The Walt Whitman Archive
Life & Letters
Correspondence
About this Item
Title: Walt Whitman to the Editor of the Critic, 17 June 1886
Date: June 17, 1886
Whitman Archive ID: loc.05961
Source: The Charles E. Feinberg Collection of the Papers of Walt
Whitman, 1839–1919, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C. 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 derived from Walt Whitman, The Correspondence, ed. Edwin Haviland Miller, 6 vols. (New York: New York University Press, 1961–1977), and supplemented, updated, or created by Whitman Archive staff as appropriate.
Editorial note: The annotation, "See Critic Lounger July 3," is in an unknown hand.
Contributors to digital file: Stefan Schöberlein, Kyle Barton, and Nicole Gray
 image 1 |  image 2 |
Camden N J
June 17 '86
Dear Sir
I send you this note just rec'd—as you might possibly care to make an item from it—Please return it to me1
Walt Whitman
SCAMMEL BROTHERS,
29 BEAVER STREET,
NEW YORK.
MAGEE BLOCK, WATER ST.,
SAINT. JOHN, N.B.
New York, June 14th
1886
Walt Whitman Esq
Dear Sir
Trusting that the intelligence conveyed will plead for my presumption, I venture
to enclose you a few lines. At a sale of Autographs & Books a few days ago
the following prices were obtained.
"Autograph letter, Whitman, Walt, Poet," $80.00
Leaves of Grass 1st Edition 10.00
Which prices were the highest paid for any similar lots. Thinking you might not
get the above information, I venture to enclose it.
with best wishes
Yours Truly
W. I. Whiting
Correspondent:
The editor of the Critic in 1886 was Jeannette Gilder (1849–1916),
who wrote that "one of the things of which I am most proud is that the Critic was the first publication of its class to invite
Walt Whitman to contribute to its pages" (see Charles N. Elliot, Walt Whitman as Man, Poet, and Friend [1915], 97); she
was assisted in her editorial tasks by her brother Joseph. For more information,
see Susan L. Roberson, "Gilder, Jeannette L. (1849–1916)," Walt Whitman: An Encyclopedia, ed. J.R. LeMaster and
Donald D. Kummings (New York: Garland Publishing, 1998).
Notes:
1. This note to The Critic was written on the verso of a letter from W. I. Whiting to Whitman on June 14. The magazine printed a notice of the sale on July 3. [back]