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Richard Maurice Bucke to Walt Whitman, 19 January 1880

About This Item

  • Title: Richard Maurice Bucke to Walt Whitman, 19 January 1880
  • Date: January 19, 1880
  • Creator(s): Richard Maurice Bucke
  • Whitman Archive ID: man.00002
  • Source: Charles Sixsmith Collection at the John Rylands Library, University of Manchester. Transcribed from digital images or a microfilm reproduction of the original item. For a description of the editorial rationale behind our treatment of the correspondence, see our statement of editorial policy.

    Notes for this letter were created by Whitman Archive staff and/or were derived from The Letters of Dr. Richard Maurice Bucke to Walt Whitman, ed. Artem Lozynsky (Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1977), and supplemented or updated by Whitman Archive staff.
  • Contributors to digital file: Alicia Bones Eder Jaramillo Grace Thomas Nicole Gray
  • Cite this page: Bucke, Richard Maurice. "Richard Maurice Bucke to Walt Whitman, 19 January 1880." The Walt Whitman Archive. Gen. ed. Matt Cohen, Ed Folsom, & Kenneth M. Price. Accessed 05 January 2025. <http://www.whitmanarchive.org>.
  • Source File: man.00002.xml (TEI)
 man_ej.00021_large.jpg Asylum for the Insane, London, Jan​ 19th 1880 My dear Walt

I am going to ask a great favor of you—I want you to write me a sketch of your interior life—especially in relation to the conception and elaboration of "Leaves of Grass" The germanancy and path of such a product as "Leaves of Grass" is a psycological expression almost unique in the history of the race and some record of it ought to remain if possible—I need not explain any further what I want from you for you will understand at once what I mean and you must surely have  man_ej.00022_large.jpgoften thought of putting it upon record1

I hope that you will take this matter into serious and favourable consideration

And I am Faithfully yours R M Bucke

Notes

  • 1. Apparently Whitman responded only by sending Bucke a list of materials to use in writing the biography (see the letter from Whitman to Bucke of February 3, 1880). [back]
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