Poems of the Soil

Some of the titles Isaac Werner owned

Several days ago my husband forwarded an article he had discovered online saying that about 28 million people had read poetry in 2017.  The survey was a joint project of the NEA and the Census Bureau, and the number of people reading poetry represented 11.7% of the US adult population.  If you are unsure whether to see that as a poetic glass half full or a poetic glass half empty, compared to the last survey it is an impressive surge.  In 2012 only 6.7 % of the population acknowledged reading poetry.  The increased number of readers in 2017 is even more significant in that the 2012 survey had revealed a steady decline in those reading poetry since 1992.

However, in Isaac Werner's time I am almost certain the percentage of Americans reading poetry was much higher.  It was not uncommon for Isaac to read Shakespeare with friends, and his library contained multiple volumes of Shakespeare, including one 12-volume set.  Among other poetry books, he owned Milton's Poetical Works, Byron's Poetical, and Reflections of Byron.  In short, poetry was not confined to academics and the wealthy in Isaac's time.  

Nature and farming were favored subjects of poets like Burns and Wordsworth, and that tradition has not disappeared.  Irish poet Seamus Heaney, widely recognized as one of the major poets of the 20th century, taught at Harvard University (1985-2006) prior to his death in 2013, and he had a strong connection with the soil.  His poem Digging reflects on watching his father dig potatoes and his grandfather cutting turf, describing:  "The coarse boot nestled on the lug, the shaft / Against the inside knee was levered firmly.  /  He rooted out tall tops, buried the bright edge deep  /  To scatter new potatoes that we picked,  /  Loving their cool hardness in our hands.  /  By God, the old man could handle a spade.  /  Just like his old man."  He ended his poem with a comparison to himself:    "But I've no spade to follow men like them.  /  Between my finger and my thumb  /  the squat pen rests.  /  I'll dig with it."

Perhaps the best-known living American poet of the soil is Wendell Berry, who lives on a farm in Port Royal, Kentucky near his birthplace, where he has farmed for over 40 years.  His poem, June Wind, shows his capacity for observing the things most of us take for granted, barely noticing their beauty.  "Light and wind are running  /  over the headed grass  /  as though the hill had  /  melted and now flowed."

W.D. Ehrhart's poem, The Farmer, describes a man who admits "I have sown my seed on soil  /  guaranteed by poverty to fail."  Yet, his poem ends:  "A farmer of dreams  /  knows how to pretend.  A farmer of dreams  /  knows what it means to be patient.  /  Each day I go into the fields."

On a writer's blog that I occasionally follow, poet Brittany R. Collins shared the story of being approached by a member of the audience after one of her poetry readings.  He told her, "There are things in this world that only children, animals, and poets understand."  I love that idea.  Perhaps poetry really is a way to see the world differently, whether we are poets or among those people who enjoy reading and hearing poetry.

I don't know how many of you who follow my blog enjoy poetry.  I hope that at least some of you are among the 11.7% or so of us who read poetry.  Maybe some of you even write poetry.  I am a sporadic poet--taking pen in hand if something inspires me but lacking the discipline to write poetry with any regularity.  I will close with a poem inspired by Isaac Werner.

As many of you know, Isaac was a bachelor, but his journal made it apparent that he hoped to find an intelligent wife with whom to spend his life.  His neighbors teased him about finding a wife, and the nickname in the first line of the poem comes from that teasing.  The rooster was also the political symbol for the People's Party.

Populist Victorious Rooster

Memorial to a Prairie Bachelor

'Rooster of the Sandhills',
imagining his someday wife,
whose mind collects ideas
as painstakingly as seeking hen's eggs
hidden in the prairie grass.

A woman to sit with in the winter's hush,
each with a book,
ideas passing like the seeds of cottonwoods
that drift and settle in a fertile place.

Alone no more.
Companion 'neath his wing.
Supporting and protecting, he and she,
when times are good and front page roosters crow.

(c) Lyn Fenwick

Your Favorite Children's Books, Part 3

For all my love of books, I regret that I ignored a wonderful set available on the bookshelves of my home when I was a child.  My grandparents had the 1909 edition of Journeys Through Bookland, a collection in ten volumes of children's literature, poetry, and fables with black and white illustrated plates and pen and ink illustrations.  I believe I opened the books once or twice but was disappointed by the absence of color illustrations.  What a shame to have ignored these wonderful books.

