Unquiet Heart: Poems for Marcia Lee Masters

In 1943, August Derleth met Marcia Lee Masters, the 34-year-old daughter of the great American poet Edgar Lee Masters, with whom Derleth had been acquainted since 1938. A friendship, then a romance, quickly evolved; and although newspaper reports announced the couple's engagement, the marriage never occurred. Nevertheless, Derleth wrote a large quantity of poems devoted to Marcia, including a full-length book manuscript that has never before been published in its original form. In these poems Derleth intertwines his affection for Marcia with evocations of the beauties of the natural landscape. His verse captures the essence of his temperament-always sensitive to the emotional overtones of both human love and the love of nature-with an intensity not often found in his prose fiction. This volume also includes the few surviving letters that Derleth wrote to Marcia during their brief involvement.