at this time that Burns became a collector of old Scots songs and was filled with a determination to preserve them. On his return to Ayrshire on February 18, 1788, he resumed his relationship with Jean Armour and took a lease on the farm of Ellisland near Dumfries but quickly gave up farming as he was writing at his best, and in November 1790 had produced Tam O' Shanter. As his health began to deteriorate, Burns began to age prematurely and fell into long fits of despondency. The habits of his youth are said to have aggravated his long-standing rheumatic heart condition. Supposedly his death was caused by bacterial endocarditis exacerbated by a streptococcal infection reaching his blood following a dental extraction in the winter of 1795, and it was no doubt further affected by the three months of famine that affected the countryside. His funeral took place on July 25, 1796, the day his son Maxwell was born. A memorial edition of his poems was published to raise money for his wife and children, and, shortly after his death, money started pouring in from all over Scotland to support them. ]]> http://www.friendshippoemsonline.com/robert_burns_biography_18592.php http://www.friendshippoemsonline.com/robert_burns_biography_18592.php Biographies Robert Burns biography_ of_ Robert_ Burns Burns life_ of_ Robert_ Burns Robert_ Burns Scottish_ poets Thu, 17 Sep 2009 20:46:41 -0800 San Francisco Evening Bulletin and an unsuccessful candidate for city tax collector. After his father's death in May 5, 1885, the family moved across the country to Lawrence, Massachusetts under the patronage of Robert's grandfather, William Frost, Sr., who was an overseer at a New England mill. Frost graduated from Lawrence High School in 1892. Despite his later association with rural life, Frost grew up in the city, and published his first poem in his high school's magazine. He attended Dartmouth College but returned home to teach and work at various jobs including delivering newspapers and working in a factory. He did not enjoy these jobs at all, as he felt that being a poet was his true calling. In 1894, he sold his first poem, My Butterfly: An Elegy, for fifteen dollars. First was very proud of himself and this accomplishment. He subsequently proposed marriage to Elinor Miriam White, but she demurred, wanting to finish college at St. Lawrence University, before they married. On his return from an excursion to Virginia, Frost asked Elinor again. Having just graduated she agreed, and they were married at Harvard University where he attended liberal arts studies for two years. He did well at Harvard, but had to leave to support his growing family. For nine years, Robert worked the farm his grandfather had purchased for him, while writing early in the mornings and producing many of the poems that would later become famous. Ultimately farming proved unsuccessful for him, and he returned to education as an English teacher. In 1912, Frost sailed with his family to Great Britain, where they first lived in Glasgow, before settling in Beaconsfield outside London. His first book of poetry, A Boy's Will, was published in 1913. It is widely felt that Frost wrote some of his best work while in England. As World War I began, Frost returned to America in 1915 where he bought a farm in Franconia, New Hampshire and launched a career writing, teaching and lecturing. Frost also taught English at Amherst College, in Amherst, Massachusetts, notably encouraging his students to account for the sounds of the human voice in their writing. Robert Frost's personal life was plagued heavily with grief and loss. His father died of tuberculosis in 1885, when Frost was just 11, leaving the family with just $8. Frost's mother then died of cancer in 1900. In 1920, Frost had to commit his younger sister, Jeanie, to a mental hospital, where she died nine years later. Mental illness seemed to run in Frost's family, as both he and his mother suffered from depression, and his daughter, Irma, was committed to a mental hospital in 1947. Frost's wife, Elinor, is also reported to have experienced bouts of depression. Elinor and Robert Frost had six children including Elliot, Lesley, Carol, a son, Irma , Marjorie and, finally, daughter Elinor Bettina . Only Lesley and Irma outlived their father. Frost's wife, who had heart problems throughout her life developed breast cancer in 1937, and died of heart failure in 1938. Frost was 86 years old when he spoke and performed a reading of his poetry at the inauguration of President John F. Kennedy on January 20, 1961. Just two years later, on January 29, 1963, he died in Boston of complications from prostate surgery. He was buried at the Old Bennington Cemetery in Bennington, Vermont. His epitaph reads, "I had a lover's quarrel with the