Comments from readers of this blog continued to mention fairy tales.  Lynn Suiter wrote:  "Strangely, the Norwegian fairy tale, "Three Billy Goats Gruff" comes to mind as an early memory.  All I can remember is the goats need to cross a bridge to get to grass for eating.  Under the bridge is a mean troll who eats anyone passing.  I can't remember being scared of this plot but that it was so far fetched."  I, too, remember this tale.  It is one of the fairy tales collected by Asbjornsen and Moe.  The plot is similar to other fairy tales involving "eat-me-when-I'm-fatter," such as Hansel and Gretel.

Jill Bowden provided a special surprise by posting pictures of the covers of some of her childhood favorites--"Jack & Jill magazine, Nancy Drew, My Big Story Book, Read with Dick & Jane" and the cover pictured to the left, "The Red Fairy Book."  She added, "I also read Laura Ingalls Wilder and Louisa May Alcott."  We certainly would not want to forget learning to read with the "Dick and Jane" books.

Linda Koebrich spotted the image of "365 Bedtime stories" and wrote, "Loved that book."  Nancy Moore, who shared her favorites last week, added her children and grandchildren's favorites, admitting that it was "hard to get all the way through because we kept laughing so hard!"  Those books are "Berenstiens B Book," in which almost every word starts with B, and "Because a Little Bug Went Ca-Choo," in which one action creates a long list of reactions!"  Genile Allton Rawson chose "The Trixie Belden mystery series [which she] started reading at age 10 and couldn't put them down."

One of the first replies to my call for followers to share their favorites came from Wes Fisk, who even provided biographical information about his favorite author, Dr. Thomas Clark Hinkle.  Hinkle was born in Illinois but came to Kansas with his parents in a covered wagon when he was two.  First ordained as a minister, he then became a doctor.  However, he found time to write more than 24 books for children about horses and dogs.  Wes said, "I loved his books."

Allan Hingston included books about dogs among his favorites, but he regretted the disappearance of some old favorites.  "Books I don't see anymore are ones like [The Adventures of] Ol Mistah Buzzard."  Its author, Thornton W. Burgess was a naturalist and conservationist who wrote more than 100 books, as well as countless short stories. His books were filled with characters like Little Joe Otter, Grandfather Frog, and Buster Bear.  Fortunately, new editions are still available on Amazon.

Along with book titles, people shared wonderful stories.  Linda Nathan wrote:  "When I was a young child my family lived two blocks from the library in San Bernardino, California.  The children/young adults' library was located below street level with a separate street entrance down steps from the sidewalk.  It was a much safer time and at age five my parents began to allow me to make the two block walk by myself.  ...It was the beginning of a lifelong love affair with books and reading."  She admitted that some days she checked out the 3 book limit in the morning and returned those for 3 more in the afternoon.

After reading the stories in last week's blog, Linda added "They bring back many good memories--reading Zane Grey westerns aloud to my younger sister, hiding a book in the bathroom, and making my dad angry when the dishwater got cold while I was happily reading away.  Little Golden Books, Nancy Drew, Little House Books, Little Women.  Oh my!"

In my earlier blog about children's books I said I did not know what Isaac B. Werner read as a child.  I still do not know, but given his love of Shakespeare, I think it is reasonable to suggest that he may have begun reading Shakespeare when he was quite young.  While young people today may find Shakespeare heavy going, that was not necessarily true in the 1800s, and Isaac was certainly a great fan when he was in his twenties, already familiar with Shakespeare's plays.  I suspect he began reading Shakespeare very early.

Thank you to everyone who has shared their favorite childhood books and stories about their early love of reading.  Next week I will conclude this series on children's books with a special look at two specific types of books.

 

 

Do You Like Isaac?

Isaac loved Shakespeare

There are a few writers' blogs that I follow occasionally, and one of them is "Live, Write, Thrive."  Recently a post there was titled, "Make Me Like Your Protagonist or I'll Stop Reading."  The advice was directed more toward novels, but I had fun applying some of the advice to my history of Isaac and the Populist Movement.

First, the suggestion was that the character has to grow and change, perhaps learn a life lesson by the end of the book, a technique sometimes called a Character Arc.  I'm going to give Isaac points for his constant belief in the importance of learning.  While he did most of his learning from books, he also learned how to work within his community, directing his attention toward helping others as much as he sought to help himself.  At the end of his life, the lesson that he learned was that even an independent, solitary man must sometimes accept help from others.

