Rollie McKenna

Rosalie Thorne “Rollie” McKenna (November 15, 1918 – June 14, 2003) was an American photographer. Writers photographed by McKenna include Sylvia Plath, Robert Frost, Dylan Thomas, and Truman Capote. McKenna had a long term friendship with Malcolm Brinnin, who helped her come in contact with many of the people she photographed. In addition to portraiture, McKenna also had an interest in architecture, particularly the architecture of Stonington, Connecticut.

Career

McKenna’s first bookish portrait was of Truman Capote, in Florence in 1950. Included among her subjects were W. H. Auden, T. S. Eliot, Edith Sitwell, Seamus Heaney, Sylvia Plath, Ted Hughes, John Minton, Ezra Pound, Robert Frost, Eleanor Roosevelt, Leonard Bernstein, the actor James Earl Jones and the United States poet laureate Richard Wilbur.