Rebel Souls: Walt Whitman and America's First Bohemians

327 Pages·2014·8.34 MB·English

by  Justin Martin

Copyright
Copyright © 2014 by Justin Martin
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or
transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or
otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher. Printed in the United States of
America. For information, address Da Capo Press, 44 Farnsworth Street, Boston, MA 02210.
Cover design by Jonathan Sainsbury
Book design by Brent Wilcox and Cynthia Young
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Martin, Justin.
Rebel Souls : Walt Whitman and America’s First Bohemians / Justin Martin.
pages cm.—(A Merloyd Lawrence book)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-306-82226-1 (hardback)—ISBN 978-0-30682227-8 (e-book) 1. Whitman, Walt,
1819–1892—Friends and associates. 2. Bohemianism—New York (State)—New York—History
—19th century. 3. New York (N.Y.) Intellectual life—19th century. 4. Ward, Artemus, 1834–
1867. 5. Booth, Edwin, 1833–1893. 6. Ludlow, Fitz Hugh, 1836–1870. 7. Menken, Adah Isaacs,
1835-1868. 8. Bars (Drinking establishments)—New York (State)—New York—History—19th
century. I. Title.
PS3231.M19 2014
811’.3—dc20
[B]
2014008822
Published as a Merloyd Lawrence Book by Da Capo Press
A Member of the Perseus Books Group
www.dacapopress.com
Da Capo Press books are available at special discounts for bulk purchases in the U.S. by
corporations, institutions, and other organizations. For more information, please contact the
Special Markets Department at the Perseus Books Group, 2300 Chestnut Street, Suite 200,
Philadelphia, PA 19103, or call [phone], ext. 5000, or e-mail
[email protected].
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
To Rex and Donna Martin, my parents, who have
always managed to embrace the best of Bohemia

“Bohemia” comes but once in one’s life.
Let’s treasure even its memory.
—WALT WHITMAN
At Pfaff’s! At Pfaff’s! At Pfaff’s!
—Toast the Bohemians would make at their legendary saloon
Contents
Photo Credits
Introduction: A Visit to Pfaff’s
1: Bohemia Crosses the Atlantic
2: A Long Table in a Vaulted Room
3: Whitman at a Crossroads
4: Hashish and Shakespeare
5: Bold Women and Whitman’s Beautiful Boys
6: The Saturday Press
7: Leaves, Third Edition
8: Year of Meteors
9: Becoming Artemus Ward
10: “The Heather Is on Fire”
11: Whitman to the Front
12: Bohemia Goes West
13: The Soldiers’ Missionary
14: Twain They Shall Meet
15: “O heart! heart! heart!”
16: A Brief Revival
17: All Fall Down
18: “Those Times, That Place”
Photographs
Acknowledgments
Notes
Further Exploration
Index
About the Author
Photo Credits
Photographs
Broadway in the 1860s (Courtesy of New-York Historical Society) Henry Clapp Jr. (Courtesy of
special collections, Fine Arts Library, Harvard University) Ada Clare (Courtesy of the Bancroft
Library, University of California, Berkeley) Whitman, 1854 (Courtesy of the Library of
Congress)
Whitman frontispiece from Leaves of Grass 1860 edition (Courtesy of New York Public Library)
Leaves of Grass title page (Courtesy of New York Public Library) Whitman at Pfaff’s (Courtesy
of Harper’s Magazine) Menken reclining (Courtesy of collection of Houghton Library, Harvard
University) Menken in Mazeppa (Courtesy of Victoria and Albert Museum) Fitz Hugh Ludlow
(Courtesy of special collections, Schaffer Library, Union College) Artemus Ward (Courtesy of
special collections, Fine Arts Library, Harvard University) Abraham Lincoln (Courtesy of the
Library of Congress)
Mark Twain (Courtesy of the Library of Congress)
Harper’s meteor cover (Courtesy of Texas State University) Armory Square Hospital (Courtesy of
the Library of Congress) Whitman and Doyle (Courtesy of the Library of Congress)
Edwin Booth (Courtesy of the Library of Congress)
Booth brothers (Courtesy of Brown University archives)
Julius Caesar playbill (Courtesy of New York Public Library for the Performing Arts/Billy Rose
Theatre Division) Whitman as good gray poet (Courtesy of the Library of Congress) All other
photos are in the public domain.