Ee Cummings

E.E. Cummings research papers discuss the author's life and/or his poetry. Paper Masters will custom write any research paper topic that has to do with the author E.E. Cummings or his work.

When writing research, you may want to include the following facts on the author:

• The poet E.E. Cummings was born Edward Estlin Cummings on October 14, 1894 at his parents' home in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
• His father, Edward Cummings taught at Harvard for a time and later was a Unitarian minister and active student of social ethics.
• Of Cummings' childhood, it could perhaps best be described by its poetic appearance in one of his most beautiful poems, "in Just."

"In Just" is one of Cummings' shorter and, at first glance, simpler poems. Its simple form fools the reader into thinking the poem may be trite and easily understood. In fact, "in Just" is one of Cummings' most difficult works to understand. "in Just" seemingly breaks every rule of language and poetic structure in an attempt to convey, not only through words, but also through images and form, the poet's feelings of joy and freedom that are associated with the subject-Spring.

Cummings' Work

The flamboyant typesetting of Cummings' work is an integral part of understanding the poem's meaning, and the only way the poet could convey his feelings. "puddle-wonderful"brings a communication of more about a child's view of springtime than conventional phraseology. The term puddle-wonderful in and of itself is not actually a word, but when these two words are stung together to make one word, all the reader can envision is a puddle being wonderful. In the same manner Cummings strings together "eddieandbill" and "bettyandisbel" as if they were one word as well. The names linked together in this manner give the reader a sense of the inseparable nature of childhood friendships. Children do not have complex rules about relationships and Cummings does not apply complex rules to his syntax.

Cummings and Childhood

In keeping with this idea of childhood and spring, Cummings has managed to incorporate a character, the balloon Man, whom he describes three times in different contexts: "the little lame balloonMan"; "the queer old balloonMan"; and "the goat-footed balloonMan." In this case the balloonMan is probably a fixed staple of Spring, like the ice cream man or the organ grinder with his monkey. These individuals seem ubiquitous to outdoor weather, a part of a pastoral background. The manner in which Cummings chooses to describe the balloonMan connotes a childlike interpretation of what he may actually look like, the way in which children make fun of physical deformities. Cummings sister Elizabeth described the genesis of the figure from their childhood:

The first and most exciting sign that spring had really come was the balloon man. First you heard his whistle in the distance; then he would come walking down the street, carrying a basket full of balloons of all colors tugging at their strings.