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Walt Whitman to Roden Noel, 3 May 1886

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Yours of April 22 just rec'd​ —The book has never reached me—I have nothing to do with Houghton, Mifflin & Co:—Of course should be glad to get & read the book, or any of your writings—I am living here well cared for, but paralyzed in body, & quite unable to walk around.—Glad to hear from you, & would send you my writings, gladly.

Walt Whitman  loc.02906.001.jpg

Correspondent:
Roden Noel (1834–1894) was an English poet. Noel came from an aristocratic English family, and in his youth developed socialist sympathies. He was a close friend of the poet and influential critic Robert Buchanan, and it may have been through Buchanan that Noel first encountered Leaves of Grass in 1871 (the same year that he first wrote to Whitman). In 1871, Noel published an essay entitled "A Study of Walt Whitman" in The Dark Blue (Harold Blodgett, Walt Whitman in England [Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1934], 147–149).


Notes

  • 1. This postal card is addressed: Roden Noel | 57 Anesley Park | London s e | England. It is postmarked: CAMDEN | MAY | [illegible] | 3 PM | 1886 | N.J. [back]
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