Catalpa blooms like Isaac's

Second, the character must have a clear goal.  Double points to Isaac on that one.  His personal goal was to make a success of his farm, and he created a farm described as one of the best in the community.  His social goal was to work with his community through the Farmer's Alliance and the People's Party to make better lives for working people, and while he and the People's Party declined at about the same time, they left accomplished goals behind.

Isaac's friend "Doc" Dix

Third, don't make me wait to like your character.  That's a little tricky, since I start the book with Isaac's funeral.  Yet, the friends gathered at his grave are those who cared about him, who knew the good things he had done for the community, and who would miss him and his thoughtfulness.  Readers won't meet Isaac until the next chapter, but they will get to know him in the Preface through the eyes of his friends.

Isaac's Gravestone

Last, make your character sympathetic by showing his passion, needs, and vulnerabilities.  None of you has read the manuscript, but as you follow this blog, I have showed many sides of Isaac, and I hope by now you are invested in his life and find him a sympathetic man.  You cannot answer whether I have done a good job in the manuscript of meeting these suggestions for developing the main character, but from reading the blog, I hope you can answer the question at the top of the blog!  Do You Like Isaac?

Isaac was not a character that I created in a novel.  He was a real man, with his talents and his flaws, his intellect and his idiosyncrasies.  But, in the end, I've enjoyed spending the last few years in his company.  I definitely like Isaac and I hope you do too!

Habits of the Past

Edgar Allan Poe

One day Isaac Werner was in St. John on business when he noticed a bill posted to advertise the appearance of a well known elocutionist at the new high school building scheduled for that same evening.  Although it meant traveling home in darkness, Isaac decided to attend.  A poet popular with elocutionists of that era, and of this elocutionist in particular, was Edgar Allan Poe, so perhaps Isaac heard his recitation of Annabel Lee:

It was many and many a year ago

In a kingdom by the sea,

That a maiden there lived whom you may know

By the name of Annabel Lee... 

Perhaps Isaac even knew that poem by heart, for in that time it was common for people to commit poetry to memory.  Isaac was a great believer in the importance of elocution, for he thought that speaking well not only impacted the speaking voice but also improved a person's reasoning ability.

John Donne

Many people of a generation or two ago could recite favorite poems, and some of those poems from Isaac's era are still read today.  The poems of John Donne remain staples for funeral oration.

Death be not proud, though some have called thee

Mighty and dreadfull, for thou are not so...

and

...Each man's death diminishes me,

For I am involved in mankind.

Therefore, send not to know

For whom the bell tolls, 

It tolls for thee.

Robert W. Service

While memorizing poetry is not so popular today, we had a friend who enjoyed nothing more than entertaining us with poetry.  One of his special favorites was "The Cremation of Sam McGee" by Robert W. Service.

There are strange things done in the midnight sun

By the men who moil for gold...

Although Service was born during Isaac's lifetime, he was not publishing poetry until too late for Isaac to have heard one of his long, narrative poems, but perhaps someone in your own family loved reciting this poem or another poem by Service, as he was a popular poet of his time.

Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Young lovers today may know more rap lyrics than love poems to recite to their sweethearts, but their grandfathers might have recited Elizabeth Barrett Browning's...

How do I love thee?  Let me count the ways.

I love thee to the depth and breadth and height

My soul can reach...

While if Isaac Werner ever chose to recite poetry to a lady, he was more likely to have chosen Shakespeare, perhaps Sonnet 18:

Shall I compare thee to a Summer's day?

Thou art more lovely and more temperate...

Today the habit of reciting poetry has waned, and the more formal rhyming style of the past has been altered by modern poets.  Yet, poetry survives, in styles as different as rap music and unrhymed verse.  William Carlos Williams wrote:

     It is difficult

to get the news from poems

                         yet men die miserably every day

for lack

of what is found there.
  

In an essay written for Poetry. philosopher Richard Rorty said, "individual men and women are more fully human when their memories are amply stocked with verses."  Surely Isaac would have agreed!

Perhaps reviving the old habit of memorizing poetry might be worth considering.  If so, Rudyard Kipling's advice to his son in the poem, "If," might be a good poem to select.

Rudyard Kipling

If you can keep your head when all around you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you
But make allowance for their doubting too,...

If you can dream--and not make dreams your master,
If you can think--and not make thoughts your aim;...

