Cummings and Carl Sandburg are alike in respect to their biographies, however, very different in the writing techniques they employ. .
Cummings is a twentieth century poet, as is Sandburg. Both had their first books of poetry published near the 1920's (Cummings, with Tulips and Chimneys in 1923 and Sandburg with Chicago Poems in 1916). .
Cummings became very popular with his books, Tulips and Chimneys and The Enormous Room (1922). The Enormous Room is a witty account of his experiences in a French detention camp. This book contained Cummings first attempt of literary attacks on authoritarianism. Tulips and Chimneys was Cummings first book of poetry and it was extremely popular. .
Cummings was a poet who showed, through his writing, who his biggest influences were. Gertrude Stein's syntactical and Amy Lowell's imagistic experiments influenced Cummings greatly and are exceptionally clear in his writing. Cummings has a few trademark techniques which are apparent in all his poetry, in some way or another. Adverbs that function as nouns, lower case "i" instead of upper case "I", lyric form and simplistic views of the world are a few of his trademark techniques. Cummings has very unregulated structure to his poetry, in regards to his punctuation and form. He uses what appears to be random punctuation, although it always has a purpose. For example, in l(a, they is an open bracket in line one and a closed on in line six. Although these brackets appear to be useless, they actually enhance the thought of a twisting leaf. The structure of his poetry is also important. Although it is unregulated, it is very meaningful. l(a is written down the page, resembling the number one, further pressing upon the reader the thought of one and loneliness. To fully grasp any of Cummings work, you must look at the structure of his poems, the way in which they are written, as opposed to just the written words on the page.
