Tulips & Chimneys

By E. E. Cummings

Edward Estlin Cummings (1894–1962), a native of Cambridge, Massachusetts, and a Harvard University graduate, is best known for his rejection of traditional poetic forms. As e. e. cummings, he conducted radical experiments with spelling, syntax, and punctuation that inspired a revolution in twentieth-century literary expression and excited the admiration and affection of poetry lovers of all ages.
With his 1923 debut, Tulips & Chimneys, the 25-year-old poet rattled the conservative literary scene, directing his avant-garde approach to the traditional subjects of love, life, time, and beauty. His playful treatment of punctuation and language adds enduring zest to such popular and oft-anthologized poems as "All in green went my love riding," "in Just-," "Tumbling-hair," "O sweet spontaneous," "Buffalo Bill's," and "the Cambridge ladies who live in furnished souls." This edition presents complete and textually accurate editions of Cummings's work, in keeping with the original manuscripts and the poet's intentions.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Dover Publications
• Release date: Jan 16, 2019
• ISBN: 9780486837079

E. E. Cummings

E. E. Cummings was an American poet, painter, essayist, author, and playwright. He wrote approximately 2,900 poems, two autobiographical novels, four plays, and several essays.

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TULIPS & CHIMNEYS

e. e. cummings

DOVER PUBLICATIONS, INC.

MINEOLA, NEW YORK

DOVER THRIFT EDITIONS

GENERAL EDITOR: SUSAN L. RATTINER

EDITOR OF THIS VOLUME: JANET B. KOPITO

Copyright

Copyright © 2019 by Dover Publications, Inc.

All rights reserved.

Bibliographical Note

This Dover edition, first published in 2019, is an unabridged, newly reset republication of a standard edition of the work. A new Introductory Note has been specially prepared for this edition.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Cummings, E. E. (Edward Estlin), 1894–1962, author.

Title: Tulips & chimneys / e. e. cummings.

Other titles: Tulips and chimneys

Description: Mineola, New York : Dover Publications, 2019. | Series: Dover thrift editions

Identifiers: LCCN 2018041008| ISBN 9780486826912 (paperback) | ISBN 0486826910 (paperback)

Subjects: | BISAC: POETRY / General.

Classification: LCC PS3505.U334 T8 2019 | DDC 811/.52—dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2018041008

Manufactured in the United States by LSC Communications

82691001 2019

www.doverpublications.com

Note

HIS NAME IS synonymous with a modern, distinctly idiosyncratic style of poetry—E. E. Cummings’ (also referred to as e. e. cummings) challenging, but ultimately satisfying, word puzzles are instantly recognizable by their punctuation and syntax:

In the,exquisite; /Morning sure lyHer eye s exactly sit,ata little roundtable / among otherlittle roundtables (Tulips, Portraits, XVIII)

Born in Cambridge, Massachusetts, on October 14, 1894, Edward Estlin Cummings grew up in a close-knit family, encouraged in his creative efforts of drawing and writing by his parents. His father, a Unitarian minister at a Boston congregation, taught at Harvard University. His mother, Rebecca, was a descendant of Susanna Rowson, the author of the first American novel, Charlotte Temple. His family called him Estlin, to distinguish him from the senior Cummings, also named Edward. Cummings spent much of his boyhood at Joy Farm, the family’s property in New Hampshire; it was the bucolic setting for many memorable experiences shared by father and son.

After earning a bachelor’s degree in English literature and Greek at Harvard, Cummings continued his education for a Master’s in English. His life took a different direction, however, when, in 1917, he enlisted in an ambulance corps to join the World War I war effort. He and a friend were suspected of spying and detained in France in a military camp—their letters home (read by the authorities for purposes of censorship) seemed to support the accusation; in addition, Cummings had been outspoken about his pacifist views. In his sole novel, The Enormous Room (1922), Cummings reflects upon this wartime experience.

Having immersed himself in the contemporary arts scene during his Harvard years, Cummings was once again drawn to modern art movements when he rejoined civilian life in 1919. Cubism (which inspired him to experiment visually with his verse) and emerging poets such as Ezra Pound and Amy Lowell had an impact on Cummings. His literary ambitions led him to publish in the Harvard Monthly, and he became involved in The Dial, a popular arts publication of the time. His experimental style—as well as the verses’ sexual content—proved to be a detriment to publishing his poetry; the potential publisher, Thomas Seltzer, made the selection with care in order to avoid the inevitable controversy. Thus, of the original 152 poems that Cummings hoped to publish, sixty-six were selected and included in Tulips & Chimneys (1923). Some of the poems were subsequently brought out in 1925 in XLI Poems, and the remainder was privately printed. E. E. Cummings drew on his early interest in art to produce many oil paintings, watercolors, and pencil and ink drawings, including portraits and landscapes, erotic art, and some abstracts. He wrote four plays, and some of his poetry was set to music by composers such as Aaron Copland and John Cage.

