Walt Whitman to Joseph M. Stoddart, 24 April 1890

About This Item

Title: Walt Whitman to Joseph M. Stoddart, 24 April 1890
Date: April 24, 1890
Creator(s): Walt Whitman
Whitman Archive ID: duk.00956
Source: Trent Collection of Whitmaniana, David M. Rubenstein Rare Book & Manuscript Library, Duke University. The transcription presented here is derived from Walt Whitman, The Correspondence, ed. Edwin Haviland Miller (New York: New York University Press, 1961–1977), 41. For a description of the editorial rationale behind our treatment of the correspondence, see our statement of editorial policy.
Contributors to digital file: Andrew David King Cristin Noonan Breanna Himschoot Stephanie Blalock
Cite this page: Whitman, Walt. "Walt Whitman to Joseph M. Stoddart, 24 April 1890." The Walt Whitman Archive. Gen. ed. Matt Cohen, Ed Folsom, & Kenneth M. Price. Accessed 09 May 2025. <http://www.whitmanarchive.org>.
Source File: duk.00956.xml (TEI)

328 Mickle street Camden New Jersey April 24 '90 My dear Stoddart1

Can you use this in the magazine? It is intended to make one page full & square—& I shall require to see a proof beforehand—(that is indispensable.) The price is $60 & a dozen copies of the magazine number. I reserve the right of printing in future book.

Respectfully &c: Walt Whitman

If necessary I will contract or expand it (in proof) to make the fair page—

Correspondent:
Joseph Marshall Stoddart (1845–1921) published Stoddart's Encyclopaedia America, established Stoddart's Review in 1880, which was merged with The American in 1882, and became the editor of Lippincott's Monthly Magazine in 1886. On January 11, 1882, Whitman received an invitation from Stoddart through J. E. Wainer, one of his associates, to dine with Oscar Wilde on January 14 (Clara Barrus, Whitman and Burroughs—Comrades [Boston, New York: Houghton Mifflin, 1931], 235n).

Notes

1. Joseph M. Stoddart (1845–1921) came to see Whitman on April 21, "inviting me to write for Lippincott's magazine" (Whitman's Commonplace Book, Charles E. Feinberg Collection of the Papers of Walt Whitman, 1839–1919, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.). Whitman sent "Old Age Echoes" "(4 pieces, 'sounds of winter,' 'the unexpress'd,' 'to the sunset-breeze' and 'after the argument')." On April 28 he agreed to Stoddart's request that the poems be printed separately (Whitman's Commonplace Book, Charles E. Feinberg Collection of the Papers of Walt Whitman, 1839–1919, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.), and on the following day, April 29, the editor paid Whitman $60. "Old-Age Echoes" was published in March, 1891; "To the Sun-Set Breeze" was in the December, 1890 issue; apparently "After the Argument" was not printed. [back]