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William Sloane Kennedy to Walt Whitman, 17 October 1890

About This Item

  • Title: William Sloane Kennedy to Walt Whitman, 17 October 1890
  • Date: October 17, 1890
  • Creator(s): William Sloane Kennedy
  • Whitman Archive ID: loc.03081
  • 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.
  • Contributors to digital file: Andrew David King Cristin Noonan Stephanie Blalock
  • Cite this page: Kennedy, William Sloane. "William Sloane Kennedy to Walt Whitman, 17 October 1890." The Walt Whitman Archive. Gen. ed. Matt Cohen, Ed Folsom, & Kenneth M. Price. Accessed 11 September 2024. <http://www.whitmanarchive.org>.
  • Source File: loc.03081.xml (TEI)
 loc.03081.002_large.jpg Dear Friend:1

Yrs w. enclosures.2 Tell Traubel3 that our exch editor clipped notice of the Ingersoll4 lecture.5 It came to me in proof (a few lines) & I added that the reference of the lecture wd be to W.W.'s works. It will be a tremendous blow to the anti-Whitmanites—the anti-naturalists, the Christians & ascetics, I feel sure. Glad to see that [illegible] Dr. B.6 is not the worse for his acci—but stop! I see by the date of yr. enclosed letters Sept. 9 that he was not then thrown out. I do hope the dear good fellow is not shocked in any way by it. Am plodding on; writing a good many little editorial bits of late, am overworked all the time, & don't feel very bright in consequence. But howsoever forge ahead! Am going to see Soudan & Verestchagin7 again.

W.S.K.

I have an editorial coming on O'Connor's8 Rock Me to Sleep expose,9 and another on Incineration.10

 loc.03081.001_large.jpg see Oct. 20, '90

Correspondent:
William Sloane Kennedy (1850–1929) was on the staff of the Philadelphia American and the Boston Transcript; he also published biographies of Longfellow, Holmes, and Whittier (Dictionary of American Biography [New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1933], 336–337). Apparently Kennedy called on the poet for the first time on November 21, 1880 (William Sloane Kennedy, Reminiscences of Walt Whitman [London: Alexander Gardener, 1896], 1). Though Kennedy was to become a fierce defender of Whitman, in his first published article he admitted reservations about the "coarse indecencies of language" and protested that Whitman's ideal of democracy was "too coarse and crude"; see The Californian, 3 (February 1881), 149–158. For more about Kennedy, see Katherine Reagan, "Kennedy, William Sloane (1850–1929)," Walt Whitman: An Encyclopedia, ed. J.R. LeMaster and Donald D. Kummings (New York: Garland Publishing, 1998).

Notes

  • 1. This letter is addressed: Walt Whitman | Camden | New Jersey. It is postmarked: CAMDEN, N.J. | OCT | 18 | 9 AM | 1890 | REC'D; BOSTON, MASS. | OCT 17 | 2-30 PM | 1890. [back]
  • 2. It is uncertain which letter is being referred to here. [back]
  • 3. 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]
  • 4. Robert "Bob" Green Ingersoll (1833–1899) was a Civil War veteran and an orator of the post-Civil War era, known for his support of agnosticism. Ingersoll was a friend of Whitman, who considered Ingersoll the greatest orator of his time. Whitman said to Horace Traubel, "It should not be surprising that I am drawn to Ingersoll, for he is Leaves of Grass. He lives, embodies, the individuality I preach. I see in Bob the noblest specimen—American-flavored—pure out of the soil, spreading, giving, demanding light" (Traubel, With Walt Whitman in Camden, Wednesday, March 25, 1891). The feeling was mutual. Upon Whitman's death in 1892, Ingersoll delivered the eulogy at the poet's funeral. The eulogy was published to great acclaim and is considered a classic panegyric (see Phyllis Theroux, The Book of Eulogies [New York: Simon & Schuster, 1997], 30). [back]
  • 5. On October 21, 1890, at Horticultural Hall in Philadelphia, Robert Ingersoll delivered a lecture in honor of Walt Whitman titled Liberty in Literature. Testimonial to Walt Whitman. Whitman recorded in his Commonplace Book that the lecture was "a noble, (very eulogistic to WW & L of G) eloquent speech, well responded to by the audience," and the speech itself was published in New York by the Truth Seeker Company in 1890 (Whitman's Commonplace Book [Charles E. Feinberg Collection of the Papers of Walt Whitman, 1839–1919, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.]). [back]
  • 6. 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). [back]
  • 7. Vasily Vasilyevich Vereshchagin (1842–1904) was a Russian realist artist who gained international fame. He traveled and lived in countries around the world and exhibited his paintings widely in Europe. [back]
  • 8. William Douglas O'Connor (1832–1889) was the author of the grand and grandiloquent Whitman pamphlet The Good Gray Poet: A Vindication, published in 1866. For more on Whitman's relationship with O'Connor, see Deshae E. Lott, "O'Connor, William Douglas (1832–1889)," Walt Whitman: An Encyclopedia, ed. J.R. LeMaster and Donald D. Kummings (New York: Garland Publishing, 1998). [back]
  • 9. O'Connor had written an article, "Who Wrote 'Rock Me to Sleep'?," on the authorship of Elizabeth Allen's (1832–1911) poem, "Rock Me to Sleep." In 1867, there was considerable controversy over the authorship of the poem when New Jersey legislator Alexander M. W. Ball (1818–1878) claimed to have written Allen's poem, which she had published under the pen name Florence Percy. O'Connor's work challenged Ball's claims, recognizing Allen's authorship. [back]
  • 10. Incineration as a method of waste disposal became controversial in the U.S. in the late 1880s after the first giant incinerator was build in New York City. [back]
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