Skipwith Cannell was an American poet

Poet

A poet is a person who writes poetry. A poet's work can be literal, meaning that his work is derived from a specific event, or metaphorical, meaning that his work can take on many meanings and forms. Poets have existed since antiquity, in nearly all languages, and have produced works that vary...

 associated with the Imagist group. His surname is pronounced with the accent on the second syllable. He was a friend of William Carlos Williams

William Carlos Williams

William Carlos Williams was an American poet closely associated with modernism and Imagism. He was also a pediatrician and general practitioner of medicine, having graduated from the University of Pennsylvania...

, and like Ezra Pound

Ezra Pound

Ezra Weston Loomis Pound was an American expatriate poet and critic and a major figure in the early modernist movement in poetry...

 he came from Philadelphia. Cannell studied at the University of Virginia

University of Virginia

The University of Virginia is a public research university located in Charlottesville, Virginia, United States, founded by Thomas Jefferson...

 and was enthusiastic about the work of Edgar Allan Poe

Edgar Allan Poe

Edgar Allan Poe was an American author, poet, editor and literary critic, considered part of the American Romantic Movement. Best known for his tales of mystery and the macabre, Poe was one of the earliest American practitioners of the short story and is considered the inventor of the detective...

 and the free verse of The King James Version of The Bible. He was briefly married to Kathleen Eaton Cannell

Kathleen Eaton Cannell

Kathleen Eaton Cannell was a Paris-based American dance and fashion correspondent for major U.S. papers and periodicals. Before moving to Paris she was the dance critic for The Christian Science Monitor...

, who was generally known as 'Kitty'.

Cannell met Pound in Paris

Paris

Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...

 in 1913. Pound sent some of Cannell's poems to Harriet Monroe

Harriet Monroe

Harriet Monroe was an American editor, scholar, literary critic, poet and patron of the arts. She is best known as the founding publisher and long-time editor of Poetry Magazine, which made its debut in 1912. As a supporter of the poets Ezra Pound, H. D., T. S...

. Back in London

London

London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...

, Pound took Cannell and Kitty to visit Yeats

William Butler Yeats

William Butler Yeats was an Irish poet and playwright, and one of the foremost figures of 20th century literature. A pillar of both the Irish and British literary establishments, in his later years he served as an Irish Senator for two terms...

 and found a room for the couple below his own in Church Walk, Kensington

Kensington

Kensington is a district of west and central London, England within the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea. An affluent and densely-populated area, its commercial heart is Kensington High Street, and it contains the well-known museum district of South Kensington.To the north, Kensington is...

.

Cannell's work appeared in Pound's 1914 anthology Des Imagistes

Des Imagistes

Des Imagistes, edited by Ezra Pound and published in 1914, was the first anthology of the Imagism movement. It was published in The Glebe in February 1914, and later that year as a book by Charles and Albert Boni in New York, and Harold Monro's Poetry Bookshop in London.The eleven authors featured...

and The New Poetry: An Anthology, edited by Harriet Monroe and Alice Corbin Henderson

Alice Corbin Henderson

Alice Corbin Henderson was an American poet, author and poetry editor.Alice Corbin was born in St. Louis, Missouri...

 in 1917.

Cannell and Kitty divorced in 1921. There were no children from this first marriage. Cannell married secondly Juliette Del Grange, a French national with whom he had two daughters, May and Sarah. His second marriage also ended in divorce. He married a third time to Catherine Pettigrew, with whom he had five additional children, David, Mary, Michael, John and Susan.

He was closely involved with Alfred Kreymborg

Alfred Kreymborg

Alfred Francis Kreymborg was an American poet, novelist, playwright, literary editor and anthologist.-Early life and associations:...

's magazine Others: A Magazine of the New Verse

Others: A Magazine of the New Verse

Others: A Magazine of the New Verse was founded by Alfred Kreymborg in July, 1915 with financing from Walter Conrad Arensberg. The magazine ran until July, 1919. It published poetry and other writing, as well as visual art. While the magazine never had more than 300 subscribers, it helped launch...

.

Sources

• Robert Karoly Sarlos, Jig Cook and the Provincetown Players: Theatre in Ferment University of Massachusetts Press, 1982. ISBN 0-87023-349-1
• James J Wilhelm, Ezra Pound in London and Paris 1908-1925 Penn State Press, 1990. ISBN 0-271-00682-X
• Noel Stock, The Life of Ezra Pound, Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1970. ISBN 0-14-021795-9 (p.174 of the Penguin edition)
• James J Wilhelm, Ezra Pound in London and Paris 1908-1925 Penn State Press, 1990. ISBN 0-271-00682-X (see p.301)

External links

• News item about small magazines, mentioning Cannell amongst others