Conrad Aiken, 1899-1973. American author
Links
Finding-Aid for the Aiken Papers [00127]Collection Description
Letters
2 items
Access: Open
Aiken, though neglected today and largely unappreciated during his lifetime, is one of the most significant figures in the development of American Modernism. Aiken enrolled at Harvard in 1907, thus qualifying him as a member of one of the famous classes of 1910-1915 which included T.S. Eliot, E.E. Cummings, John Reed, Robert Benchley, and Walter Lippmann. Leaving Harvard in his senior year, Aiken embarked on the first of several trips to Europe. There he met Ezra Pound and Amy Lowell who were then launching the Imagist movement. Soon after his graduation, Aiken moved to Europe and began writing and reviewing for New Republic, Poetry, Dial, and other periodicals. By 1925, he was settled in Boston and well into a writing career that produced more than 50 books of poetry, fiction, and criticism.
The two letters are to Arthur Cohen. The first one (1/24/1964) comments on Aiken’s recent appearance in Time, and the second (11/18/1964) humorously relates Aiken’s selling attempts on behalf of Cohen.