V. Literature of the Gilded Age- Poetry

• American Poetry in 19th C

• Walt Whitman

• Emily Dickinson

19th Century Poetry

• Europe as role model

• William Cullen Bryant– “Thanatopsis”

• Henry W. Longfellow– The Song of Hiawatha (Kalevala)– ”Paul Revere's Ride”

• Edgar A. Poe

”Paul Revere’s Ride”Listen my children and you shall hearOf the midnight ride of Paul Revere,On the eighteenth of April, in Seventy-five;Hardly a man is now aliveWho remembers that famous day and year.

He said to his friend, "If the British marchBy land or sea from the town to-night,Hang a lantern aloft in the belfry archOf the North Church tower as a signal light,--One if by land, and two if by sea;And I on the opposite shore will be,Ready to ride and spread the alarmThrough every Middlesex village and farm,For the country folk to be up and to arm."

19th Century Poetry

• Emerson on poetry & America:

"America is a poem in our eyes; its ample geography dazzles the imagination, and it will not wait long for metres."

Walt Whitman

• Leaves of Grass (1855)

• Develops free verse

• Emerson’s voice is found

Walt Whitman

• Born New York (1819)

• Printer, editor, carpenter, school teacher

• Travel thru US• Publishes Leaves of

Grass (1855)

Walt Whitman

• Enlists Emerson’s aid in publishing

• Wound dresser in Washington, DC during Civil War

• Govt jobs from 1865-73

• Publishes 9 editions of Leaves of Grass

• Dies in 1892

The Good Gray Poet

• Singing• Vitality• Self• America• Democracy• Physicality• Mystical• Transcendental• Innovation

”Song of Myself”

I CELEBRATE myself; And what I assume you shall assume; For every atom belonging to me, as good belongs to you.

I loafe and invite my Soul; I lean and loafe at my ease, observing a spear of summer grass.

”Song of Myself”

Houses and rooms are full of perfumes—the shelves are crowded with perfumes; I breathe the fragrance myself, and know it and like it; The distillation would intoxicate me also, but I shall not

let it.

The atmosphere is not a perfume—it has no taste of the distillation—it is odorless;

It is for my mouth forever—I am in love with it; I will go to the bank by the wood, and become undisguised and naked; I am mad for it to be in contact with me.

Beat! Beat! Drums!

BEAT! beat! drums!—Blow! bugles! blow! Through the windows—through doors—burst like a ruthless force, Into the solemn church, and scatter the congregation; Into the school where the scholar is studying; Leave not the bridegroom quiet—no happiness must he

have now with his bride; Nor the peaceful farmer any peace, plowing his field or

gathering his grain; So fierce you whirr and pound, you drums—so shrill you

bugles blow.

WHEN lilacs last in the door-yard bloom’d, And the great star early droop’d in the western sky in the night, I mourn’d—and yet shall mourn with ever-

returning spring. O ever-returning spring! trinity sure to me

you bring; Lilac blooming perennial, and drooping star

in the west, And thought of him I love.

Emily Dickinson

• Other major poetic voice

• Distinctly different from Whitman

Whitman - Dickinson

• Well-known• Exhuberant• National and social

concerns• Yankee

– Innovative

• Reclusive• Reserved• Private

• Puritan background

– Innovative

Emily Dickinson

• Born Amherst, Mass (1830)

• After college, reclusive, ”eccentric” lifestyle

• Faith important, but doesn’t join church

• Never married• Own family important• Dies in 1886

Dickinson on poetry

”If I read a book and it makes my whole body so cold no fire can ever warm me, I know that is poetry. If I feel physically as if the top of my head were taken off, I know that is poetry. These are the only ways I know it. Is there any other way?”

I'm nobody! Who are you?Are you nobody, too?Then there's a pair of us--don't tell!They'd banish us, you know.

How dreary to be somebody!How public, like a frogTo tell your name the livelong dayTo an admiring bog!

After great pain a formal feeling comes--The nerves sit ceremonious like tombs;The stiff Heart questions--was it He that bore?And yesterday--or centuries before?

The feet, mechanical, go roundA wooden wayOf ground, or air, or ought,Regardless grown,A quartz contentment, like a stone.

This is the hour of leadRemembered if outlived,As freezing persons recollect the snow--First chill, then stupor, then the letting go.

I like a look of Agony,Because I know it's true --Men do not sham Convulsion,Nor simulate, a Throe --

The Eyes glaze once -- and that is Death -Impossible to feignThe Beads upon the ForeheadBy homely Anguish strung.

A narrow Fellow in the GrassOccasionally rides--You may have met Him--did you notHis notice sudden is--

The Grass divides as with a Comb--A spotted shaft is seen--And then it closes at your feetAnd opens further on--

He likes a Boggy AcreA Floor too cool for Corn--Yet when a Boy, and Barefoot--I more than once at Noon

Have passed, I thought, a Whip lashUnbraiding in the SunWhen stooping to secure itIt wrinkled, and was gone--

Several of Nature's PeopleI know, and they know me--I feel for them a transportOf cordiality--

But never met this FellowAttended, or aloneWithout a tighter breathingAnd Zero at the Bone--

Because I could not stop for Death –

He kindly stopped for me –

The Carriage held but just Ourselves –

And Immortality.

We slowly drove –

He knew no haste

And I had put away My labor and my leisure too,

For His Civility --

We passed the School, where Children strove

At Recess -- in the Ring –

We passed the Fields of Gazing Grain –

We passed the Setting Sun –

Or rather -- He passed Us –

The Dews drew quivering and chill –

For only Gossamer, my Gown –

My Tippet -- only Tulle --

We paused before a House that seemed

A Swelling of the Ground –

The Roof was scarcely visible –

The Cornice -- in the Ground –

Since then -- 'tis Centuries -- and yet

Feels shorter than the Day

I first surmised the Horses' Heads

Were toward Eternity --

My life closed twice before its close --It yet remains to seeIf Immortality unveilA third event to me

So huge, so hopeless to conceiveAs these that twice befell.Parting is all we know of heaven,And all we need of hell.

Dickinson - themes

• Death

• Religion

• Nature

• Pain

• Love

Next week

• Mark Twain