James Gates Percival

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James Gates Percival

James Gates Percival (born September 15 or 17, 1795 in Kensington , Connecticut , † May 2, 1856 in Hazel Green , Wisconsin ) was an American geologist and poet , who was best known for his books of poetry Clio and Poems .

Life

After attending school, Percival first studied at Yale University and, after graduating in 1815, medicine at the School of Medicine there. He later accepted a professorship in chemistry at the US Military Academy in West Point , where he also studied geology .

In addition to his teaching activities, he was active as a poem writer and published his first volume of poems Poems in 1821 , the three in rapid succession with Clio (1822), Prometheus, Part II: With Other Poems (1822) and Poems (1823) at the beginning of the 1820s further volumes followed. His poems made him one of the most successful American romantic poets before William Cullen Bryant .

After a break of around twenty years, The Dream of a Day, and Other Poems (1843) was published in 1843, while The Poetical Works of James Gates Percival (1863) was only published posthumously .

Background literature

  • Julius H. Ward: The Life and Letters of James Gates Percival . Boston: Ticknor and Fields (1866)
  • Henry E. Legler: James Gates Percival: An Anecdotal Sketch and a Bibliography . Mequon Club (1901)
  • F. Cogswell: James Gates Percival and his Friends , 1902

Web links and sources

personal data
SURNAME Percival, James Gates
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American poet and philologist
DATE OF BIRTH September 15, 1795 or September 17, 1795
PLACE OF BIRTH Kensington , Connecticut
DATE OF DEATH May 2, 1856
Place of death Hazel Green , Wisconsin