James Russell Lowell

Elmwood, birthplace and longtime home of James Russell Lowell in Cambridge, Massachusetts

James Russell Lowell was born February 22, 1819.[1] He was a member of the eighth generation of the Lowell family,[2] the descendants of Percival Lowle who settled in Newbury, Massachusetts, in 1639.[3] His parents were the Reverend Charles Lowell (1782–1861), a minister at a Unitarian church in Boston who had previously studied theology at Edinburgh, and Harriett Brackett Spence Lowell.[4] By the time that James was born, the family owned a large estate in Cambridge called Elmwood.[5] He was the youngest of six children; his siblings were Charles, Rebecca, Mary, William, and Robert.[6] Lowell's mother built in him an appreciation for literature at an early age, especially in poetry, ballads, and tales from her native Orkney.[4] He attended school under Sophia Dana, who later married George Ripley; he later studied at a school run by a particularly harsh disciplinarian, where one of his classmates was Richard Henry Dana Jr.[7]

Lowell attended Harvard College beginning at age 15 in 1834, though he was not a good student and often got into trouble.[8] In his sophomore year, he was absent from required chapel attendance 14 times and from classes 56 times.[9] In his last year there, he wrote, "During Freshman year, I did nothing, during Sophomore year I did nothing, during Junior year I did nothing, and during Senior year I have thus far done nothing in the way of college studies."[8] In his senior year, he became one of the editors of Harvardiana literary magazine, to which he contributed prose and poetry that he admitted was of low quality. As he said later, "I was as great an ass as ever brayed & thought it singing."[10] During his undergraduate years, Lowell was a member of Hasty Pudding and served both as secretary and poet.

Lowell was elected the poet of the class of 1838[11] and, as was tradition, was asked to recite an original poem on Class Day, the day before Commencement on July 17, 1838.[9] He was suspended, however, and not allowed to participate. Instead, his poem was printed and made available thanks to subscriptions paid by his classmates.[11] He had composed the poem in Concord,[12] where he had been exiled by the Harvard faculty to the care of the Rev. Barzallai Frost because of his neglect of his studies.[13] During his stay in Concord, he became friends with Ralph Waldo Emerson and got to know the other Transcendentalists. His Class Day poem satirized the social movements of the day; abolitionists, Thomas Carlyle, Emerson, and the Transcendentalists were treated.[12]

Lowell did not know what vocation to choose after graduating, and he vacillated among business, the ministry, medicine, and law. He ultimately enrolled at Harvard Law School in 1840 and was admitted to the bar two years later.[14] While studying law, however, he contributed poems and prose articles to various magazines. During this time, he was admittedly depressed and often had suicidal thoughts. He once confided to a friend that he held a cocked pistol to his forehead and considered killing himself at the age of 20.[15]

In late 1839, Lowell met Maria White through her brother William, a classmate at Harvard,[16] and the two became engaged in the autumn of 1840. Maria's father Abijah White, a wealthy merchant from Watertown, insisted that their wedding be postponed until Lowell had gainful employment.[17] They were finally married on December 26, 1844,[18] shortly after the groom published Conversations on Some of the Old Poets, a collection of his previously published essays.[19] A friend described their relationship as "the very picture of a True Marriage".[20] Lowell himself believed that she was made up "half of earth and more than half of Heaven".[17] She, too, wrote poetry, and the next twelve years of Lowell's life were deeply affected by her influence. He said that his first book of poetry A Year's Life (1841) "owes all its beauty to her", though it only sold 300 copies.[17]

Maria's character and beliefs led her to become involved in the movements directed against intemperance and slavery. She was a member of the Boston Female Anti-Slavery Society and persuaded her husband to become an abolitionist.[21] James had previously expressed antislavery sentiments, but Maria urged him towards more active expression and involvement.[22] His second volume of poems Miscellaneous Poems expressed these antislavery thoughts, and its 1,500 copies sold well.[23]

