Poem in sonnet form by American Jewish poet Emma Lazarus, written in 1883 as a donation to the
"Art and Loan Fund Exhibition in Aid of the Bartholdi Pedestal Fund for the Statue of Liberty",
an American fundraising effort for the pedestal on which the statue (a French gift) was to be placed.
In 1903, a plaque with the text of the poem was mounted inside the pedestal.
The "brazen giant of Greek fame" is the Colossus of Rhodes; the "twin cities" are New York City and
the City of Brooklyn (consolidated in 1898 to form the modern City of New York).
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