Joel Chandler Harris, who furnished an introduction to the book, said that, as far as he knew, this volume was the first of American anthologies devoted wholly to verse produced by southern writers.
Brought up in a library and carefully taught by her mother, Mary Ellis (West) Clarke, Jennie was twice graduated with the highest honors; first, by a female college in Georgia and afterwards (in 1889), by the University of Nashville.
Her extraordinary memory seemed to contain a whole library, and every line of Virgil or Horace recalled to her a wealth of illustrations from ancient and modern English poets.
Choice Selections from Southern Poets from Colonial Times to the Present Day (Lippincott, 1896) was collected and edited by Clarke.
About 150 southern poets were represented by one or more poems,[3] including Poe, Piatt, Ryan, Welby, Lanier, Hayne, Harney, and various others.