Robert Montgomery Bird

Mike Wilson (Appalachian State University)

The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 3.2.2: American (US) Writing and Culture: The Nineteenth Century, 1783-1900.
Vol. editors: J. Michael Duvall (College of Charleston), Emory Elliott (University of California, Riverside), Stephen E. Meats (Pittsburg State University), Tony Papanikolas (San Jose State University)

Dates

Born 5 Feb 1806
Died 23 Jan 1854
Activity 1826-1854

Places

Born in United States
Active in United States

Activities

Primary

Novelist
Playwright / Dramatist

Resources

Bird's Works

Save to Bookshelf

Robert Montgomery Bird came to prominence as an American dramatist and novelist during the 1830s, and his career as a creative writer more or less begins and ends with the boundaries of that decade. His plays met with popular and critical acclaim, and after he turned from plays to novels in 1837, his South American historical romances were praised by Edgar Allen Poe among other reviewers. Bird’s contemporaries viewed him as a significant literary figure, but this view of his literary importance has not lasted. Nonetheless, his work retains historical significance despite his almost complete neglect by modern readers: he offers close and perceptive depictions of both the American cultural and physical landscape of the 1830s. Bird was also a gifted watercolour artist, and produced a…

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2008 words

Citation: Wilson, Mike. "Robert Montgomery Bird". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 02 November 2006 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/speople.php?rec=true&UID=415, accessed 27 November 2024.]