Sidney Lanier served as a soldier for the Confederacy during the Civil War. After his death his work was elevated and showcased largely through the efforts of the United Daughters of the Confederacy who fought to make his writings part of the curriculum in Southern schools. Students were given assignments to memorize and recite large portions of his poems. This was part of a concerted effort to skew all public school curriculum towards a positive view of the Southern side of Civil War history.

There are entire chapters of the UDC that are named after Lanier. The group even went so far as to write a cookbook with Lanier’s name on it titled, “Sidney’s Potboilers: Recipes of the Sidney Lanier Chapter #25 UDC.”

During his short life Sidney Lanier wrote poetry and one pre-war plantation novel in which he depicted the South prior to the Civil War as a kind of chivalrous kingdom that was the epitome of gentility. This kingdom was populated by chivalrous men and delicate damsels pursuing agrarian, intellectual and romantic endeavors. Critics grade his work and legacy as that of a minor poet with a few notable exceptions. Lanier's prewar Southern novel, “Tiger-Lillies” is emblematic of a skewed view of life in the pre-Civil War South. Southern plantations may indeed have kept up an appearance of gentility and civility for their visitors but the wealth creating these circumstances was built upon the back breaking labor of unpaid enslaved people, who were routinely mistreated and abused emotionally and physically through lashings and rape. 

These people could be ripped away from their families without notice and they had no choice in supporting the idyllic lifestyles described in the works of Confederate loyalists like Sidney Lanier. There are entire chapters of the UDC that is named after Lanier. The group even went so far as to write a cookbook with Lanier’s name on it titled, “Sidney’s Potboilers: Recipes of the Sidney Lanier Chapter #25 UDC.”