Easy Poet Costume Ideas
Whether you're heading to a party with a literary theme or simply trying to impress an English teacher this Halloween, here are a few inexpensive costume ideas worth trying on.
Though Emily Dickinson published fewer than a dozen poems over the course of her reclusive lifetime, she was an avid reader and writer, penning nearly 1,800 poems in her uniquely American style.
You Will Need
An old-school nightgown or simple white cotton dress
A ribbon
Hair pulled back in a modest bun
A fascicle (a small bundle of folded poems)
Extra Credit
Hand out plastic flies while reciting the immortal line: "I heard a Fly buzz—when I died..."
One of the originators of both horror and detective fiction, Edgar Allan Poe gave the American Romantic movement a morbid twist.
You Will Need
A moustache
A bowtie
A velvet blazer
A touch of eyeshadow
Dishevelled hair
Extra Credit
The raven which quoth "Nevermore!"
Also a practicing physician, William Carlos Williams sought to invent an entirely fresh—and singularly American—poetics, whose subject matter was centered on the everyday circumstances of life and the lives of common people.
You Will Need
A stethoscope
Medical gloves
Glasses
Brushed-back hair
Extra Credit
A bowl of plums
Among the most influential poets in the American canon, Walt Whitman is often called the father of free verse. His major work, Leaves of Grass, aimed to reflect the experiences of everyday Americans.
You Will Need
A beard
A simple collared shirt
Rustic pants
A floppy brown hat
Extra Credit
Roll in the grass to complete the look: when someone asks what that is stuck to your shirt, you can reply as Whitman does in "A child said, What is the grass?"
Called "the tenth Muse" by Plato, Sappho either invented or refined the meter of her day, now known as "Sapphic" meter.
You Will Need
A toga
A lyre
Extra Credit
Recite fragments of poems from memory, as in ancient times: "I feel that / death has come near me."
Hand out chocolate Sapphic coins.
Happy Halloween!