Maria was in poor health, and the couple moved to Philadelphia shortly after their marriage, thinking that her lungs could heal there.[24] In Philadelphia, he became a contributing editor for the Pennsylvania Freeman, an abolitionist newspaper.[25] In the spring of 1845, the Lowells returned to Cambridge to make their home at Elmwood. They had four children, though only one (Mabel, born 1847) survived past infancy. Blanche was born December 31, 1845, but lived only fifteen months; Rose, born in 1849, survived only a few months as well; their only son Walter was born in 1850 but died in 1852.[26] Lowell was very affected by the loss of almost all of his children. His grief over the death of his first daughter in particular was expressed in his poem "The First Snowfall" (1847).[27] He again considered suicide, writing to a friend that he thought "of my razors and my throat and that I am a fool and a coward not to end it all at once".[26]

Lowell's earliest poems were published without remuneration in the Southern Literary Messenger in 1840.[28] He was inspired to new efforts towards self-support and joined with his friend Robert Carter in founding the literary journal The Pioneer.[20] The periodical was distinguished by the fact that most of its content was new rather than material that had been previously published elsewhere, and by the inclusion of very serious criticism, which covered not only literature but also art and music.[29] Lowell wrote that it would "furnish the intelligent and reflecting portion of the Reading Public with a rational substitute for the enormous quantity of thrice-diluted trash, in the shape of namby-pamby love tales and sketches, which is monthly poured out to them by many of our popular Magazines."[20] William Wetmore Story noted the journal's higher taste, writing that "it took some stand & appealled to a higher intellectual Standard than our puerile milk or watery namby-pamby Mags with which we are overrun".[30] The first issue of the journal included the first appearance of "The Tell-Tale Heart" by Edgar Allan Poe.[31] Lowell was treated for an eye disease in New York shortly after the first issue, and in his absence Carter did a poor job of managing the journal.[23] The magazine ceased publication after three monthly numbers beginning in January 1843, leaving Lowell $1,800 (~$56,533 in 2022) in debt.[31] Poe mourned the journal's demise, calling it "a most severe blow to the cause—the cause of a Pure Taste".[30]

Despite the failure of The Pioneer, Lowell continued his interest in the literary world. He wrote a series on "Anti-Slavery in the United States" for the Daily News, though his series was discontinued by the editors after four articles in May 1846.[32] He had published these articles anonymously, believing that they would have more impact if they were not known to be the work of a committed abolitionist.[33] In the spring of 1848, he formed a connection with the National Anti-Slavery Standard of New York, agreeing to contribute weekly either a poem or a prose article. After only one year, he was asked to contribute half as often to the Standard to make room for contributions from Edmund Quincy, another writer and reformer.[34]

Daguerreotype of James Russell Lowell, taken in Philadelphia, 1844

A Fable for Critics was one of Lowell's most popular works, published anonymously in 1848. It proved a popular satire, and the first 3,000 copies sold out quickly.[35] In it, he took good-natured jabs at his contemporary poets and critics—but not all the subjects were pleased. Edgar Allan Poe was referred to as part genius and "two-fifths sheer fudge"; he reviewed the work in the Southern Literary Messenger and called it "'loose'—ill-conceived and feebly executed, as well in detail as in general ... we confess some surprise at his putting forth so unpolished a performance."[36] Lowell offered his New York friend Charles Frederick Briggs all the profits from the book's success (which proved relatively small), despite his own financial needs.[35]

In 1848, Lowell also published The Biglow Papers, later named by the Grolier Club as the most influential book of 1848.[37] The first 1,500 copies sold out within a week and a second edition was soon issued—though Lowell made no profit, as he had to absorb the cost of stereotyping the book himself.[38] The book presented three main characters, each representing different aspects of American life and using authentic American dialects in their dialogue.[39] Under the surface, The Biglow Papers was also a denunciation of the Mexican–American War and war in general.[24]

In 1850, Lowell's mother died unexpectedly, as did his third daughter, Rose. Her death left Lowell depressed and reclusive for six months, despite the birth of his son Walter by the end of the year. He wrote to a friend that death "is a private tutor. We have no fellow-scholars, and must lay our lessons to heart alone."[40] These personal troubles as well as the Compromise of 1850 inspired Lowell to accept an offer from William Wetmore Story to spend a winter in Italy.[41] To pay for the trip, Lowell sold land around Elmwood, intending to sell off further acres of the estate over time to supplement his income, ultimately selling off 25 of the original 30 acres (120,000 m²).[42] Walter died suddenly in Rome of cholera, and Lowell and his wife, with their daughter Mabel, returned to the United States in October 1852.[43] Lowell published recollections of his journey in several magazines, many of which would be collected years later as Fireside Travels (1867). He also edited volumes with biographical sketches for a series on British Poets.[44]

