Agnes Blake Poor was an American writer and translator active during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Born in Bangor, Maine, to financial analyst Henry Varnum Poor and Mary Wild Pierce, she spent the majority of her life residing in Brookline, Massachusetts. Poor established a literary presence both through her original fiction and her pioneering efforts in translating South American poetry.\n\nWriting under the pseudonym Dorothy Prescott, Poor published short stories in various contemporary periodicals. One of her notable pieces, "A Little Fool," published in The Century in October 1896, generated significant public controversy. The story drew backlash from readers due to remarks made by the title character that were perceived as derogatory toward the neighborhood of South Boston.\n\nBeyond her fiction, Poor made significant contributions to the field of translation and language instruction. She taught Portuguese and is recognized as likely the first American to translate Brazilian poetry from Portuguese into English. Her major compilation, Pan American Poems (1918), featured her translations of Spanish and Portuguese works from South America, including poems by Antônio Gonçalves Dias, Bruno Seabra, and Francisco Manuel de Nascimento. For much of the early twentieth century, this volume stood as the only available collection of Portuguese translations of its kind.