If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;

If all men count with you, but none too much...

...you'll be a Man, my son!  

(All of the poets pictured were living before or during Isaac's lifetime, although not all had begun publishing their poetry prior to his death.)











Who reads Shakespeare?

Visit to Shakespeare's Birthplace

I cannot answer who reads Shakespeare today, but in the 1800s many people did, and  Isaac Werner was certainly among those readers.  On December 31, 1870, he wrote in his journal:  "The following works I long to possess...in the course of time to possess them all, and arranged in my library...Clark's Concordona to Shakespeare and some future time also one of the very best large editions of Shakespeare, and so we can cultivate deeper familiarity with authors the more we long to read their works and see the best we can the individuals themselves."  On January 4, 1871 he recorded in his journal having ordered that book, along with Wealth of Nations, Don Quixote, Wharton's History of English Poetry, and several others.   

 

Isaac was unusual among many boys of that era, for at the age of 17 he and his twin brother were still attending school in Wernersville, PA where they were raised.  Clearly, he had received more education than many of his peers.  However, as a young druggist in Rossville, IL he chose to spend much of his income acquiring a personal library and continuing his learning.  (See blog post "Isaac's Library, February 2, 2012)  For the rest of his life he enjoyed Shakespeare, describing in his journal during his years as a homesteader on the prairie many evenings spent reading Shakespeare.

On January 26, 1871, Isaac recorded the list of books he had ordered, including the prices he had paid for them.  Clark's Concordona to Shakespeare was the second most expensive of all the books, at $11.25.  (Don Quixote cost $12.)  To put this cost into context, I researched average earnings in 1870.  According to ask.com, the average yearly income for 1870 was $129.  According to a book no longer in print titled the National Bureau of Economic Research, hourly wages that year ranged between 17 and 41 cents per hour.  Can you imagine wanting a book so badly that you would spend 12% of your annual income to buy it?! 

Title Page to Shakespeare's 1st Folio

Isaac was not alone in his love of Shakespeare.  According to Abraham Lincoln's aide, John Hay, President Lincoln "read Shakespeare more than all other writers together."  We even know which of Shakespeare's plays was Lincoln's favorite, for in 1863 he wrote a letter to Shakespearean actor James Hackett saying, "I think nothing equals Macbeth.  It is wonderful."  Ironically, following Lincoln's assassination the murder of King Duncan in that play was often compared to Lincoln's own death.

For many children of that era--as families pushed westward and often lived on isolated farms or struggled beside their parents just to survive--formal education was not possible.  If these children learned to read and write, they had to learn at home, and often the only books from which to learn were the Bible and Shakespeare--if they were lucky.

One of my favorite quotes from a child of this historic period describing his discovery of the works of Shakespeare comes from the famous lecturer, Robert Ingersoll, who was not so lucky as Lincoln to have Shakespeare in his home.  Ingersoll was in his teens, already on his own in search of work when he heard an old man reading aloud in a small hotel.  He was "filled with wonder," and when everyone left the room for supper, Ingersoll lagged behind to read the title of what the man had been reading, too ashamed to have simply asked the man when he felt the book must be something "an intelligent boy ought to know."  The book was Samuel Johnson's edition of Shakespeare.  Poor and getting by through traveling to offer himself for work wherever it could be found, Ingersoll spent $4 of his meager earnings for his own copy of the book the next morning!  Years later, this is what he wrote about the experience.  "For days, for nights, for months, for years, I read those books, two volumes, and I commenced with the introduction.  I haven't read that introduction for nearly fifty years, certainly forty-five, but I remember it still.  Other writers are like a garden diligently planted and watered, but Shakespeare a forest where the oaks and elms toss their branches to the storm, where the pine towers, where the vine bursts into blossoms at its foot.  That book opened to me a new world, another nature..."

Tableaux recreating scene from Shakespeare's era

How many of us today have read Shakespeare since one or two of his plays were assigned to us in high school?  Perhaps that is because Shakespeare's plays were written to be performed, and as a result, they are better heard than read silently.  The plays are still performed, and many have been adapted for the screen.  Romeo and Juliet may have been adapted more than any other, including George Cukor's 1936 adaptation in which the main characters, Norma Shearer and Leslie Howard, had a combined age of 75!  The beautiful 1968 adaptation by Franco Zeffirelli, that attracted many young fans to Shakespeare, cast teenagers Leonard Whiting as Romeo and Olivia Hussey as the Juliet that I will forever picture in my mind.  For the younger MTV generation, Baz Luhrmann's 1996 version cast Leonardo DiCaprio and Claire Dane as the young lovers.

