Edgar Lee Masters

Born in Kansas in 1868 and raised in Illinois, Edgar Lee Masters drew deeply on Midwestern life in his writing. He briefly attended Knox College, then studied law, was admitted to the bar in 1891, and practiced for many years in Chicago.

His lasting fame rests on Spoon River Anthology (1915), a sequence of poems spoken by the dead residents of a fictional town. The book made him widely known for its frank, human portraits of ordinary people and the secrets, regrets, and desires they carried through life.

Masters published many other books, including poetry, biographies, memoir, and fiction, and later received major literary honors. He died in 1950, but Spoon River Anthology remains the work most closely associated with his name.