Christine Teale Howes collection, 1979–1995
Collection Scope and Content
This collection includes Howes’ resume, some correspondence, one interview with the York County Coast Star, several chapbooks, and early drafts. Also included is the sheet music accompanying her compositions, “Changing Perceptions” and “Epitaph.”
Biographical/Historical Note
Christine Teale Howes was born in Granby, Connecticut, on June 12, 1927, to Arthur and Lillian Teale. Christine began writing at the age of nine, and devoted much time to the study of poetry. She attended Syracuse University in New York as a creative writing major, and graduated cum laude in 1949. She married Robert M. Howes, a minister of Kennebunkport, Maine’s South Congregational Church. The couple had six children.
Christine attended the Breadloaf Writers’ Conference at Middlebury College, as well as a writing course through Radcliffe College’s continuing education program. Two of her poems were included in the 1979 SPECTRA I Anthology, published by Westbrook College and The Maine Association of Women in Fine and Performing Arts. Christine was very active in community leadership roles, as well as various arts organizations. She taught English composition for a time at University of New England, and has lectured widely, including at Bowdoin and Westbrook College. She has also done several poetry readings, including at the Soirée de Poésie in Quebec and at Mansfield College, Oxford.
Christine’s work is characterized by her adherence to traditional forms and is influenced by Edna St. Vincent Millay, D.H. Lawrence, Dylan Thomas, Amy Lowell, and Wallace Stevens. She is also very inspired by art, and collaborated with an artist friend on “Uncommon Denominators,” a project that includes a video and a book, in 1993. “Ambage,” a biographical tribute to her late father, is a series of 24 poems composed to fit the structures of old Welsh poetry. Her poem “Epitaph” was chosen by the Choral Arts Society of Maine to be set to music. The piece was performed in March 1995 at the Cathedral Church of St. Luke’s in Portland, Maine.