E. E. Cummings: E. E. Cummings A Life, by Susan Cheever, Pantheon, 1 edition (February 11, 2014), ISBN-13: 978-0307379979, 240 pages

 e. e. cummings, lower case, the way he would want it. Edward Estlin Cummings; Poet, painter, essayist, author, and playwright and for me, best described as an irreverent poet with an enigmatic style that made many contemporaries and critics feel his work was not complete or grammatically incorrect. Once called juvenile work, it is far from it. His constant experimentation with form, punctuation, grammar, spelling and syntax makes his works uniquely his own.

Edward Cummings grew up in Cambridge, MA as a son of a minister, and for the remainder of his life, a near puritan. Two degrees from Harvard, WW II ambulance driver, prison time in France, and three wives, the most famous was Marion Morehouse, the first supermodel. Liked the burlesque and bordellos scenes, yet remained celibate until in his twenties. The only place he wanted to be was Greenwich Village.

For the book itself I rank it 3 out of 5. This is a biography that follows Cummings through his entire life and the people in his life. It provides the reader with a syntopical understanding of the man without imbuing an opinion on the reader. I liked the length of the book, about an 8 hour read. I did like the fact that some of his work was interspersed throughout the book. The performance is good, although the narrator is a little slow for my liking. The book lives up to its subtitle “E. E. Cummings A Life” although not an overly exciting life still an interesting life of one of the eminent voices of 20th century literature with over 2500 poems, two novels, four plays as well as paintings and drawings to his credit.