RIP The Final Impression

On this day in 1700, poet, literary critic, translator, and playwright John Dryden died in London at the age of 68. Born on 19 August [O.S. 9 August] 1631 in Aldwincle, Thrapston, Northamptonshire, England. Dryden was made England’s first Poet Laureate in 1668. His influenced the literary life of Restoration England to such a point that the period came to be known in literary circles as the Age of Dryden. Walter Scott called him “Glorious John”.

Dryden, by John Michael Wright, 1668

Dryden, by James Maubert, c. 1695

Dryden is believed to be the first person to posit that English sentences should not end in prepositions because Latin sentences cannot end in prepositions. Dryden created the proscription against preposition stranding in 1672 when he objected to Ben Jonson‘s 1611 phrase, “the bodies that those souls were frighted from”, though he did not provide the rationale for his preference. Dryden often translated his writing into Latin, to check whether his writing was concise and elegant, Latin being considered an elegant and long-lived language with which to compare; then Dryden translated his writing back to English according to Latin-grammar usage. As Latin does not have sentences ending in prepositions, Dryden may have applied Latin grammar to English, thus forming the rule of no sentence-ending prepositions, subsequently adopted by other writers.

The phrase “blaze of glory” is believed to have originated in Dryden’s 1686 poem The Hind and the Panther, referring to the throne of God as a “blaze of glory that forbids the sight”.

On 1 December 1663 Dryden married Lady Elizabeth Howard (died 1714). The marriage was at St. Swithin’s, London, and the consent of the parents is noted on the licence, though Lady Elizabeth was then about twenty-five. She was the object of some scandals, well or ill founded; it was said that Dryden had been bullied into the marriage by her brothers. A small estate in Wiltshire was settled upon them by her father. The lady’s intellect and temper were apparently not good; her husband was treated as an inferior by those of her social status. Lady Elizabeth Dryden survived her husband, but went insane soon after his death. Though some have historically claimed to be from the lineage of John Dryden, his three children had no children themselves.

The Final Footprint

Dryden was initially buried in St. Anne’s cemetery in Soho, before being exhumed and reburied in Westminster Abbey ten days later. He was the subject of poetic eulogies, such as Luctus Brittannici: or the Tears of the British Muses; for the Death of John Dryden, Esq. (London, 1700), and The Nine Muses. A Royal Society of Arts blue plaque commemorates Dryden at 43 Gerrard Street in London’s Chinatown. Other notable Final Footprints at Westminster include; Robert Browning, Lord Byron, Charles II, Geoffrey Chaucer, Oliver Cromwell, Charles Darwin, Charles Dickens, Edward III, Edward VI, Edward The Confessor, Elizabeth I, George II, George Frideric Handel, Stephen Hawking, Henry III, Henry V, Henry VII, James I (James VI of Scotland), Samuel Johnson, Ben Jonson, Rudyard Kipling, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Mary I, Mary II, Mary Queen of Scots, John Milton, Isaac Newton, Laurence Olivier, Henry Purcell, Thomas Shadwell, Edmund Spenser, Lord Alfred Tennyson, Dylan Thomas, and William III

Dryden near end of his life

“A man is to be cheated into passion, but to be reasoned into truth.”

Lines 789–795 of Book 2 when Aeneas sees and receives a message from the ghost of his wife, Creusa.

iamque vale et nati serva communis amorem.’
haec ubi dicta dedit, lacrimantem et multa volentem
dicere deseruit, tenuisque recessit in auras.
ter conatus ibi collo dare bracchia circum;
ter frustra comprensa manus effugit imago,
par levibus ventis volucrique simillima somno.
sic demum socios consumpta nocte reviso

Dryden translates it like this:

I trust our common issue to your care.’
She said, and gliding pass’d unseen in air.
I strove to speak: but horror tied my tongue;
And thrice about her neck my arms I flung,
And, thrice deceiv’d, on vain embraces hung.
Light as an empty dream at break of day,
Or as a blast of wind, she rush’d away.
Thus having pass’d the night in fruitless pain,
I to my longing friends return again

On this day in 1850, poet Frances Sargent Osgood died of tuberculosis at her home in New York City at the age of 38. Born Frances Sargent Locke on June 18, 1811 in Boston. She was one of the most popular women writers during her time. Nicknamed “Fanny”, she was also famous for her exchange of romantic poems with Edgar Allan Poe. In 1834, while composing poems inspired by paintings, Frances met Samuel Stillman Osgood, a young portrait artist at the Boston Athenaeum. He asked her to sit for a portrait. They were engaged before the portrait was finished and married on October 7, 1835.

