S. Eliot or other modernist poets may help one to appreciate his poems, but often only basic knowledge is needed. The poem creates its own world. For example, a knowledge of Stonewall Jackson and of the battles at Shiloh, Antietam, Malvern Hill, and Bull Run is undoubtedly needed for a full understanding of "Ode to the Confederate Dead" and a comprehension of the key reference to "muted Zeno and Parmenides" may be crucial; yet the poem has meaning even for readers who lack knowledge of the particular historical facts. Indeed, the specific details of the poem are finally the vehicle for conveying a universal truth. One of Tate's strengths is, indeed, his bringing together of concrete particulars--often from Southern, classical, or Christian history--to elicit in the reader thought and feeling.
The son of John Orly and Eleanor Varnell Tate, John Orly Allen Tate was born in Winchester, Clark County, Kentucky, on 19 November 1899. With a Border background he had to face the question of whether he was a Southerner or an American. Affirming the first, he had to confront the dominant positivist and materialistic Yankee values which were supplanting the older values of the South.
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