++Burroughs_John_1.jpg)
A man can fail many times, but he isn't a failure until he begins to blame somebody else.
J. Burroughs
一个人可以失败许多次，但只要他没有开始责斥别人，他还不算个失败者。
J·巴勒斯
【姑布评议】
J. Burroughs
一个人可以失败许多次，但只要他没有开始责斥别人，他还不算个失败者。
J·巴勒斯
【姑布评议】
关于不可败论可有不少版本了，经常是人造的神话，因为基于能人的创世之说。无论是独孤求败还是东方不败，虽说很孤独，但又何尝不令俗夫羡煞，如果撇开性别、政治论的话。但是，对于没有他们聪慧又刻苦努力的求道者而言，无非有两条道路：一条是通往沉默、克制直至可能无所事事或毫无建树地终其一身，或者是一条继续痴狂地求道、历尽万苦千辛仍不言败、最后失败的下场那课仍然在迷狂地憧憬着。无疑，后一种更需要别样的见地和达识，也就是接近于不可败的神话和绝伦的悟道！你只能说，实在实在难得，或实在难得难得！J·巴勒斯似乎在说，只要有热情和执著，总会有出头之日，可是，谁知道这出头之日系指什么，许多急盼盼的人可能已经历岁月的淘洗，看不见黄金，因为只有在少数的山谷溪涧之中，并且在偶然之机或有断定之艺才能达到目的。从这种意义上说，还要顾及你向往的成功的涵义！不过，如果从人生处世行事的大角度看待成功的要义，学会不去责怪别人，自强不息、永攀高峰，无疑你已经是一重山峰！
【作者简介】
John Burroughs (1837-1921)
General Resources
John Burroughs: American Nature Writer, 1837-1921 (Walt Carroll's site, mirror at the English Department of Texas Tech.)
Catskill Archive: John Burroughs (Tim Mallery)
The John Burroughs Page (John Burroughs Association)
The John Burroughs Pages (American Museum of Natural History Library)
Ecology Hall of Fame: Burroughs Writings
In the Catskills (HTML at LOC)
General Resources
John Burroughs: American Nature Writer, 1837-1921 (Walt Carroll's site, mirror at the English Department of Texas Tech.)
Catskill Archive: John Burroughs (Tim Mallery)
The John Burroughs Page (John Burroughs Association)
The John Burroughs Pages (American Museum of Natural History Library)
Ecology Hall of Fame: Burroughs Writings
In the Catskills (HTML at LOC)
约翰·巴勒斯
维基百科，自由的百科全书
跳转到: 导航, 搜索
约翰·巴勒斯(John Burroughs，1837年4月3日-1921年3月29日)，美国博物学家、散文家，美国环保运动中的重要人物。国会图书馆美国记忆项目中的传记作家，将约翰·巴勒斯视作继梭罗之后，美国文学的自然散文领域中，最重要的实践者。
1871年，巴勒斯的Wake-Robin问世[1]，此后相继出版了许多著作，获得了极大的声誉。传记作家Edward Renehan认为，巴勒斯不只是一位科学的博物学者，更是一位有责任心记录自己对大自然独特视角的人文博物学者。其著作在文化上产生了很大的共鸣，当时造成了极大的影响，而此后则相对淡化。
目录[隐藏]
1 早期生活
2 婚姻与职业
3 写作
4 约翰·巴勒斯协会
5 书目
6 注释
7 外部链接
//
[编辑] 早期生活
巴勒斯是Chauncy 和 Amy Kelly Burroughs十个子女中的第七个，他出生于卡兹奇山的家庭农场中，靠近纽约州特拉华县的Roxbury镇。孩提时代，巴勒斯把很多时间都花在Old Clump Mountain的斜坡上，在那里可以向东远眺，看到卡兹奇山的最高峰，特别是Slide Mountain，以后巴勒斯再著作中会有提及。他在当地的同学中包括Jay Gould。
17岁时巴勒斯离开学校，成为一名教师，同时他在一些机构中作研究，包括Cooperstown学院。在那里他接触到了威廉·华兹华斯和拉尔夫·沃尔多·爱默生，他们对自然的关注，以及对精神的追求，对巴勒斯产生了终生的影响。1856年7月，他来开学院，前往伊利诺斯州Buffalo Grove的一个小村庄。在那里他教学数年，还曾返回东部与“遗落的女孩”结婚。[2][3]
[编辑] 婚姻与职业
1857年9月12日，巴勒斯与厄休拉·诺斯（1836年-1917年）结婚。而后巴勒斯继续教书生涯，并着手写作出版。夫妻俩省吃俭用，一直到1859年才建起自己的居所。
1860年，巴勒斯的写作终于有所收获，当时的新兴杂志《大西洋月刊》接受了其作品《Expression》，编辑詹姆斯·拉塞尔·洛维尔发现其作品与爱默生的风格很像，他起初甚至认为巴勒斯抄袭了他的老朋友。另外一首小诗《Waiting》也引起一些关注。