In 1926, Cummings’ father was killed, and his mother severely injured, in a car crash. The poet addressed this devastating event in his poem my father moved through dooms of love (Fifty Poems, 1940). Cummings had a complicated personal life—he was married twice: his first wife, Elaine Orr, gave birth to their daughter, Nancy, in 1919; however, in spite of a custody agreement, Cummings did not see Nancy until 1946. His marriage to his second wife, Anne Barton, lasted three years. Marion Morehouse, whom Cummings met in 1934, was a fashion model who was photographed by Edward Steichen and Cecil Beaton (and became a photographer herself). She was Cummings’ partner for the rest of his life (it’s not certain that they actually were married). The couple lived in Greenwich Village, New York, a haven for artists and writers, until the poet’s death of a stroke on September 3, 1962, in North Conway, New Hampshire—near Joy Farm, the site of many pleasant childhood memories. Cummings was sixty-seven.

Tulips & Chimneys begins, in the first section, Tulips, with a backward glance to the Elizabethan era in Epithalamion, a marriage poem that can be compared to the work of that name by Edmund Spenser (1594). Cummings, a scholar of Greek, mentions Chryselephantine Zeus Olympian in stanza 4—a reference to a giant statue of Zeus, one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. The poem Of Nicolette references the anonymous work Aucassin and Nicolette, a medieval French troubadour poem concerning a tortured love affair. These conventional verses give way to a more modern sensibility—and wicked humor—in La Guerre: Humanity i love you because you are perpetually putting the secret of life in your pants and forgetting it’s there and sitting. Portraits, XII offers imagery that combines a juxtaposition of sight and sound: I saw a dirty child / skating on noisy wheels of joy. Known for his compounding of words to create an entirely new, vivid image, Cummings coins mothermonster and all its implications in "Portraits, XII." A far cry from the romantic poems that begin Tulips are verses that depict a grittier reality, as in kitty. Sixteen,5’I,white,prostitute ...whose slippery body is Death’s littlest pal (Sonnets—Realities, XII) and "twentyseven bums give a prostitute the once / -over. fiftythree (and one would see if it could) / eyes say

Reviews for Tulips & Chimneys

[bness2 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

When he nails it he nails it, but sometimes the result is stilted or lost.

[nmhale_1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

E. E. Cummings is the poet best known for unusual punctuation, strange sentence configurations, and free flowing verses and stanzas. His work defines free verse. Did I know much about his poetry beyond that? Not really. I had read several of his pieces in anthologies or picture books, and I had a friend in college who greatly admired him. His reputation, combined with my lack of knowledge, prompted me to buy a couple of books by him while I was in college, which then sat on my shelf for years. However, I picked one up last year and slowly read my way through the entire collection of poems in the book, and now at least feel better acquainted with Cummings' themes and style. Honestly, I didn't understand every poem in the book. Some were more transparent, like "cruelly,love" or "the Cambridge ladies who live in furnished souls", while others were cryptic, such as "Cleopatra built". Some of the poems in the book resembled more traditional poetry, with clearly defined stanzas and lines that were balanced, while others have lines running across the page in all different lengths and starting points, and some even chop and mix the very words together. The work reveals Cummings knowledge of classical poetic forms, and proves that he wasn't just throwing words on a page, but rearranged the acknowledge forms for a purpose, for a visual and aural effect. I noticed recurrent imagery and themes in his work. Many of his poems are earthy and sensual. He often equates making love to nature and corruption, it is presented as both beautiful and awful. Many poems dwell on time and the ephemeral nature of beauty, love, and life. He also has poems that evoke the city, others that are more realistic depictions of simple scenes in daily life, and some that . I enjoyed reading this collection. Even without understanding every poem, by reading the whole book I gathered a wider picture of meaning and emotion. If I studied this in a formal setting, I'm sure I would take even more away from Cumming's work, but even just slowly reading through the work on my own, I expanded my poetic world. Poetry was once a major form of literature and communication, and it is seriously under read now. This book was another step in my efforts to open myself to poetry, and I'm glad I took it.