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Walt Whitman to Richard Maurice Bucke, 27 January 1889

About This Item

  • Title: Walt Whitman to Richard Maurice Bucke, 27 January 1889
  • Date: January 27, 1889
  • Creator(s): Walt Whitman
  • Whitman Archive ID: loc.07572
  • 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 created by Whitman Archive staff and/or were derived from Walt Whitman, The Correspondence, ed. Edwin Haviland Miller, 6 vols. (New York: New York University Press, 1961–1977), and supplemented or updated by Whitman Archive staff.
  • Contributors to digital file: Alex Ashland Breanna Himschoot Ashlyn Stewart Stephanie Blalock
  • Cite this page: Whitman, Walt. "Walt Whitman to Richard Maurice Bucke, 27 January 1889." The Walt Whitman Archive. Gen. ed. Matt Cohen, Ed Folsom, & Kenneth M. Price. Accessed 14 September 2024. <http://www.whitmanarchive.org>.
  • Source File: loc.07572.xml (TEI)
 loc_as.00163_large.jpg Camden1 4 PM Jan: 27 '89

Quiet & comfortable & ab't the same—y'rs came yesterday2—expect to see you now before long—have the letters come via Kennedy3—& the French magazine4 with Sarrazin's5 piece?6—Of the latter I wish you w'd give me the running am't in translation (no hurry)—Cloudy & rainy day—

Walt Whitman  loc_as.00162_large.jpg

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 is addressed: Dr R M Bucke | London Asylum | Ontario Canada. It is postmarked: Camden, N.J. | Jan 27 | 5 PM | 89. [back]
  • 2. See Richard Maurice Bucke's letter of January 26–27, 1889. [back]
  • 3. 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). [back]
  • 4. Whitman is referring to Gabriel Sarrazin's "Poetes modernes de l'Amerique, Walt Whitman," which appeared in La Nouvelle Revue, 52 (May 1, 1888), 164–184. Whitman also asked William Sloane Kennedy to make an abstract in English of it (see Whitman's letter to Kennedy of January 22, 1889. Sarrazin's piece is reprinted in an English translation by Harrison S. Morris in In Re (1893, pp. 159–194). [back]
  • 5. Gabriel Sarrazin (1853–1935) was a translator and poet from France who commented positively not only on Whitman's work but also on Poe's. Whitman later corresponded with Sarrazin and apparently liked the critic's work on Leaves of Grass—Whitman even had Sarrazin's chapter on his book translated twice. For more on Sarrazin, see Carmine Sarracino, "Sarrazin, Gabriel (1853–1935)," Walt Whitman: An Encyclopedia, ed. J.R. LeMaster and Donald D. Kummings (New York: Garland Publishing, 1998). [back]
  • 6. See Whitman's letter to Bucke and William Sloane Kennedy of January 22, 1889. [back]
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