Philip Pendleton Cooke
BornOctober 26, 1816
Martinsburg, Virginia, U.S.
DiedJanuary 20, 1850(1850-01-20) (aged 33)
Clarke County, Virginia, U.S.
Notable workFroissart Ballads: and Other Poems
SpouseWilliann Corbin Tayloe Burwell (1837−1850, his death)
Children5
RelativesJohn Esten Cooke (brother)
John Pendleton Kennedy (cousin)
Signature

Philip Pendleton Cooke (October 26, 1816 – January 20, 1850) was an American lawyer and minor poet from Virginia.

Early and family life

Cooke was born on October 26, 1816,[1] in Martinsburg when it was then part of Virginia to the former Maria Pendleton and her husband, planter and delegate John R. Cooke (1788−1854).[2] He was thus descended from the First Families of Virginia. Of the large (13 child) family, his younger brother John Esten Cooke would become a minor novelist as well as lawyer, then a Confederate officer during the American Civil War while his cousin Philip St. George Cooke became a Union officer.[3] Much earlier, the Cooke brothers received a private education appropriate to their class. Philip attended Princeton University, and graduated in 1834.

Career

Cooke spent the majority of his life in the northern part of the Shenandoah Valley.[4] At Princeton, Cooke wrote the poems "Song of the Sioux Lovers," "Autumn," and "Historical Ballads, No. 6 Persian: Dhu Nowas," as well as a short story, "The Consumptive" before graduation.[5] Admitted to the Virginia bar, Cooke followed in his father's profession as a lawyer. His two main hobbies, however, were hunting and writing, though he never made a profession out of his writing.[1] He once wrote: "I detest the law. On the other hand, I love the fever-fits of composition."[6] Cooke lived for a time at Saratoga, the former home of Daniel Morgan.[7]

Death and legacy

Cooke died January 20, 1850.[1]

Writings

Cooke believed his literary sustenance came from his library rather than from writing, despite several important literary figures — including John P. Kennedy and Rufus Wilmot Griswold — who encouraged him to write more. Edgar Allan Poe praised his work and wrote to him that he would "give your contributions a hearty welcome, and the choicest position in the magazine."[8] By 1835, he resolved to give up on poetry entirely.[9] He believed that poetry was as barren "as a worn-out tobacco field" and that even William Cullen Bryant, who he considered "the master of them all," had "sheltered himself from starvation behind the columns of a political newspaper" rather than making money from poetry.[10] By 1847, the Southern Literary Messenger reported that Cooke had turned into a prose writer.[11]

Cooke was well-read and his poetry was inspired by Edmund Spenser, Geoffrey Chaucer and Dante Aligheri.[12] He also admired the prose work of Poe, which he told in a letter:

I have always found some remarkable thing in your stories to haunt me long after reading them. The teeth in Berenice—the changing eyes of Morella—that red & glaring crack in the House of Usher—the pores of the deck in the MS. Found in a Bottle—the visible drops falling into the goblet in Ligeia.[13]

References

  1. 1 2 3 Trent, William Peterfield. Southern Writers: Selections in Prose and Verse. New York: The Macmillan Company, 1905: 276.
  2. ↑ Toby Drews (ed.) Genealogies of Virginia Families from the Virginia Magazine of History and Biography, Vol. IV (Genealogical Publishing Co., Inc. 1981) p. 686
  3. ↑ William Thomas Doherty, Berkeley County, U.S.A.: a bicentennial history (Parsons Printing Company 1972) pp. 132n, 134n
  4. ↑ Hubbell, Jay B. The South in American Literature: 1607-1900. Durham, North Carolina: Duke University Press, 1954: 502.
  5. ↑ Ehrlich, Eugene and Gorton Carruth. The Oxford Illustrated Literary Guide to the United States. New York: Oxford University Press, 1982: 192. ISBN 0-19-503186-5
  6. ↑ Parks, Edd Winfield. Ante-Bellum Southern Literary Critics. Athens, GA: University of Georgia Press, 1962: 139
  7. ↑ "Saratoga, Clarke County". Xroads.virginia.edu. Retrieved July 7, 2016.
  8. ↑ Parks, Edd Winfield. Ante-Bellum Southern Literary Critics. Athens, GA: University of Georgia Press, 1962: 138
  9. ↑ Hubbell, Jay B. The South in American Literature: 1607-1900. Durham, North Carolina: Duke University Press, 1954: 505.
  10. ↑ Parks, Edd Winfield. Ante-Bellum Southern Literary Critics. Athens, GA: University of Georgia Press, 1962: 136
  11. ↑ Hubbell, Jay B. The South in American Literature: 1607-1900. Durham, North Carolina: Duke University Press, 1954: 509.
  12. ↑ Parks, Edd Winfield. Ante-Bellum Southern Literary Critics. Athens, GA: University of Georgia Press, 1962: 137
  13. ↑ Meyers, Jeffrey. Edgar Allan Poe: His Life and Legacy. New York: Cooper Square Press, 1992: 180. ISBN 0-8154-1038-7
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