author
Edna Worthley Underwood
1873–1961
A self-taught poet and translator, she built a literary life out of determination, languages, and a wide curiosity about the world. Her work ranges from original poetry and fiction to English translations that helped bring international voices to new readers.
3 Audiobooks
The taste of honey : The note book of a linguist
by Edna Worthley Underwood
The garden of desire : Love sonnets to a Spanish monk
by Edna Worthley Underwood
A book of dear dead women
by Edna Worthley Underwood
About the author
Born in Phillips, Maine, in January 1873, she spent part of her childhood with limited formal schooling before her family moved to Kansas. From there, she pushed her own education forward and went on to become a prolific American author, poet, and translator.
Her writing life was unusually wide-ranging. In addition to publishing poetry, stories, and novels, she translated literature into English from several languages, and her papers at Kansas State University reflect how active she was across many forms, including prose, plays, journalism, and translation.
She died on June 14, 1961. Today, she is remembered both for her original writing and for the energy she brought to introducing readers to literature from beyond the English-speaking world.