Shakespeare Theater in Ashland, OR

Sometimes movie versions are inspired by Shakespeare's plays rather than being adaptations.  Two hugely popular movies based on Shakespeare's plays are West Side Story, based on Romeo and Juliet, and The Lion King, based on Hamlet. 

Sadly for Isaac, there is no indication that I have found that he ever saw Shakespeare performed, but he read it with friends and he read it alone.  He, like many other great men of that era and since, elevated their minds by reading Shakespeare.  If you have a dusty volume of Shakespeare on a bookcase somewhere, you might consider pulling it off the shelf to read something young men were once willing to spend money earned with days of sweat and toil to buy a challenging book. 

To read a wonderful analysis of Lincoln's interest in Shakespeare you may visit www.abrahamlincolnsclassroom.org/Library/newsletter.asp?ID=21&CRLI=101.

 

Isaac's Library

I immediately formed a kinship with Isaac because of our common love for books. When Isaac's Journal begins in December of 1870, he is a druggist in Rossville, Illinois, in his mid-twenties. He is prospering, with every bit of money he can set aside spent on books, views for his stereoscope, and portrait cards of famous people that he kept in albums. He had a curious mind that he wanted to fill with the writings of great authors, pictures of the world, and images of important people, and he was determined to build his collections, despite being criticized by some of his less literary friends. About the money he spent, he wrote in his Journal: "Some get rid of a good deal [of money] in horses and buggies, great many in whisky, and how many on women? Ike [Isaac] fools good deal away in Books and Views and Pictures." That is not to suggest that Isaac wasn't keeping his eyes open for a well-educated young lady. He tried charming one young miss by loaning her some of his art books, and he paid particular attention to a bright young bookkeeper at Henderson & Lee's store, the first female employed in that position in town. He was also quite interested in a young woman who played chess and appreciated music, but unfortunately for Isaac, none of these relationships matured into a romance.

From his successful business he had assets he could have invested or loaned at profitable rates of interest, but instead he continued to buy books, explaining in his Journal: "How interesting and delightful such reading is and the daily increase in familiarity with such noble literary monuments. When I think back over all my best investments yet made, what I done [sic] in good Books I must consider the Master stroke of all. What a permanent and ever increasing value does such an investment bring..."

These words were written when he was young, but even during the hard times as a homesteader on the Kansas prairie, he treasured his books and added to his library occasionally. Most of the later additions were of a practical nature and often pamphlets rather than beautifully bound volumes, but he never doubted the value of books. Isaac would have agreed completely with Barbara Tuchman, who wrote, "Books are the carriers of civilization. Without books, history is silent, literature dumb, science crippled, thought and speculation at a standstill."

Many of the books in Isaac's library are still read today--Mark Twain's Innocents Abroad, Gibbon's History of the Roman Empire, Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations, Edward Bellamy's Looking Backward, Cervantes's Don Quixote, monthly issues of "Scientific American" which he had bound. He also collected books of art, philosophy, engineering, law, economics, political theory, logic, travel, and languages. He had reference books about Shakespeare, the Bible, and Dictionaries of words, authors, and artists. Among them all, he seemed to love Shakespeare best. I can picture Isaac sitting in his early dugout, before he had built his house and still lacking a horse to ride to the nearest town, reading Shakespeare by lamplight.

I was so curious about the books Isaac read that I went to some of my favorite used book websites and ordered the oldest editions I could find of titles he had mentioned. I guess you might say that Isaac and I formed a book club! Pictured are the following: Progress & Poverty by Henry George, Twain's Innocents Abroad, A Comprehensive Dictionary of Organ Stops, Classical Antiquities, Cuba with Pen & Pencil, Theory of Spencerian Penmanship, Bain's Logic: Deductive & Inductive, Cooper's Justinian, and The Culture Demanded by Modern Life. The books on art and travel that I would have particularly enjoyed could not be found, but the sampling I read impressed me with Isaac's thirst for knowledge. Surely you can understand why I must tell the story of this remarkable man!

[The stereoscope and views in the photograph belonged to my ancestors. I do know from Isaac's Journal, however, that he visited my great grandparents, Aaron & Susan Beck, and shared his stereoscope views with them.