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James Russell Lowell
Brahmin Poet, 1819-1891
"It is difficult to characterize this poet, or to do
justice to his work in its various departments. His prose lacks the charm of
Hawthorne and the neatness of
Holmes; in poetry he is not a Druid like
Bryant, nor a preacher like Whittier. The apparent ease of his verse has not
made him profuse. Nevertheless, any accusation of indolence or lack of moral
purpose seems unjust, when we remember that Mr. Lowell [was], for
forty years, critic, poet, teacher, editor, and man of affairs. It has been
said that he might have achieved greatness in any one of these lines if he
had shut himself up and given his mind to it; but such criticism is offset
by the fact that these partial successes have enriched the mass of people,
while consummate skill in one line would have satisfied only the critics. In
short, where other men of letters have represented this or that theory or
sentiment or 'section,' Mr. Lowell has been broadly American, and as long as
we are interesting to ourselves or to other nations his works will have
readers.
The pathos, the fun, the mimicry, the sensitiveness, the boastfulness, the
stern justice, the many-sided facility of our national character, find
alternate sympathy or criticism, but always a mirror, in Mr. Lowell's pages.
To our shame be it said that foreigners have sometimes understood and
appreciated him better than his own countrymen.
It has been urged that Mr. Lowell was born too late; that Boston, in the
year 1819, was already too far advanced to give the bracing atmosphere
necessary for his development. He had the misfortune, too, of being some
years younger than Tennyson, and of reading his English contemporary instead
of forming himself on classic models. Mr. Lowell has judged himself as
severely as his critics have done, has winnowed his early poems, and written
but sparingly in later years. The work of the law office opened by him in
1840, and very soon closed, was succeeded by labors equally exhausting
though more congenia1. In 1843, with Neal, Hawthorne, Poe, and Parsons for
helpers, he began the task of editing The Pioneer; but his literary
standard was high, and only three numbers were published. His first
collection of poems, A Year's Life (1841), was followed in 1844 by
The Legend of Brittany, Miscellaneous Poems and Sonnets. Already
Mr. Lowell had announced his anti-slavery views, and had allied himself with
Wendell Phillips and other agitators. A series of Conversations on the
Old Poets was the result of an attempt to interest the public in English
literature, but the criticism was very much hampered by the dialogue, and
the work was never popular. The Present Crisis, whose verses throb
with patriotism and with hatred of oppression, was printed in a volume of
poems in 1848. The Vision of Sir Launfal, A Fable for Critics,
and The Biglow Papers, appeared in the same year. The first of these
is the most sustained of the author's works, and contains exquisite
descriptions and poetical fancies; Fable for Critics comments
shrewdly on the literary characters of the day; the Biglow Papers is
a dramatic reproduction of thought and dialect in New England. The Mexican
War and the extension of slavery are the principal themes touched by its
keen satire.
In 1855, Mr. Lowell was appointed to succeed Mr. Longfellow in the
professorship of Polite Letters at Harvard. He accepted the position, and at
once went abroad for special study. After his return he seems to have
devoted himself very persistently to the duties of his chair. In 1867, the
second series of the Biglow Papers appeared, followed, in 1869, by a
collection of poems entitled Under the Willows. The Commemoration
Ode, recited in Cambridge, in 1865, in honor of the Harvard alumni who
fell during the Civil War, is full of elevated feeling, and contains a noble
tribute to the memory of President Lincoln. Mr. Lowell was editor of The
Atlantic Monthly from its foundation in 1857 [until] 1862; his editorial
connection with the North American Review extended from 1863 to 1872.
In these magazines were printed many of the articles that make up the
volumes entitled Among my Books (in two series) and My Study
Windows.
Source: English & American Literature, Shaw & Backus, p.440
Sample Works
Love and Thought
The First Snow-Fall
The Landlord
Under The October Maples
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