His wife Maria, who had been suffering from poor health for many years, became very ill in the spring of 1853 and died on October 27[45] of tuberculosis.[26] Just before her burial, her coffin was opened so that her daughter Mabel could see her face while Lowell "leaned for a long while against a tree weeping", according to Henry Wadsworth Longfellow and his wife, who were in attendance.[46] In 1855, Lowell oversaw the publication of a memorial volume of his wife's poetry, with only fifty copies for private circulation.[44] Despite his self-described "naturally joyous" nature,[47] life for Lowell at Elmwood was further complicated by his father becoming deaf in his old age, and the deteriorating mental state of his sister Rebecca, who sometimes went a week without speaking.[48] He again cut himself off from others, becoming reclusive at Elmwood, and his private diaries from this time period are riddled with the initials of his wife.[49] On March 10, 1854, for example, he wrote: "Dark without & within. M.L. M.L. M.L."[50] Longfellow, a friend and neighbor, referred to Lowell as "lonely and desolate".[51]

At the invitation of his cousin John Amory Lowell, James Russell Lowell was asked to deliver a lecture at the prestigious Lowell Institute.[52] Some speculated the opportunity was because of the family connection, offered as an attempt to bring him out of his depression.[53] Lowell chose to speak on "The English Poets", telling his friend Briggs that he would take revenge on dead poets "for the injuries received by one whom the public won't allow among the living".[52] The first of the twelve-part lecture series was to be on January 9, 1855, though by December, Lowell had only completed writing five of them, hoping for last-minute inspiration.[54] His first lecture was on John Milton and the auditorium was oversold; Lowell had to give a repeat performance the next afternoon.[55] Lowell, who had never spoken in public before, was praised for these lectures. Francis James Child said that Lowell, whom he deemed was typically "perverse", was able to "persist in being serious contrary to his impulses and his talents".[54] While his series was still in progress, Lowell was offered the Smith Professorship of Modern Languages at Harvard, a post vacated by Longfellow, at an annual salary of $1,200, though he never applied for it.[56] The job description was changing after Longfellow; instead of teaching languages directly, Lowell would supervise the department and deliver two lecture courses per year on topics of his own choosing.[57] Lowell accepted the appointment, with the proviso that he should have a year of study abroad. He set sail on June 4 of that year,[58] leaving his daughter Mabel in the care of a governess named Frances Dunlap.[56] Abroad, he visited Le Havre, Paris, and London, spending time with friends including Story, Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Browning, and Leigh Hunt. Primarily, however, Lowell spent his time abroad studying languages, particularly German, which he found difficult. He complained: "The confounding genders! If I die I shall have engraved on my tombstone that I died of der, die, das, not because I caught them but because I couldn't."[58]

He returned to the United States in the summer of 1856 and began his college duties.[59] Towards the end of his professorship, then-president of Harvard Charles William Eliot noted that Lowell seemed to have "no natural inclination" to teach; Lowell agreed, but retained his position for twenty years.[60] He focused on teaching literature, rather than etymology, hoping that his students would learn to enjoy the sound, rhythm, and flow of poetry rather than the technique of words.[61] He summed up his method: "True scholarship consists in knowing not what things exists, but what they mean; it is not memory but judgment."[62] Still grieving the loss of his wife, during this time Lowell avoided Elmwood and instead lived on Kirkland Street in Cambridge, an area known as Professors' Row. He stayed there, along with his daughter Mabel and her governess Frances Dunlap, until January 1861.[63]

Lowell had intended never to remarry after the death of his wife Maria White. However, in 1857, surprising his friends, he became engaged to Frances Dunlap, whom many described as simple and unattractive.[64] Dunlap, niece of the former governor of Maine Robert P. Dunlap,[65] was a friend of Lowell's first wife and formerly wealthy, though she and her family had fallen into reduced circumstances.[56] Lowell and Dunlap married on September 16, 1857, in a ceremony performed by his brother.[66] Lowell wrote, "My second marriage was the wisest act of my life, & as long as I am sure of it, I can afford to wait till my friends agree with me."[59]

