Literary Gloucester, A Walking Tour

Gloucester is known as an endless source of fish tales, but it is also home to a vast literary landscape. Judith Sargent Murray, Kipling, Charles Olson, and many others are ready to be re-discovered on a free two-hour walking tour of Gloucester with noted raconteur Phil Storey. T.S. Eliot, often regarded as the most important poet writing in English in the 20th century, summered in Gloucester throughout his childhood. He bought a composition notebook at Proctor Brothers downtown, in which he wrote his early poems, including “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock.” Horror writer H.P. Lovecraft set a number of his weird tales in Gloucester such as “The Shadow Over Innsmouth” featuring the American Legion building on the tour. One of the best-selling American author of the 19th century, Elizabeth Stuart Phelps, summered in Gloucester most of her life. Sadly, she is largely forgotten now, but in her time she was so popular she attracted other creatives to the area, including Longfellow, whom she brought to Norman’s Woe, a rocky outcropping which inspired “The Wreck of the Hesperus.” Delve into Gloucester’s literary history on this fascinating tour.