1864年，巴勒斯在美国财政部某得一个职位，后来他成为联邦银行的主考者，一直任职到1880年代。期间他继续出版，并对沃尔特·惠特曼的诗歌产生了兴趣。美国内战时期，巴勒斯与惠特曼在华盛顿见面，并成为亲密的朋友。
惠特曼鼓励巴勒斯发展自己的天赋，同时坚持创作自己的哲理和文学散文。1867年，巴勒斯出版了《Walt Whitman as Poet and Person》（沃尔特·惠特曼个人与诗人），这是第一部关于惠特曼的传记与评论著作，出版前经过惠特曼（匿名）修订与编辑。
四年后，the Boston house of Hurd & Houghton 出版了巴勒斯的首部自然散文合集《Wake-Robin》[1]。
1874年，巴勒斯在纽约州的West Park（现在属于Esopus镇）购买了一个大农场。他在那里种植了大量农作物，后来他又主要种植鲜食葡萄，同时坚持写作，并继续任职于联邦银行数年。该地后被命名为Riverby。
1894年秋天，巴勒斯在附近又买了一些土地，他和儿子朱利安·巴勒斯（1878年12月15日-1954年）盖了一个阿尔岗金族风格[4]的木屋，后被命名为Slabsides。在那里，巴勒斯种植了大片的芹菜，并招待来访者，包括瓦瑟学院（Vassar College）的学生。
1900年后，巴勒斯将其出生地附近的一所农舍粉刷一新，并取名为Woodchuck Lodge。这里后来成为其夏季的居所，直至其去世。
巴勒斯写了30多本著作，在杂志上先后发表了数百篇散文、诗歌。
他的一些佳作创作于卡兹奇山旅行归来。1880年代后期，在散文"The Heart of the Southern Catskills"（南部卡兹奇山之心）中，他对攀登卡兹奇山脉最高峰Slide Mountain作了记录。谈及登顶后所见，它这样写道，“"The works of man dwindle, and the original features of the huge globe come out. Every single object or point is dwarfed; the valley of the Hudson is only a wrinkle in the earth's surface. You discover with a feeling of surprise that the great thing is the earth itself, which stretches away on every hand so far beyond your ken.”为纪念其登顶成功，他的部分语句已经被刻于突出的岩石上，被称为Burroughs Ledge。附近的Cornell和Wittenberg 山，巴勒斯也曾攀登过，因此被合称为巴勒斯山脉。
还有一些卡兹奇山的散文中，不乏冷幽默，还有令人肃然起敬的描述，包括飞钓（fly fishing）鳟鱼，在Peekamoose山脉以及Mill Brook Ridge中徒步，沿特拉华河东面支流乘筏漂流。尽管巴勒斯在很多地方旅行过，并写有很多地区和国家的游记，也参与过一些自然科学的争论，包括当时的新理论自然选择，但在卡兹奇山区，巴勒斯依然为人津津乐道，知名度颇高。他对哲学和文学问题也有涉猎，1896年，也就是惠特曼去世后的第四年，他又写了一本关于这位诗人的著作，彰显了惠特曼美德在文学中的地位。
在巴勒斯后期，他与那个时代的不少名人都有交往，包括西奥多·罗斯福、约翰·缪尔、亨利·福特（他将一辆汽车赠送给巴勒斯，是哈德森山谷的第一辆汽车）、哈威·费尔斯通以及托马斯·爱迪生。1899年，他参与了E. H. Harriman的阿拉斯加探险。
与厄休拉结婚后，由于妻子极度憎恶肉体关系，这对夫妇产生矛盾。1901年，巴勒斯遇到了仰慕者克拉拉·Barrus（1864年-1931年），她是纽约Middletown的州精神病医院的内科医生，当时克拉拉37岁。她成为巴勒斯的挚爱，并最后成为其文学的遗嘱执行人。1917年厄休拉去世后，克拉拉搬来与巴勒斯同住。
1921年年春，巴勒斯在从加利福尼亚返回的火车上去世。而后在其84岁生日那天，他被安葬于Roxbury镇，位于岩壁脚下，孩提时代他曾在那里玩耍。
1962年，Woodchuck Lodge被指定为国家历史地标，1968年，Riverby和Slabsides也获得同样的待遇。这三处都被列入国家历史遗迹。
巴勒斯当时获得了很高的声誉。有一项以他命名的自然写作奖，美国还有11所以他命名的学校，包括密尔沃基和洛杉矶的公立中学，一所加利福尼亚州伯班克的公立高中，明尼阿波利斯的巴勒斯小学，以及圣路易斯的约翰·巴勒斯中学。
[编辑] 写作
巴勒斯的许多散文在流行杂志上首发，他对观鸟、花草和乡间情景的描写广为人知，其散文还涉及宗教和文学。他是沃尔特·惠特曼何拉尔夫·沃尔多·爱默生的忠实支持者，对亨利·戴维·梭罗则有所批评。
[编辑] 约翰·巴勒斯协会
为了纪念巴勒斯，在其1921年去世后，成立了约翰·巴勒斯协会。
[编辑] 书目
Notes on Walt Whitman as Poet and Person (1867)
Wake Robin (1871)
Winter Sunshine (1875), (travel sketches)
Birds and Poets (1877)
Locusts and Wild Honey (1879)
Pepacton (1881)
Fresh Fields (1884), (travel sketches)
