Allen Tate

Allen Tate (1899-1979), American poet and literary critic, one of the young writers at Vanderbilt University in the 1920s who called themselves the “Fugitives.” Born in Winchester, Kentucky, Tate enrolled at Vanderbilt in 1918. He and his roommate, the future poet and novelist Robert Penn Warren, were invited to join the Fugitives, a group of young Southern poets headed by John Crowe Ransom that advocated the traditional agrarian values of the South. After graduating, Tate continued his association with the group, contributing to the magazine The Fugitive (1922-1925) and to the volume of essays I'll Take My Stand (1930), both of which conveyed the group's views opposing the industrialization of the South. During this period Tate's best-known poem, “Ode to the Confederate Dead” (1928), was published.

Beginning in the 1930s Tate taught at various American universities and became involved in the New Criticism, a literary movement characterized by its attention to textual detail (see Criticism, Literary). Tate served as the editor of the literary journal The Sewanee Review from 1944 to 1946, helping to establish the journal's widespread influence. In 1950 he converted to Roman Catholicism (see Roman Catholic Church), reflecting an interest in religion already evident in his literary work. Tate's concern with the relation between past and present is also evident in his writing. His volumes of poetry include Mr. Pope and Other Poems (1928), Poems: 1928-1931 (1932), and The Mediterranean and Other Poems (1936). Tate also wrote the biographies Stonewall Jackson (1928) and Jefferson Davis (1929) and the novel The Fathers (1938). Many of his critical works were collected in Essays of Four Decades (1969). His Collected Poems: 1919-1976 was published in 1977.