E. E. Cummings wrote approximately 2,900 poems, two autobiographical novels, four plays and several essays.
Cummings was born in Massachusetts, on October 14th, 1894. He began writing poems by the age of ten. Cummings learned Latin and Greek at the Cambridge Latin High School.
His experiments with form, punctuation, spelling, and syntax resulted in the creation of ground-breaking poetry. In 1917, his poetry appeared in the anthology titled ‘Eight Harvard Poets’. His poems, seven in all, were published by The Dial, a journal. ‘Buffalo Bill’s’ was one of these poems. Cummings wrote 12 volumes of verse in his lifetime. ‘Complete Poems’ published in 1968 is a collection of these poems in two volumes. Cummings, along with his friend, served as a volunteer ambulance driver in France during World War I. However, the French authorities thought he was a spy and held him in a prison camp.
Later, these charges were found to be baseless, and the poet was released. Cummings passed away on September 3rd, 1962.
He is remembered as an eminent poet of 20th century English literature. In the US, his poems were second only to Robert Frost’s, in popularity.