Signs and Seasons (1886)
Birds and bees and other studies in nature (1896)
Indoor Studies (1889)
Riverby (1894)
Whitman: A Study (1896)
The Light of Day (1900)
Squirrels and Other Fur-Bearers (1900)
Songs of Nature (Editor) (1901)
John James Audubon (1902), (biography)
Literary Values and other Papers (1902)
Far and Near (1904)
Ways of Nature (1905)
Camping and Tramping with Roosevelt (1906)
Bird and Bough (1906), (poetry)
Afoot and Afloat (1907)
Leaf and Tendril (1908)
Time and Change (1912)
The Summit of the Years (1913)
The Breath of Life (1915)
Under the Apple-Trees (1916)
Field and Study (1919)
Accepting the Universe (1920)
Under the Maples (1921)
The Last Harvest (1922)
My Boyhood, with a Conclusion by His Son Julian Burroughs (1922)
Books About John Burroughs
Our Friend John Burroughs by Clara Barrus (Boston and New York, Houghton Mifflin Company, The Riverside Press Cambridge, 1914)
John Burroughs Boy and Man by Clara Barrus (Garden City New York Doubleday, Page & Company, 1920)
The Life and Letters of John Burroughs by Clara Barrus (Volume 1, Boston and New York, Houghton Mifflin Company, The Riverside Press Cambridge, 1925)
John Burroughs: An American Naturalist by Edward J. Renehan Jr. (Chelsea, VT: Chelsea Green, 1992; paperback - Hensonville, NY: Black Dome Press, 1998)
John Burroughs and The Place of Nature by James Perrin Warren (Athens, GA: University of Georgia Press, 2006)
John Burroughs: An American Naturalist by Edward J. Renehan, Jr. (Black Dome Press)
Sharp Eyes: John Burroughs and American Nature Writing edited by Charlotte Zoe Walker, ed. (Syracuse University Press)
The Art Of Seeing Things by John Burroughs edited by Charlotte Zoe Walker, ed. (Syracuse University Press)
John Burroughs: The Sage of Slabsides by Ginger Wadsworth (Clarion Books)
[编辑] 注释
^ 1.0 1.1 有翻译作《延龄草》，另有简体中文译本《醒来的森林》，生活·读书·新知三联书店，2004年
^ Buffalo Grove
^ Our Friend John Burroughs / Barrus, Clara
^ Adirondack-style，阿尔岗金族属于印第安人，这种风格的建筑采用原木搭建，强调自然的感觉
[编辑] 外部链接
维基共享资源中相关的多媒体资源：
约翰·巴勒斯
维基语录上的相关摘录：
约翰·巴勒斯
维基文库中相关的原始文献：
约翰·巴勒斯
http://zh.wikisource.org/wiki/约翰·巴勒斯
John Burroughs的作品 - 古腾堡计划
约翰·巴勒斯协会
卡兹奇山档案的约翰·巴勒斯页
约翰·巴勒斯的作品
American Memory In the Catskills
Afterword to John Burroughs: An American Naturalist by Edward J. Renehan Jr.（约翰·巴勒斯：美国自然主义者）
The Half More Satisfying Than the Whole: John Burroughs and the Hudson by Edward J. Renehan Jr.
