Walt Whitman to Jeannette L. Gilder, 27 May [1884]

About This Item

Title: Walt Whitman to Jeannette L. Gilder, 27 May [1884]
Date: May 27, 1884
Creator(s): Walt Whitman
Whitman Archive ID: tex.00443
Source: The Walt Whitman Collection, Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center, The University of Texas at Austin. The transcription presented here is derived from Walt Whitman, The Correspondence, ed. Edwin Haviland Miller (New York: New York University Press, 1961–1977), 370. For a description of the editorial rationale behind our treatment of the correspondence, see our statement of editorial policy.
Contributors to digital file: Stefan Schöberlein Kyle Barton Kevin McMullen
Cite this page: Whitman, Walt. "Walt Whitman to Jeannette L. Gilder, 27 May [1884]." The Walt Whitman Archive. Gen. ed. Matt Cohen, Ed Folsom, & Kenneth M. Price. Accessed 09 May 2025. <http://www.whitmanarchive.org>.
Source File: tex.00443.xml (TEI)

Private 328 Mickle st Camden May 27 My dear friend

If convenient & you can print the following, just as it is,1 put in & oblige your friend

Walt Whitman

Correspondent:
Jeannette Leonard Gilder (1849–1916) helped her brother, Richard Watson Gilder (1844–1909), edit Scribner's Monthly and then, with another brother, Joseph Benson Gilder (1858–1936), co-edited the Critic (which she co-founded in 1881). For more, 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. The Critic printed on May 31 "A Fabulous Episode," in which Whitman, writing in the third person, repudiated an anecdote related by James Berry Bensel in the Lynn Saturday Union of May 24: when Whitman allegedly asked Longfellow for permission to dedicate to him the first edition of Leaves of Grass, the latter was ready to consent if certain passages were excised. The notice in the Lynn newspaper was sent to Whitman by S. W. Foss on May 26, 1884. [back]