Walt Whitman to Richard Maurice Bucke, 20 November 1890
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Camden1
Evn'g Nov. 20 '90
Cool2 weather—I went out at 12 in wheel chair,3 but was driven back by snow & wind squall—sun out since—the worst of belly ache over, but just a reminder sometimes—Everything as well as could be expected I guess.
Walt Whitman
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Correspondent:
Richard Maurice Bucke (1837–1902) was a
Canadian physician and psychiatrist who grew close to Whitman after reading Leaves of Grass in 1867 (and later memorizing it) and
meeting the poet in Camden a decade later. Even before meeting Whitman, Bucke
claimed in 1872 that a reading of Leaves of Grass led him
to experience "cosmic consciousness" and an overwhelming sense of epiphany.
Bucke became the poet's first biographer with Walt
Whitman (Philadelphia: David McKay, 1883), and he later served as one
of his medical advisors and literary executors. For more on the relationship of
Bucke and Whitman, see Howard Nelson, "Bucke, Richard Maurice," Walt Whitman: An
Encyclopedia, ed. J.R. LeMaster and Donald D. Kummings (New York:
Garland Publishing, 1998).
Notes
- 1. This postal card included a printed address for the intended recipient: S. P. Wharton, who lived at or had a business at 910 Clinton St. in Philadelphia. Whitman drew a line in pen through each line of Wharton's address, and wrote Bucke's address. This postal card is addressed: Dr Bucke | Asylum | London Ontario | Canada. It is postmarked: Camden, N.J. | Nov 20 | 8 PM | 90; London | PM | No 22 | 9 | Canada. [back]
- 2. Whitman wrote this note to Bucke on a postal card that was used for ordering tickets to a series of lectures by John Fiske. Whitman drew lines in pen through the printed information about Fiske's lectures and wrote his message to Bucke on the card. [back]
- 3. Horace Traubel and Ed Wilkins, Whitman's nurse, went to Philadelphia to purchase a wheeled chair for the poet that would allow him to be "pull'd or push'd" outdoors. See Whitman's letter to William Sloane Kennedy of May 8, 1889. [back]