Rediscovering John Burroughs' Catskills Retreat: Woodchuck Lodge by Edward J. Renehan Jr.
Bird and Bough by John Burroughs. Complete text of his only book of published poems plus poems published in periodicals; also public domain recordings of his poems.
Quotes by John Burroughs
取自"http://zh.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=%E7%BA%A6%E7%BF%B0%C2%B7%E5%B7%B4%E5%8B%92%E6%96%AF&variant=zh-cn"
维基百科，自由的百科全书
跳转到: 导航, 搜索
约翰·巴勒斯(John Burroughs，1837年4月3日-1921年3月29日)，美国博物学家、散文家，美国环保运动中的重要人物。国会图书馆美国记忆项目中的传记作家，将约翰·巴勒斯视作继梭罗之后，美国文学的自然散文领域中，最重要的实践者。
1871年，巴勒斯的Wake-Robin问世[1]，此后相继出版了许多著作，获得了极大的声誉。传记作家Edward Renehan认为，巴勒斯不只是一位科学的博物学者，更是一位有责任心记录自己对大自然独特视角的人文博物学者。其著作在文化上产生了很大的共鸣，当时造成了极大的影响，而此后则相对淡化。
目录[隐藏]
1 早期生活
2 婚姻与职业
3 写作
4 约翰·巴勒斯协会
5 书目
6 注释
7 外部链接
//
[编辑] 早期生活
巴勒斯是Chauncy 和 Amy Kelly Burroughs十个子女中的第七个，他出生于卡兹奇山的家庭农场中，靠近纽约州特拉华县的Roxbury镇。孩提时代，巴勒斯把很多时间都花在Old Clump Mountain的斜坡上，在那里可以向东远眺，看到卡兹奇山的最高峰，特别是Slide Mountain，以后巴勒斯再著作中会有提及。他在当地的同学中包括Jay Gould。
17岁时巴勒斯离开学校，成为一名教师，同时他在一些机构中作研究，包括Cooperstown学院。在那里他接触到了威廉·华兹华斯和拉尔夫·沃尔多·爱默生，他们对自然的关注，以及对精神的追求，对巴勒斯产生了终生的影响。1856年7月，他来开学院，前往伊利诺斯州Buffalo Grove的一个小村庄。在那里他教学数年，还曾返回东部与“遗落的女孩”结婚。[2][3]
[编辑] 婚姻与职业
1857年9月12日，巴勒斯与厄休拉·诺斯（1836年-1917年）结婚。而后巴勒斯继续教书生涯，并着手写作出版。夫妻俩省吃俭用，一直到1859年才建起自己的居所。
1860年，巴勒斯的写作终于有所收获，当时的新兴杂志《大西洋月刊》接受了其作品《Expression》，编辑詹姆斯·拉塞尔·洛维尔发现其作品与爱默生的风格很像，他起初甚至认为巴勒斯抄袭了他的老朋友。另外一首小诗《Waiting》也引起一些关注。
1864年，巴勒斯在美国财政部某得一个职位，后来他成为联邦银行的主考者，一直任职到1880年代。期间他继续出版，并对沃尔特·惠特曼的诗歌产生了兴趣。美国内战时期，巴勒斯与惠特曼在华盛顿见面，并成为亲密的朋友。
惠特曼鼓励巴勒斯发展自己的天赋，同时坚持创作自己的哲理和文学散文。1867年，巴勒斯出版了《Walt Whitman as Poet and Person》（沃尔特·惠特曼个人与诗人），这是第一部关于惠特曼的传记与评论著作，出版前经过惠特曼（匿名）修订与编辑。
四年后，the Boston house of Hurd & Houghton 出版了巴勒斯的首部自然散文合集《Wake-Robin》[1]。