In February 1845, Poe gave a lecture in New York in which he criticized American poetry, especially that of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. He made special mention, however, of Osgood, saying she had “a rosy future” in literature. Though she missed the lecture, she wrote to her friend, saying Poe was “called the severest critic of the day”, making his compliment that much more impressive.

It is believed Poe and Osgood first met in person when introduced by Nathaniel Parker Willis in March 1845 when Osgood had been separated from (but not divorced from) her husband. Poe’s wife, Virginia, was still alive, but in ill health. Poe may have been attracted to Osgood because they were both born in Boston and possibly due to her childlike qualities which were similar to Virginia’s. She may have already been in an early stage of tuberculosis, just like Virginia.

In 1845, Poe used his role as one-third owner of the Broadway Journal to print some of Osgood’s poems, including some flirtatious ones: “The Rivulet’s Dream” (1845), “So Let It Be. To–” (1845), “Love’s Reply” (1845), “Spring” (1845), “Slander” (1845), “Echo-Song” (1845), “To–” (1845), “A Shipwreck” (1845) and “To ‘The Lady Geraldine” (1845). Poe responded with published poems of his own, occasionally under his pseudonym of Edgar T. S. Grey. Most notable is his poem “A Valentine”. The poem is actually a riddle which conceals Osgood’s name, found by taking letter 1 from line 1, letter 2 from line 2, and so on. Despite these passionate interchanges, the relationship between Poe and Osgood is often considered purely platonic.

Virginia approved of the relationship and often invited Osgood to visit their home. Virginia believed their friendship had a “restraining” effect on her husband. Poe had given up alcohol to impress Osgood, for example. Virginia may also have been aware of her own impending death and was looking for someone who would take care of Poe. Osgood’s husband, Samuel, also did not object, apparently used to his wife’s impetuous behavior. He himself had a reputation as a philanderer.

The Final Footprint

Her last word, “angel”, was written on a slate to her husband. She was buried in her parents’ lot at Mount Auburn Cemetery in Cambridge, Massachusetts. In 1851, a collection of her writings was published by her friends and titled The Memorial, Written by Friends of the Late Mrs. Frances Sargent Locke Osgood. It was reissued as Laurel Leaves in 1854. The volume was meant to raise money for her memorial headstone. However, Fanny Fern noted that, by 1854, the plot remained unmarked and criticized Samuel Osgood in her book Fern Leaves from Fanny’s Port-Folio. Samuel Osgood noted in the New York Evening Post that he had already designed a monument, inspired by her poem “The Hand That Swept the Sounding Lyre”, which was soon installed. Other notable final footprints at Mount Auburn include; Winslow Homer, Julia Ward Howe, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Amy Lowell (see below), and Bernard Malamud.

On this day in 1925, poet Amy Lowell died of a cerebral hemorrhage in Brookline, Massachusetts, at the age of 51. Born Amy Lawrence Lowell on February 9, 1874 in Brookline. Her poetry is classified as being from the imagist school. She posthumously won the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry in 1926.

In 1912 she and actress Ada Dwyer Russell were reputed to be lovers. Russell is possibly the subject of Lowell’s more erotic works, most notably the love poems contained in ‘Two Speak Together’, a subsection of Pictures of the Floating World. The two women traveled to England together, where Lowell met Ezra Pound, who at once became a major influence and a major critic of her work. Pound considered Lowell’s embrace of Imagism to be a kind of hijacking of the movement. Lowell has been linked romantically to writer Mercedes de Acosta.

Lowell publicly smoked cigars, as newspapers of the day frequently mentioned. Journalist Heywood Broun in his obituary tribute to Amy wrote, “She was upon the surface of things a Lowell, a New Englander and a spinster. But inside everything was molten like the core of the earth… Given one more gram of emotion, Amy Lowell would have burst into flame and been consumed to cinders.”

The Final Footprint

Lowell is interred in Mount Auburn Cemetery in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Other notable final footprints at Mount Auburn include; Winslow Homer, Julia Ward Howe, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Bernard Malamud, and Frances Sargent Osgood (see above).

#RIP #OTD in 1980 singer and actress, her life story was told in her memoir and 1955 film I’ll Cry Tomorrow (portrayed by Susan Hayward, who was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actress), Lillian Roth died at De Witt Nursing Home in Manhattan aged 69. Mount Pleasant Cemetery, Hawthorne, New York

#RIP #OTD in 1985 painter and sculptor of the Ecole de Paris, founder of the art movement art brut, Jean Debuffet died from emphysema in Paris aged 83. Cimetière de Tubersent, France