Sonnet: The Death of The Debutante in The New Century

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At the turn of the last century (termed The New Century), sex and social position constrained young girls. A child in Victorian-era Wilmington, Delaware, Marion Gause Canby defied expectations when tragedy and opportunity presented themselves. An older brother Harry Courtland Gause died of appendicitis at Yale University, a few days past Christmas, 1899. The pre-teen-aged Marion founded, in his memory, a primary fund-raising children’s medical charity (later to become the Junior Board of the Delaware Hospital). She was a hands-on helper among the sick. In adulthood, she formed a literary alliance with spouse Henry Seidel Canby, Yale professor, editor and critic. A published poet (the volume High Mowing and poems published in Scribner’s, The Yale Review, and The New Yorker) Marion Gause Canby conducted the Children’s Bookshop department of the Saturday Review of Literature. She came from a philanthropic and noted Wilmington family, but managed to surmount expectations placed on women of the period by wielding her own passion and creativity.

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SONNET: THE DEATH OF THE DEBUTANTE IN THE NEW CENTURY

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At the turn of the last century (termed The New Century), sex and social position constrained young girls. A child in Victorian-era Wilmington, Delaware, Marion Gause Canby defied expectations when tragedy and opportunity presented themselves. An older brother Harry Courtland Gause died of appendicitis at Yale University, a few days past Christmas, 1899. The pre-teen-aged Marion founded, in his memory, a primary fund-raising children’s medical charity (later to become the Junior Board of the Delaware Hospital). She was a hands-on helper among the sick. In adulthood, she formed a literary alliance with spouse Henry Seidel Canby, Yale professor, editor and critic. A published poet (the volume High Mowing and poems published in Scribner’s, The Yale Review, and The New Yorker) Marion Gause Canby conducted the Children’s Bookshop department of the Saturday Review of Literature. She came from a philanthropic and noted Wilmington family, but managed to surmount expectations placed on women of the period by wielding her own passion and creativity.

Copyright:

Attribution Non-Commercial (BY-NC)
Download as DOC, PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
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109 views1 page

Sonnet: The Death of The Debutante in The New Century

Original Title:

SONNET: THE DEATH OF THE DEBUTANTE IN THE NEW CENTURY

Uploaded by

DLGuerra

Description:

At the turn of the last century (termed The New Century), sex and social position constrained young girls. A child in Victorian-era Wilmington, Delaware, Marion Gause Canby defied expectations when tragedy and opportunity presented themselves. An older brother Harry Courtland Gause died of appendicitis at Yale University, a few days past Christmas, 1899. The pre-teen-aged Marion founded, in his memory, a primary fund-raising children’s medical charity (later to become the Junior Board of the Delaware Hospital). She was a hands-on helper among the sick. In adulthood, she formed a literary alliance with spouse Henry Seidel Canby, Yale professor, editor and critic. A published poet (the volume High Mowing and poems published in Scribner’s, The Yale Review, and The New Yorker) Marion Gause Canby conducted the Children’s Bookshop department of the Saturday Review of Literature. She came from a philanthropic and noted Wilmington family, but managed to surmount expectations placed on women of the period by wielding her own passion and creativity.

Copyright:

Attribution Non-Commercial (BY-NC)
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Gause Family Vault and Grave Marker Commemorating a Young Girls Brother-Wilmington, Delaware

SONNET: DEATH OF THE DEBUTANTE IN THE NEW CENTURY

by D. L. Guerra
2009 All Rights Reserved

Death came to him. The debutante in her


Bent from oblivious joy. Post-Christmas strike
Gouged childhood, compelled her to inter,
With brothers bones, paternal hopes alike.

For Courtlands parents, too, had set some course.


His ended where their own commenced, at Yale:
A tragedy at twenty-three; remorse
For her contained at ten. How dare she fail

To gather friends, oneself, round charity


The room, a childrens ward but in an age
When lagging Science fought mortality,
Organs withered without bacteriophage?

An act of will propelled Marion through pain,


Owned or shared, to art and life again.

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