world." ]]> http://www.friendshippoemsonline.com/robert_frost_biography_18593.php http://www.friendshippoemsonline.com/robert_frost_biography_18593.php Biographies Robert Frost American_ poets biography_ of _Robert_ Frost Frost life_ of_ Robert_ Frost Robert_ Frost Wed, 16 Sep 2009 20:51:55 -0800 The Pentland Rising: a Page of History, 1666. It was expected that Stevenson's writing would remain secondary to his career joining the family business. In November 1867, he entered the University of Edinburgh to study engineering. From the beginning, he demonstrated a complete lack of enthusiasm for his studies and devoted much energy to avoiding lectures. This time was more important for the friendships he developed with other students. In April 1871, he announced his decision to pursue a life of writing to his father . Years later, in his 1887 poetry collection, Underwoods, he looked back on how he turned away from the family profession. It was at this time Stevenson rejected his family heritage and religion in favor of a more Bohemian attitude in behavior and dress. He also began to write in earnest, producing a prolific body of work that would cover the next 20 years. While his health would often interfere with his writing, and sometimes force him to move to warmer climates, he steadily wrote as much as possible. On one of his travels he met Fanny Vandegrift Osbourne (1840-1914), who had three children from another marriage. Despite being ill and nearly penniless in May, 1880, Stevenson married Fanny. They honeymooned in Napa Valley and then returned to Europe. Between 1880 and 1887, Stevenson searched in vain for a place of residence suitable for his state of health. In 1890, he finally found what he was searching for when he purchased four hundred acres of land in Upolu, one of the Samoan Islands. His influence spread to the natives, who consulted him for advice. He soon became involved in local politics as he was widely popular among the natives. In addition to building his house, clearing his land and helping the natives in many ways, he found time to write. During the morning of December 3, 1894, he had worked hard as usual on Weir of Hermiston. During the evening, while conversing with his wife he was straining to open a bottle of wine, he suddenly exclaimed, "What's that!" He then asked his wife "Does my face look strange?" and collapsed beside her. He died within a few hours, probably from a cerebral hemorrhage, at the age of 44. The natives insisted on surrounding his body with a watch-guard during the night and on bearing him upon their shoulders to nearby Mount Vaea, where they buried him on a spot overlooking the sea. ]]> http://www.friendshippoemsonline.com/robert_louis_stevenson_biography_18594.php http://www.friendshippoemsonline.com/robert_louis_stevenson_biography_18594.php Biographies Robert Louis Stevenson biography_ of_ Robert_ Louis_ Stevenson life_ of_ Robert_ Louis_ Stevenson Robert_ Louis_ Stevenson Stevenson Treasure_ Island Tue, 15 Sep 2009 20:53:28 -0800 The Jungle Book, which has inspired numerous other literary works and several adaptations to television and film. Joseph Rudyard Kipling was born to Alice MacDonald (1837-1910) and John Lockwood Kipling (1837-1911) on December 30, 1865 in Bombay, now Mumbai, India. His father was head of the Department of Architectural Sculpture at the Jejeebhoy School of Art and Industry in Bombay. Some of Kipling's earliest and fondest memories were of his and sister Alice's trips to the bustling fruit market with their ayah, or nanny, or her telling them Indian nursery rhymes and stories before their nap in the tropical afternoon heat. His father's art studio also provided many creative opportunities using clay and paints. Those idyllic days were to end when in 1871 Rudyard and Alice were sent to Southsea, England, to live with Captain Holloway and his wife, while attending school. She ruled the boarding house with a heavy hand and Kipling was often beaten by her and her son. Kipling soon learned to read and was able to find solace in literature and poetry, voraciously turning to the magazines and books his parents sent him. Kipling got a brief respite from the Holloway household each December when he visited with his mother's kind sister Aunt Georgie and her husband, pre-Raphaelite painter Edward Burne Jones, and their children, in London. Those Decembers were paradise to Kipling as North End House was constantly brimming with visiting friends and relatives, and the homey and artistic effects of the affectionate couple were everywhere. In 1877, Kipling's mother returned to England and immediately collected him from 'The House of Desolation' as he grimly refers to the Holloway's over sixty years later in his autobiography, so that he could attend the United Services