[London, Ont.,]
22 Jan [188]91
Well that wonderfull snowstorn did not amount to much after all, made very
indifferent sleighing and today the sun is out bright and warm and the snow is going
again as fast as it can. [—] Your good, heartily welcomed letter of 19th & 20th2 came to hand this forenoon, by the same mail came also
your bundle of "Critic" and "Press"3 also a bundle from
Horace;4 San Francisco "Bulletin"5 & "Poet Lore [.]"6 Many thanks to you and him for
all.7 Also just arrived from Brentano Bros "The
Century Guild Hobby Horse" with a lovely little 2 page piece on "November Boughs" by
Selwyn Image.8 So you see 'tout va bien" with my
collection which bids fair to be one day the envy of millionaires. The "Springfield
Rep.," I should say, came in Horaces bundle9 and I like
Sanborns10 criticism11
well—better than the critic piece which (to me) has a smack of unrealness,
want of sincerity (but perhaps I do the writer injustice).12 [—] Yes, dear Walt, you must be tired, horribly
tired, of that room of yours—I really think that when the warm spring days
come you must move downstairs and by means of some contrivance get into a suitable
carriage and have a look again at the grass and trees—if you are not worse
than at present if can be done and ought to be done, and if any thing will revive
you that will.—Yes I shall be right glad to see the big book13 in its permanent cover and shall depend on you for as early a
copy as possible. Nothing more definite about trip East, still hope to get off 4
Feb
Love to you R M Bucke
P.S.14 Thanks also for Ed. Carpenter's15 letter I was real glad to see it16
R M B.
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. The note "Ref to an
entry | of Jan—24 | 1889 | G[ertrude] T[raubel]," appears in the upper
right-hand corner of the first recto. The reference is to Horace Traubel, With Walt Whitman in Camden, Thursday, January 24, 1889. Also on the first recto, written in an
unidentified hand in the center of the top margin, is "To WW." [back]
- 2. See Whitman's letter to
Bucke of January 19–20, 1889. See also
Horace Traubel, With Walt Whitman in Camden, Friday, January 18, 1889, and Monday, February 18, 1889. [back]
- 3. Bart Bonsall described
his visit of January 7 or 8, 1889, to Whitman in a paragraph in the Philadelphia
Press (Horace Traubel, With Walt
Whitman in Camden, Thursday, January 10, 1889). [back]
- 4. Horace L. Traubel (1858–1919)
was an American essayist, poet, and magazine publisher. He is best remembered as
the literary executor, biographer, and self-fashioned "spirit child" of Walt
Whitman. During the late 1880s and until Whitman's death in 1892, Traubel visited
the poet virtually every day and took thorough notes of their conversations,
which he later transcribed and published in three large volumes entitled With Walt Whitman in Camden (1906, 1908, & 1914).
After his death, Traubel left behind enough manuscripts for six more volumes of
the series, the final two of which were published in 1996. For more on Traubel,
see Ed Folsom, "Traubel, Horace L. [1858–1919]," Walt
Whitman: An Encyclopedia, ed. J.R. LeMaster and Donald D. Kummings (New
York: Garland Publishing, 1998). [back]
- 5. The San Francisco Chronicle [January 13, 1887], not the Bulletin contained
a brief notice of November Boughs. Whitman commented:
"—a notice hardly of moment . . ." (Horace Traubel, With
Walt Whitman in Camden, Friday, January 18, 1889). For more information on November Boughs, see James E. Barcus, Jr. November Boughs," Walt
Whitman: An Encyclopedia, ed. J.R. LeMaster and Donald D. Kummings (New
York: Garland Publishing, 1998). [back]
- 6. A review of November Boughs appeared in Poet-Lore, 1 (March 1889), 145–47. [back]
- 7. This letter provides a
good illustration of Whitman's and Traubel's tenacity and thoroughness in
sending Bucke relevant material from periodicals. Eventually, Bucke had "over
two thousand newspaper cuttings, [and] nearly four hundred magazine articles" in
his Whitman collection (Letter from Richard Maurice Bucke to Charles N. Elliot
of June 10, 1897: Charles E. Feinberg Collection in the Library of
Congress). [back]
- 8. Selwyn Image's review of November Boughs appeared in The Century Guild Hobby Horse, 13 (January 1889),
37–39. [back]
- 9. A brief but favorable review of November
Boughs appeared in the Springfield Daily
Republican on December 25, 1888. Traubel sent Bucke a copy on January
7, 1889 (Horace Traubel, With Walt Whitman in Camden,
Monday, January 7, 1889). [back]
- 10. Franklin B. Sanborn
(1831–1917) was an abolitionist and a friend of John Brown. In 1860, when
he was tried in Boston because of his refusal to testify before a committee of
the U.S. Senate, Whitman was in the courtroom (Gay Wilson Allen, The Solitary Singer [New York: Macmillan, 1955], 242). He
reviewed Drum-Taps in the Boston
Commonwealth on February 24, 1866. He was editor of the Springfield
Republican from 1868 to 1872, and was the author of books dealing with
his friends Emerson, Thoreau, and Alcott. "A Visit to the Good Gray Poet"
appeared without Sanborn's name in the Springfield
Republican on April 19, 1876. For more on Sanborn, see Linda K. Walker,
"Sanborn, Franklin Benjamin (Frank) (1831–1917)," Walt Whitman: An Encyclopedia, ed. J.R. LeMaster and
Donald D. Kummings (New York: Garland Publishing, 1998). [back]
- 11. Bucke is referring to
Sanborn's [untitled] piece on Emerson and Whitman in the Springfield Daily Republican on January 1889 (See Henry S. Saunders,
comp., "Complete Index to the Conservator: Published
by Horace Traubel from March 1890 to June 1919," Manuscript held in the Charles
E. Feinberg Collection in the Library of Congress). [back]
- 12. See Horace Traubel,
With Walt Whitman in Camden, Thursday, January 24, 1889. [back]
- 13. Whitman often referred to Complete Poems & Prose (1888) as his "big book." The
volume was published by the poet himself in an arrangement with publisher David
McKay, who allowed Whitman to use the plates for both Leaves
of Grass and Specimen Days—in December
1888. With the help of Horace Traubel, Whitman made the presswork and binding
decisions, and Frederick Oldach bound the volume, which included a profile photo
of the poet on the title page. For more information on the book, see Ed Folsom,
Whitman Making Books/Books Making Whitman: A Catalog and
Commentary (University of Iowa: Obermann Center for Advanced Studies, 2005). [back]
- 14. The postscript is
written in the top left-hand corner of the left recto. [back]
- 15. Edward Carpenter (1844–1929) was an English
writer and Whitman disciple. Like many other young disillusioned Englishmen, he
deemed Whitman a prophetic spokesman of an ideal state cemented in the bonds of
brotherhood. Carpenter—a socialist philosopher who in his book Civilisation, Its Cause and Cure posited civilization as
a "disease" with a lifespan of approximately one thousand years before human
society cured itself—became an advocate for same-sex love and a
contributing early founder of Britain's Labour Party. On July 12, 1874, he wrote for the first time to Whitman: "Because you
have, as it were, given me a ground for the love of men I thank you continually
in my heart . . . . For you have made men to be not ashamed of the noblest
instinct of their nature." For further discussion of Carpenter, see Arnie
Kantrowitz, "Carpenter, Edward [1844–1929]," Walt Whitman:
An Encyclopedia, ed. J.R. LeMaster and Donald D. Kummings (New York:
Garland Publishing, 1998). [back]
- 16. In his letter of January 19–20, 1889, Whitman sent Bucke
Carpenter's letter of January 13, 1889. [back]