Authors

American · 1842–1881

Sidney Lanier

Sidney Lanier was a Confederate veteran, professional flautist, and poet who brought musical theory explicitly to bear on verse construction, arguing that poetry's meter was a form of musical time. His poems — 'The Marshes of Glynn,' 'The Symphony,' 'The Song of the Chattahoochee' — have an unusual sonic density that his theoretical writings explain. He died of tuberculosis at thirty-nine after spending the last decade of his life fighting the disease while writing against it.