The Atlantic Monthly, 1857

In the autumn of 1857, The Atlantic Monthly was established, and Lowell was its first editor. With its first issue in November of that year, he at once gave the magazine the stamp of high literature and of bold speech on public affairs.[67] In January 1861, Lowell's father died of a heart attack, inspiring Lowell to move his family back to Elmwood. As he wrote to his friend Briggs, "I am back again to the place I love best. I am sitting in my old garret, at my old desk, smoking my old pipe ... I begin to feel more like my old self than I have these ten years."[68] Shortly thereafter, in May, he left The Atlantic Monthly when James T. Fields took over as editor; the magazine had been purchased by Ticknor and Fields for $10,000 two years before.[69] Lowell returned to Elmwood by January 1861 but maintained an amicable relationship with the new owners of the journal, continuing to submit his poetry and prose for the rest of his life.[68] His prose, however, was more abundantly presented in the pages of the North American Review during the years 1862–1872. For the Review, he served as a coeditor along with Charles Eliot Norton.[70] Lowell's reviews for the journal covered a wide variety of literary releases of the day, though he was writing fewer poems.[71] One essay of his for the North American Review, an acerbic review of the life and work of the recently deceased Henry David Thoreau titled "Letters to Various Persons,"[72] contributed to a decades-long critical consensus of disdain for Thoreau.[73]

As early as 1845, Lowell had predicted the debate over slavery would lead to war[74] and, as the Civil War broke out in the 1860s, Lowell used his role at the Review to praise Abraham Lincoln and his attempts to maintain the Union.[70] Lowell lost three nephews during the war, including Charles Russell Lowell Jr., who became a brigadier general and fell at the Battle of Cedar Creek. Lowell himself was generally a pacifist. Even so, he wrote, "If the destruction of slavery is to be a consequence of the war, shall we regret it? If it be needful to the successful prosecution of the war, shall anyone oppose it?"[75] His interest in the Civil War inspired him to write a second series of The Biglow Papers,[68] including one specifically dedicated to the preliminary Emancipation Proclamation called "Sunthin' in the Pastoral Line" in 1862.[76]

Shortly after Lincoln's assassination, Lowell was asked to present a poem at Harvard in memory of graduates killed in the war. His poem, "Commemoration Ode", cost him sleep and his appetite, but was delivered on July 21, 1865,[77] after a 48-hour writing binge.[78] Lowell had high hopes for his performance but was overshadowed by the other notables presenting works that day, including Ralph Waldo Emerson and Oliver Wendell Holmes. "I did not make the hit I expected", he wrote, "and am ashamed at having been tempted again to think I could write poetry, a delusion from which I have been tolerably free these dozen years."[79] Despite his personal assessment, friends and other poets sent many letters to Lowell congratulating him. Emerson referred to his poem's "high thought & sentiment" and James Freeman Clarke noted its "grandeur of tone".[80] Lowell later expanded it with a strophe to Lincoln.[78]

In the 1860s, Lowell's friend Longfellow spent several years translating Dante Alighieri's Divine Comedy and regularly invited others to help him on Wednesday evenings.[81] Lowell was one of the main members of the so-called "Dante Club", along with William Dean Howells, Charles Eliot Norton and other occasional guests.[82] Shortly after serving as a pallbearer at the funeral of friend and publisher Nathaniel Parker Willis on January 24, 1867,[83] Lowell decided to produce another collection of his poetry. Under the Willows and Other Poems was released in 1869,[71] though Lowell originally wanted to title it The Voyage to the Vinland and Other Poems. The book, dedicated to Norton, collected poems Lowell had written within the previous twenty years and was his first poetry collection since 1848.[84]

Lowell intended to take another trip to Europe. To finance it, he sold off more of Elmwood's acres and rented the house to Thomas Bailey Aldrich; Lowell's daughter Mabel, by this time, had moved into a new home with her husband Edward Burnett, the son of a successful businessman-farmer from Southborough, Massachusetts.[85] Lowell and his wife set sail on July 8, 1872,[86] after he took a leave of absence from Harvard. They visited England, Paris, Switzerland, and Italy. While overseas, he received an honorary Doctorate of Law from the University of Oxford and another from Cambridge University. They returned to the United States in the summer of 1874.[85]

