(Providence, Rhode Island; Massachusetts: 1817-1823; 1833).
Price: $12,000.00
Hardcover. Commonplace Book. Octavo (5¼” x 8”). Contains approximately 120 manuscript pages in ink on the rectos and versos, consisting of quoted extracts and occasional personal reflections written by John Winslow Whitman and his sister Caroline, and a final page possibly in the hand of Sarah Whitman written soon after the death of her husband in 1833. Original soft calf over boards stamped in dark brown, red leather spine label lettered in gold: “Trash Book." Owner name: “J. Winslow Whitman B.U. [Brown University] 1817” and quotation from Horace in Latin on first leaf recto. With Whitman’s younger sister’s name: “Caroline Whitman” in ink on back pastedown, and a later faint name: “Samuel Robinson” on first leaf recto. The leather binding is rubbed and worn, text block is shaken at the spine, a few leaves have been removed, two leaves are partly torn with some loss of text, else good overall, with most manuscript pages fully legible throughout.
An intriguing commonplace book kept by John Winslow Whitman while a student at Brown University. A poet and lawyer at Boston, for five years until his death (1828-33), he was the husband of Sarah Helen Whitman (nee Power). Before he graduated in 1818, Winslow (as his family called him) often visited Sarah’s home in Providence. Although at first Winslow was in pursuit of Sarah’s older sister Rebecca, he and Sarah developed a close relationship and they became engaged in 1824 and married four years later. In addition to his law practice, Winslow was affiliated with the literary periodical *The Ladies’ Album* and a newspaper called *The Times*, both of which published and promoted Sarah’s poetry, essays, and criticism. After his untimely death in 1833, Sarah kept his name and would later grow close to Poe in the 1840s.
This commonplace book is chiefly comprised of quoted extracts of poetry and prose entered by Winslow and Caroline, including some of their own poetry and prose interspersed with occasional personal reflections. Most of Winslow’s entries appear to date from 1817-18. Here for example is a paragraph from a long letter entered by Winslow:
“How very few are there, who are sensible of the many sacrifices a woman makes, when she marries. How important is it then, to every delicate & feeling mind, that they should consider well before they resign their liberty: & that the object of her choice should be sensible of her value … .” Winslow identifies the author only as “Mrs. G-----r’s Letter, Oct. 1817.” Among Caroline’s entries is her own long poem: “The Flight – addressed to the Female Reading Society, Pembroke [Mass.] – on their 7th anniversary [1818].”
Also included are several entries in one or two other hands (dating up through 1823), including a few signed “S.L.R.” (Samuel Robinson?). Of particular interest is an original poem written in four, four-line stanzas at the back of the book. It is introduced at the head of the page as a “Copy of lines found amongst papers of John W. Whitman, after his decease” [1833]:
“The Last of the Buccaneers
The dark flag has sunk – the pirates last bark
Exists but amid the blue caves of the sea,
The freebooters wave with tempest is dark
And the shallop of Death waits now but for me.
I fear not her rocking – the brave have been here
And stem’d the rude tide, which buffets me now,
I cannot, I will not, to Fate give a tear,
But pull at the oar to give speed to her prow.
Like one who may dive to the caves of the deep,
To bring up a gem, that shall dazzle the skies
I spring to the caverns where freebooters sleep,
And who must not give at some time his course
To thy shallop, grim Death, & thou at the helm;
Then why should I shrink, or turn pale with remorse,
When thy sea must at last all nations overwhelm.”
An examination of holograph poems and letters by Sarah Helen Whitman in the 1840s shows that this last poem by Winslow was likely handwritten and entered into the journal by Sarah. An intriguing commonplace book documenting the shared literary aspirations of Sarah Whitman and her husband, and shedding light on her growth after his death into an independent poet who would later enter into a tempestuous romantic relationship with Edgar Allan Poe.
Item #563731
