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Walt Whitman to John Burroughs, 26 November 1880

About This Item

  • Title: Walt Whitman to John Burroughs, 26 November 1880
  • Date: November 26, 1880
  • Creator(s): Walt Whitman
  • Whitman Archive ID: med.00688
  • Source: The location of this manuscript is unknown. The transcription presented here is derived from Walt Whitman, The Correspondence, ed. Edwin Haviland Miller (New York: New York University Press, 1964), 198. For a description of the editorial rationale behind our treatment of the correspondence, see our statement of editorial policy.
  • Contributors to digital file: Alicia Bones Anthony Dreesen Grace Thomas Kevin McMullen Kirsten Clawson Nicole Gray
  • Cite this page: Whitman, Walt. "Walt Whitman to John Burroughs, 26 November 1880." The Walt Whitman Archive. Gen. ed. Matt Cohen, Ed Folsom, & Kenneth M. Price. Accessed 24 April 2024. <http://www.whitmanarchive.org>.
  • Source File: med.00688.xml (TEI)
431 Stevens Street Camden New Jersey Nov​ 26 '80 p m Dear John

What could you do, towards helping me in the matter by these two pages?—badly copied, but I can't write them out—I have sent duplicates of the two pp to Watson Gilder1 & said I requested you to see him soon as convenient.

I am ab't​ as usual, except the locomotion business is worse, making a bad drawback, rendering me indeed at times practically helpless. I rec'd​ your letter—I thought Stedman's article full as good as could be expected2—Marvin call'd here yesterday, but I was absent & didn't see him—

Walt

Notes

  • 1. For images and a transcription of these pages, see Whitman's letter to Richard Watson Gilder of November 26, 1880. [back]
  • 2. Burroughs on November 2, 1880, informed Whitman of Stedman's difficulties in getting his article printed in Scribner's Monthly over the objections of Holland, the editor, and observed: "The article is candid & respectful & that is all we can ask. . . . it seems to me that the adverse criticisms in the paper are all weak & ineffectual, & that he is truly at home only when he is appreciative. How gingerly he does walk at times to be sure, as if he feared the ground underfoot was mined" (T.E. Hanley Collection, University of Texas). Interestingly, Whitman did not comment on the following passage in Burroughs's letter: "Dr Bucke is a good fellow, but between me & you, I am a little shy of him: I fear he lacks balance & proportion & that his book will not be pitched in the right key. But I hope I do him injustice." [back]
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