James Russell Lowell in his later years

Lowell resigned from his Harvard professorship in 1874, though he was persuaded to continue teaching through 1877.[60] It was in 1876 that Lowell first stepped into the field of politics. That year, he served as a delegate to the Republican National Convention in Cincinnati, Ohio, speaking on behalf of presidential candidate Rutherford B. Hayes.[87] Hayes won the nomination and, eventually, the presidency. In May 1877, President Hayes, an admirer of The Biglow Papers, sent William Dean Howells to Lowell with a handwritten note proffering an ambassadorship to either Austria or Russia; Lowell declined, but noted his interest in Spanish literature.[88] Lowell was then offered and accepted the role of Minister to the court of Spain at an annual salary of $12,000.[88] Lowell sailed from Boston on July 14, 1877, and, though he expected he would be away for a year or two, did not return to the United States until 1885, with the violinist Ole Bull renting Elmwood for a portion of that time.[89] The Spanish media referred to him as "José Bighlow".[90] Lowell was well-prepared for his political role, having been trained in law, as well as being able to read in multiple languages. He had trouble socializing while in Spain, however, and amused himself by sending humorous dispatches to his political bosses in the United States, many of which were later collected and published posthumously in 1899 as Impressions of Spain.[91] Lowell's social life improved when the Spanish Academy elected him a corresponding member in late 1878, allowing him contribute to the preparation of a new dictionary.[92]

In January 1880, Lowell was informed of his appointment as Minister to England, his nomination made without his knowledge as far back as June 1879. He was granted a salary of $17,500 with about $3,500 for expenses.[93] While serving in this capacity, he addressed an importation of allegedly diseased cattle and made recommendations that predated the Pure Food and Drug Act.[94] Queen Victoria commented that she had never seen an ambassador who "created so much interest and won so much regard as Mr. Lowell".[95] Lowell held this role until the close of Chester A. Arthur's presidency in the spring of 1885, despite his wife's failing health. Lowell was already well known in England for his writing and, during his time there, befriended fellow author Henry James, who referred to him as "conspicuously American".[95] Lowell also befriended Leslie Stephen many years earlier and became the godfather to his daughter, future writer Virginia Woolf.[96] Lowell was popular enough that he was offered a professorship at Oxford after his recall by President Grover Cleveland, though the offer was declined.[97] He was elected as a member to the American Philosophical Society in 1883.[98]

His second wife, Frances, died on February 19, 1885, while still in England.[99]

Grave of James Russell Lowell at Mount Auburn Cemetery in Cambridge, Massachusetts

He returned to the United States by June 1885, living with his daughter and her husband in Southboro, Massachusetts.[100] He then spent time in Boston with his sister before returning to Elmwood in November 1889.[101] By this time, most of his friends were dead, including Quincy, Longfellow, Dana, and Emerson, leaving him depressed and contemplating suicide again.[102] Lowell spent part of the 1880s delivering various speeches,[103] and his last published works were mostly collections of essays, including Political Essays, and a collection of his poems Heartsease and Rue in 1888.[101] His last few years he traveled back to England periodically[104] and when he returned to the United States in the fall of 1889, he moved back to Elmwood[105] with Mabel, while her husband worked for clients in New York and New Jersey.[106] That year, Lowell gave an address at the centenary of George Washington's inauguration. Also that year, the Boston Critic dedicated a special issue to Lowell on his seventieth birthday to recollections and reminiscences by his friends, including former presidents Hayes and Benjamin Harrison and British Prime Minister William Ewart Gladstone as well as Alfred, Lord Tennyson and Francis Parkman.[105]

In the last few months of his life, Lowell struggled with gout, sciatica in his left leg, and chronic nausea; by the summer of 1891, doctors believed that Lowell had cancer in his kidneys, liver, and lungs. His last few months, he was administered opium for the pain and was rarely fully conscious.[107] He died on August 12, 1891, at Elmwood.[108] After services in the Appleton Chapel, he was buried in Mount Auburn Cemetery.[109] After his death, Norton served as his literary executor and published several collections of Lowell's works and his letters.[110]