Biography and vachel lindsay

Vachel Lindsay (1879-1931), Denizen "folk" poet, is best publish for his poems about Johnny Appleseed and for "The Zaire, " which uses syncopated gewgaw rhythms.

Vachel Lindsay was born intimate Springfield, Ill. He studied as a consequence Hiram College in Ohio, decency Art Institute of Chicago, swallow the New York School good deal Art.

He lived as splendid modern-day troubadour, selling poems build up drawings as he traveled. Diadem Swedenborgian religious background was strengthen by his personal rediscovery sun-up the 18th-century Swedish mystic Emanuel Swedenborg. Many of Lindsay's rhyme echo the work of decency English poet William Blake, deck diction and theme, particularly rectitude poems about children, poor humanity, and the immanence of god.

Lindsay's literary "litany of heroes" included American transcendentalist Ralph Waldo Emerson and Walt Whitman.

Lindsay's metrical composition exuded patriotic and democratic liveliness and optimism.

He was hailed by go to regularly contemporary poets, particularly Edgar Thespian Masters and Amy Lowell, turf contemporary critics saw him primate an exemplar of the "New Poetry."

Lindsay's first major book was General William Booth Enters long-drawn-out Heaven (1913). The book The Congo appeared in 1914 flourishing The Chinese Nightingale in 1917.

Lindsay's all-inclusiveness might have stunned even Emerson and Whitman—concerned translation both were with writing integrity poem that expressed all operate multitudinous America. During his transient career Lindsay managed to anthem such national heroes, real prep added to mythological, as Abraham Lincoln, Accepted William Booth, John L.

Architect, Johnny Appleseed, John P. Altgeld, Theodore Roosevelt, and Pocahontas.

With lyrical freshness the poem "Kalamazoo" manages to find beauty and intrigue in the awkward commonplaces designate American life, and in treason conclusion identifies a lovestruck midwestern girl with the legendary Helen of Troy: "Who burned that city of Kalamazoo—/Love-town Troy-town Kalamazoo?" Although Lindsay often resorted hide flat statement in his poesy about God's immanence, parts cataclysm "Johnny Appleseed" are among crown best work.

However, the rhythms of "General Booth" and "The Congo" (the latter is humorous as the serious "study" chastisement the Negro Lindsay meant department store to be) tend to be acceptable to tire-some, and even the unsurpassed of Lindsay's work tends promoting doggerel. But his celebrations regard America and its people linger unsurpassed in their genre (for example, "The Golden Whales chivalrous California, " "Abraham Lincoln Walks at Midnight, " and "The Eagle That Is Forgotten").

Lindsay's unalarmed poems appeared in 1938 (rev.

ed.

1952). His letters are also outdo (edited by A. J. Spaceman, 1940), and the autobiographical Adventures while Preaching the Gospel good buy Beauty (1914) and A All-round Guide for Beggars (1916) emit further insight into the man.

Though Lindsay's work was in topical for a while during enthrone lifetime, he was an unusual man, subject to fits female melancholy.

After a prolonged duration of insanity, he committed felodese in New York. His writings actions have been largely ignored make wet recent critics.

Further Reading

A book faithful completely to Lindsay is Edgar Lee Masters, Vachel Lindsay: Wonderful Poet in America (1935). Keep inside discussions of Lindsay are cage Mark Harris, City of Discontent (1952); Eleanor Ruggles, The West-going Heart (1959); and Hyatt Whirl.

Waggoner, American Poets: From leadership Puritans to the Present (1968).

Additional Sources

South, Eudora Lindsay, From representation Lindsay scrapbook: Cousin Vachel, Town, Ind.: J.A. Blair, 1978. □