The Idaho Republican. [volume] (Blackfoot, Idaho) 1904-1932, 1919-04-15
LIBRARY NOTES
American Writers Continued

American Writers Continued
The latter nineteenth century was
the magazine era. Many and sor-
rowful were the journalistic expert
ments, but we see no wthe golden
results of all those attempts. The
spirit of national unity was growing
to manhood. 1t is because we have
so many common likes and dislikes
in this broad land that the magazines
go out in such fabulous numbers into
every niche and corner
The Atlantic Monthly was the first
successful pioneer, the first real
American article without an
European smack to it. William Gull
len Bryant in those days conducted
daily newspaper. He published
his 'Thanatopsis" in the North
American Review. Edgar Allan Poe
with his diamond edged style and
devilish choice of subjects, at times
upheld feeble and tottering journals.
Harriet Beecher Stowe and John
Greenleaf Whittier are two of the
great lights of the period. While
Poe went in for intellectual beauty,
they stuck to the lowly things
Whittier was a self-educated poet,
Quaker, and wrote sweet poetry.
His Barbara Frietchie" will long
be recited in the classroom, to it's
hurt. Bayard Taylor was a poet,
translator and traveller. We some
times read him, not often. We used
to read Mrs. Stoves Uncle Tom s
Cabin" but now we leave that to
the Europeans; they are just about
that far along with American litera-
ture.
Walt Whitman stands out as the
great American eccentric. Our peo-
pie thought him harmless and funny,
but abroad he is even yet considered
as the one distinctive American poet.
He was a priter, teacher, editor,
and builder; he wore his hair long
and shaved when he felt like it; he
wrote Leaves of Grass"
After the war came humor, for the
first bow to the new and sober ma
ton. Mark Twain is the master of
them all. Artemus Ward was a
stager, and got by in fine style, but
isn't read. Mark Twain was a
satirist, besides being funny, and he
told the good old American people a
lot of things about themselves in a
polite way that they haven't grasped
yet.
At the same time came the van
guard of our present large family
of short story writers. 1t is not i'm
possible that the short story will
finally be our national mode of lit
erary expression, the one thing we
will develop as our very own, for
it is recent form even in Europe,
has not many models and is very
popular. Edward Everett Hale is
piece is 'The Man Without a
Country" Bret Harte discovered the
romantic west to all literarydom. At
this time magazines began to take
firm root and they have been COM
ing along ever since hand in hand
with the short story.
James Whitcomb Riley bobbed
into the lime-light with his Hoosier
dialect poems, with which everybody
is familiar. Eugene Field is almost
as we'll known for his wonderful
child's verse. He was a newspaper
man. Riley was everything, from
printer to signpainter.
Sidney Lanier, a poet and George
w. Cable, novelist and story-writer
represented the south at this time of
so much advancement in letters and
did it we'll Cable is a charming
writer. His Creole Days" is I'M
matched in delicacy, depicting the
human side of Creole life in New
Orleans.
To Vy hal
but we can't say much for him, be-
cause he wrote an English style, and
finally forsook our shores for the
British Isles and all of us have been
out of patience with him ever since.
William Dean Howell handed out
some big, thick and perhaps. wonder
full novels. Those who read them
say they are wonderful. He is the
dean of American letters today,
anyway. .,
This is the extent Of guidance to
be gained from Initial Studies in
! American Letters" but it brings us
up to times we can remember and to
names that are familiar to this gen
Grafton outside of classroom con-
nections. OF course there is a lot
A more in the book than has been set
down; in fact we have here only
\ the names, while in the book some
II thing is said about them all, more
u or less at length.
American literature is getting
more recognition among Americans.
Much of it is well worth reading,
too; and even in this day of fast
writing and reading, good stuff is
coming out every day, so much of it
that one scarcely has time to read
up on the past.-F. C. K.