



Produced by Dave Maddock, Charles Franks and the Online
Distributed Proofreading Team








TOWARD THE GULF

By Edgar Lee Masters




CONTENTS

  TOWARD THE GULF
  THE LAKE BOATS
  CITIES OF THE PLAIN
  EXCLUDED MIDDLE
  SAMUEL BUTLER, ET AL
  JOHNNY APPLESEED
  THE LOOM
  DIALOGUE AT PERKO'S
  SIR GALAHAD
  ST. DESERET
  HEAVEN IS BUT THE HOUR
  VICTOR RAFOLSKI ON ART
  THE LANDSCAPE
  TO-MORROW IS MY BIRTHDAY
  SWEET CLOVER
  SOMETHING BEYOND THE HILL
  FRONT THE AGES WITH A SMILE
  POOR PIERROT
  MIRAGE OF THE DESERT
  DAHLIAS
  THE GRAND RIVER MARSHES
  DELILAH
  THE WORLD-SAVER
  RECESSIONAL
  THE AWAKENING
  IN THE GARDEN AT THE DAWN HOUR
  FRANCE
  BERTRAND AND GOURGAUD TALK OVER OLD TIMES
  DRAW THE SWORD, O REPUBLIC
  DEAR OLD DICK
  THE ROOM OF MIRRORS
  THE LETTER
  CANTICLE OF THE RACE
  BLACK EAGLE RETURNS TO ST. JOE
  MY LIGHT WITH YOURS
  THE BLIND
  "I PAY MY DEBT FOR LAFAYETTE AND ROCHAMBEAU"
  CHRISTMAS AT INDIAN POINT
  WIDOW LA RUE
  DR. SCUDDER'S CLINICAL LECTURE
  FRIAR YVES
  THE EIGHTH CRUSADE
  THE BISHOP'S DREAM OF THE HOLY SEPULCHRE
  NEANDERTHAL
  THE END OF THE SEARCH
  BOTANICAL GARDENS




TO WILLIAM MARION REEDY


It would have been fitting had I dedicated Spoon River Anthology to
you. Considerations of an intimate nature, not to mention a literary
encouragement which was before yours, crowded you from the page.  Yet
you know that it was you who pressed upon my attention in June, 1909,
the Greek Anthology. It was from contemplation of its epitaphs that my
hand unconsciously strayed to the sketches of "Hod Putt," "Serepta The
Scold" ("Serepta Mason" in the book), "Amanda Barker" ("Amanda" in the
book), "Ollie McGee" and "The Unknown," the first written and the
first printed sketches of The Spoon River Anthology.  The
_Mirror_ of May 29th, 1914, is their record.

I take one of the epigrams of Meleager with its sad revealment and
touch of irony and turn it from its prose form to a verse form, making
verses according to the breath pauses:

"The holy night and thou, O Lamp, we took as witness of our vows; and
before thee we swore, he that would love me always and I that I would
never leave him. We swore, and thou wert witness of our double
promise. But now he says that our vows were written on the running
waters. And thou, O Lamp, thou seest him in the arms of another."

In verse this epigram is as follows:

  The holy night and thou,
  O Lamp,
  We took as witness of our vows;
  And before thee we swore,
  He that would love me always
  And I that I would never leave him.
  We swore,
  And thou wert witness of our double promise.
  But now he says that our vows were written on the running waters.
  And thou, O Lamp,
  Thou seest him in the arms of another.

It will be observed that iambic feet prevail in this translation. They
merely become noticeable and imperative when arranged in verses. But
so it is, even in the briefest and starkest rendering of these
epigrams from the Greek the humanism and dignity of the original
transfer themselves, making something, if less than verse, yet more
than prose; as Byron said of Sheridan's speeches, neither poetry nor
oratory, but better than either. It was no difficult matter to pass
from Chase Henry:

  "In life I was the town drunkard.
   When I died the priest denied me burial
   In holy ground, etc."

to the use of standard measures, or rhythmical arrangements of iambics
or what not, and so to make a book, which for the first third required
a practiced voice or eye to yield the semblance of verse; and for the
last two-thirds, or nearly so, accommodated itself to the less
sensitive conception of the average reader.  The prosody was allowed
to take care of itself under the emotional requirements and
inspiration of the moment. But there is nothing new in English
literature for some hundreds of years in combinations of dactyls,
anapests or trochees, and without rhyme.  Nor did I discover to the
world that an iambic pentameter can be lopped to a tetrameter without
the verse ceasing to be an iambic; though it be no longer the blank
verse which has so ennobled English poetry.  A great deal of unrhymed
poetry is yet to be written in the various standard rhythms and in
carefully fashioned metres.

But obviously a formal resuscitation of the Greek epigrams, ironical
and tender, satirical and sympathetic, as casual experiments in
unrelated themes would scarcely make the same appeal that an epic
rendition of modern life would do, and as it turned out actually
achieved.

The response of the American press to Spoon River Anthology during the
summer of 1914 while it was appearing in the _Mirror_ is my
warrant for saying this.  It was quoted and parodied during that time
in the country