“Here is the difference between Dante, Milton, and me. They wrote about hell and never saw the place. I wrote about Chicago after looking the town over for years and years.”

American poet, biographer, journalist, and editor

Carl Sandburg was an American poet, biographer, journalist, and editor, active in the 20th century, 1878 to 1967. He is remembered for his poetry and for his biography of Abraham Lincoln. During his lifetime, Sandburg was widely seen as a major figure in modern literature. He won three Pulitzer Prizes, two for poetry and one for his Lincoln biography, and his reputation rested in part on books such as Chicago Poems, Cornhuskers, and Smoke and Steel. His work was often praised for its broad connection to American life.