College in Westward Ho!, Devon. Now armed with spectacles, because Kipling was nearly blind without them, Mrs. Holloway and his schoolteachers gave him grief about his undiagnosed vision problems. He learned to defend himself from bullies and settled into the life of a student, became the editor of the school paper and, in his second year, started writing his own Schoolboy Lyrics , published in 1881, that was printed by his parents. In 1881, Kipling moved back to Lahore, India to live with his parents. It was a happy homecoming. He had his own office because he became the assistant editor for the Anglo-Indian Civil and Military Gazette and later The Pioneer. He had suffered frail health as a child and his penchant for working ten or more hours a day may have led to a nervous breakdown later on in life. Thus began Kipling's career as a roving reporter. He wrote dozens of essays, reviews and short stories including The Man Who Would Be King in 1888 and Gunga Din in 1890. These works would later be collected in such volumes as the poetry volume, Departmental Ditties, published in 1886, and the volumes of short stories titled, Plain Tales From the Hills , published in 1888, and Wee Willie Winkie, published in 1888. Other volumes written by Rudyard Kipling include the 1891 non-fiction volume, American Notes and his first major success, the 1892 poetry volume, Barrack-Room Ballads. On January 18, 1892, during the influenza epidemic, Kipling married Caroline 'Carrie' Balestier, the sister of his American publisher. Their first child, daughter Josephine, was born in 1892, daughter Elsie in 1896 and son John was born "on a warm August night of '97'". In 1902, he and Carrie purchased Bateman's House in Burwash, which he purchased and lived in for the rest of his life. Rudyard Kipling hemorrhaged and died on January 18, 1936 in London; his ashes are interred in the Poet's Corner of Westminster Abbey, London, England near to T. S. Eliot. ]]> http://www.friendshippoemsonline.com/rudyard_kipling_biography_18595.php http://www.friendshippoemsonline.com/rudyard_kipling_biography_18595.php Biographies Rudyard Kipling biography_ of_Rudyard_ Kipling Jungle_ Book Kipling life_ of_ Rudyard_ Kipling Rudyard_ Kipling Mon, 14 Sep 2009 20:54:39 -0800 Foster's Ethiopian Melodies; included in that work was the song "Nelly was a Lady," which was made famous by the Christy Minstrels. After publishing his latest work, he moved back to Pennsylvania and signed a contract with the Christy Minstrels. During this period in his life, he wrote most of his best-known songs. In 1850 he wrote "Camptown Races, De" and "Nelly Bly," in 1851 he published "Old Folks at Home," which is also known as "Swanee River". During 1853, he wrote and published "My Old Kentucky Home," and "Old Dog Tray." In 1854, he wrote "Jeannie With the Light Brown Hair" for his wife, Jane Denny McDowell. The majority of Foster's songs were of the blackface minstrel show tradition, which was popular at the time. In Foster's own words, what he wanted to do was "build up taste... among refined people by making words suitable to their taste, instead of the trashy and really offensive words which belong to some songs of that order." While most of Foster's songs had Southern themes, he never lived in the South. In fact, Foster only visited the South once in 1852 when he was on a river-boat voyage on his brother Dunning's steamboat, for his honeymoon. The biggest problem Foster faced with trying to make a living as a professional songwriter was that they did not exist in the modern sense. Due to the inadequate provisions for music copyright and composer royalties at the time, Foster realized very little of the profits that his works generated for sheet music printers. Many times competing editions of Foster's tunes were published by multiple printers and Foster was never paid anything. For the song "Oh! Susanna." Foster received a total of $100. In 1860, Foster and his family moved to New York City. About a year later, Foster's wife and daughter left him and returned to Pittsburgh. Starting in 1862, Foster's fortunes decreased along with the quality of his songs decreased. Stephen Foster died in New York City at the age of thirty-seven. At the time of his death at Bellevue Hospital, where he had been admitted three days before he died, he had thirty-seven cents to his name. ]]> http://www.friendshippoemsonline.com/stephen_foster_biography_18597.php http://www.friendshippoemsonline.com/stephen_foster_biography_18597.php Biographies Stephen Foster biography_of_Stephen_Foster facts_on_Stephen_Foster information_on_Stephen_Foster Stephen_Foster Stephen_Foster_biography the_life_of_Stephen_Foster what_you_need_to_know_about_Stephen_Foster who_is_Stephen_Foster Sun, 13 Sep 2009 20:57:22 -0800