Life. In the list of Southern poets the name of Sidney Lanier ranks next to that of Poe. He was born at Macon, Georgia, February 3, 1842. His father, Robert S. Lanier, was of Huguenot descent and a lawyer by profession. His mother was a native of Virginia of Scotch descent. Lanier was passionately fond of two things,poetry and music. He entered Oglethorpe College in 1856 as a sophomore, graduating in 1860, after a year's absence, as valedictorian of his class. After graduation he acted as tutor in his alma mater, but in April, 1861, he enlisted in the Confederate army with the Macon volunteers. He rendered efficient service as a soldier, and on three occasions he was offered promotion, but refused because he wished to stay near his younger brother who was serving with him. In 1863 he became a blockade-runner, but his vessel was captured and he was confined for five months in Point Lookout Prison. In 1865 he was released, and the next few years were spent in teaching and studying law. In December, 1867, he married Miss Mary Day, of Macon. From this time on his life was a constant struggle with disease and poverty. Finally he determined to earn his living by following a profession that he loved, and in 1873 he became a member of the Peabody Symphony Orchestra in Baltimore. In a letter to his father at this time he says: "My dear father, think how, for twenty years, through poverty, through pain, through weariness, through sickness, through the uncongenial atmosphere of a farcical college and of a bare army and then of an exacting business life, through all the discouragement of being wholly unacquainted with literary people and literary ways, I say, think how, in spite of all these depressing circumstances, and of a thousand more which I could enumerate, these two figures of music and of poetry have steadily kept in my heart so that I could not banish them. Does it not seem to you as to me, that I begin to have the right to enroll myself among the devotees of these two sublime arts, after having followed them so long and so humbly, and through so much bitterness?" Lanier was constantly seeking new climes that his health might be improved, but all to no avail. In 1879 he was appointed lecturer on English literature at Johns Hopkins University, a position which he occupied until his death. Work. Lanier's passionate love of music deeply influenced his poetry. He wrote largely for the ear. Like Whitman, he declared against stereotyped forms and struck out on a path of his own which he expounded in his Science of English Verse. His poems are often rich in melody and rhythm. Sunrise, his last poem, was written when he was dying. "He invited me to eat; the service was silver and gold, but no food therein save pepper and salt." Lanier is not a poet of the people nor will his verses ever be very popular, but he has many warm admirers. An Estimate. In his Literary History of America Barrett Wendell says: "The more you read The Marshes of Glynn, however, and the more, indeed, you read any of Lanier's poetry, the more certain you feel that he was among the truest men of letters whom our country has produced. Genuine in impulse, fervid in temper, impressed but not overwhelmed by the sad and tragic conditions of his life, and sincerely moved to write in words which he constantly and ardently strove to make beautiful, he exhibits lyric power hardly to be found in any other American." SUGGESTIONS FOR READING The Marshes of Glynn, Sunrise, Corn, The Mocking Bird, The Stirrup Cup, Song of the Chattahoochee. HELPFUL Books W. M. Baskervill's Sidney Lanier. SM. AM. LIT. — 17 |