威廉·卡伦·布莱恩特传记

诗人的传记

布莱恩特于1794年11月3日出生在马萨诸塞州卡明顿附近的一间小木屋里;他的出生地今天用一块牌匾作了标记。他是彼得·布莱恩特(Peter Bryant)和萨拉·斯内尔(Sarah Snell)的次子，彼得是一名医生，后来成为州议员。他母亲的祖先可以追溯到五月花号上的乘客;他父亲的父亲，给了十几年后来到这里的殖民者。科比两岁的时候和他的家人搬到了新家。他童年的家威廉·卡伦·布莱恩特宅基地(William Cullen Bryant Homestead)现在是博物馆。在威廉姆斯学院仅仅两年后，他在马萨诸塞州的沃辛顿和布里奇沃特学习法律，并于1815年获得律师资格。然后，他开始在附近的普莱恩菲尔德从事法律工作，每天从卡明顿步行7英里。1815年12月，在一次散步中，他注意到地平线上有一只鸟在飞翔; the sight moved him enough to write "To a Waterfowl". Bryant developed an interest in poetry early in life. Under his father's tutelage, he emulated Alexander Pope and other Neo-Classic British poets. The Embargo, a savage attack on President Thomas Jefferson published in 1808, reflected Dr. Bryant's Federalist political views. The first edition quickly sold out—partly because of the publicity earned by the poet's young age—and a second, expanded edition, which included Bryant's translation of Classical verse, was printed. The youth wrote little poetry while preparing to enter Williams College as a sophomore, but upon leaving Williams after a single year and then beginning to read law, he regenerated his passion for poetry through encounter with the English pre-Romantics and, particularly, William Wordsworth. Although "Thanatopsis", his most famous poem, has been said to date from 1811, it is much more probable that Bryant began its composition in 1813, or even later. What is known about its publication is that his father took some pages of verse from his son's desk and submitted them, along with his own work, to the North American Review in 1817. The Review was edited by Edward Tyrrel Channing at the time and, upon receiving it, read the poem to his assistant, who immediately exclaimed, "That was never written on this side of the water!" Someone at the North American joined two of the son's discrete fragments, gave the result the Greek-derived title Thanatopsis (meditation on death), mistakenly attributed it to the father, and published it. For all the errors, it was well-received, and soon Bryant was publishing poems with some regularity, including "To a Waterfowl" in 1821. On January 11, 1821, Bryant, still striving to build a legal career, married Frances Fairchild. Soon after, having received an invitation to address the Harvard University Phi Beta Kappa Society at the school's August commencement, Bryant spent months working on "The Ages," a panorama in verse of the history of civilization, culminating in the establishment of the United States. That poem led a collection, entitled Poems, which he arranged to publish on the same trip to Cambridge. For that book, he added sets of lines at the beginning and end of "Thanatopsis." His career as a poet was launched. Even so, it was not until 1832, when an expanded Poems was published in the U.S. and, with the assistance of Washington Irving, in Britain, that he won recognition as America's leading poet. His poetry has been described as being "of a thoughtful, meditative character, and makes but slight appeal to the mass of readers." In his last decade, Bryant shifted from writing his own poetry to translating Homer. He assiduously worked on the Iliad and The Odyssey from 1871 to 1874. He is also remembered as one of the principal authorities on homeopathy and as a hymnist for the Unitarian Church—both legacies of his father's enormous influence on him. Bryant died in 1878 of complications from an accidental fall suffered after participating in a Central Park ceremony honoring Italian patriot Giuseppe Mazzini.