1874年，巴勒斯在纽约州的West Park（现在属于Esopus镇）购买了一个大农场。他在那里种植了大量农作物，后来他又主要种植鲜食葡萄，同时坚持写作，并继续任职于联邦银行数年。该地后被命名为Riverby。
1894年秋天，巴勒斯在附近又买了一些土地，他和儿子朱利安·巴勒斯（1878年12月15日-1954年）盖了一个阿尔岗金族风格[4]的木屋，后被命名为Slabsides。在那里，巴勒斯种植了大片的芹菜，并招待来访者，包括瓦瑟学院（Vassar College）的学生。
1900年后，巴勒斯将其出生地附近的一所农舍粉刷一新，并取名为Woodchuck Lodge。这里后来成为其夏季的居所，直至其去世。
巴勒斯写了30多本著作，在杂志上先后发表了数百篇散文、诗歌。
他的一些佳作创作于卡兹奇山旅行归来。1880年代后期，在散文"The Heart of the Southern Catskills"（南部卡兹奇山之心）中，他对攀登卡兹奇山脉最高峰Slide Mountain作了记录。谈及登顶后所见，它这样写道，“"The works of man dwindle, and the original features of the huge globe come out. Every single object or point is dwarfed; the valley of the Hudson is only a wrinkle in the earth's surface. You discover with a feeling of surprise that the great thing is the earth itself, which stretches away on every hand so far beyond your ken.”为纪念其登顶成功，他的部分语句已经被刻于突出的岩石上，被称为Burroughs Ledge。附近的Cornell和Wittenberg 山，巴勒斯也曾攀登过，因此被合称为巴勒斯山脉。
还有一些卡兹奇山的散文中，不乏冷幽默，还有令人肃然起敬的描述，包括飞钓（fly fishing）鳟鱼，在Peekamoose山脉以及Mill Brook Ridge中徒步，沿特拉华河东面支流乘筏漂流。尽管巴勒斯在很多地方旅行过，并写有很多地区和国家的游记，也参与过一些自然科学的争论，包括当时的新理论自然选择，但在卡兹奇山区，巴勒斯依然为人津津乐道，知名度颇高。他对哲学和文学问题也有涉猎，1896年，也就是惠特曼去世后的第四年，他又写了一本关于这位诗人的著作，彰显了惠特曼美德在文学中的地位。
在巴勒斯后期，他与那个时代的不少名人都有交往，包括西奥多·罗斯福、约翰·缪尔、亨利·福特（他将一辆汽车赠送给巴勒斯，是哈德森山谷的第一辆汽车）、哈威·费尔斯通以及托马斯·爱迪生。1899年，他参与了E. H. Harriman的阿拉斯加探险。
与厄休拉结婚后，由于妻子极度憎恶肉体关系，这对夫妇产生矛盾。1901年，巴勒斯遇到了仰慕者克拉拉·Barrus（1864年-1931年），她是纽约Middletown的州精神病医院的内科医生，当时克拉拉37岁。她成为巴勒斯的挚爱，并最后成为其文学的遗嘱执行人。1917年厄休拉去世后，克拉拉搬来与巴勒斯同住。
1921年年春，巴勒斯在从加利福尼亚返回的火车上去世。而后在其84岁生日那天，他被安葬于Roxbury镇，位于岩壁脚下，孩提时代他曾在那里玩耍。
1962年，Woodchuck Lodge被指定为国家历史地标，1968年，Riverby和Slabsides也获得同样的待遇。这三处都被列入国家历史遗迹。
巴勒斯当时获得了很高的声誉。有一项以他命名的自然写作奖，美国还有11所以他命名的学校，包括密尔沃基和洛杉矶的公立中学，一所加利福尼亚州伯班克的公立高中，明尼阿波利斯的巴勒斯小学，以及圣路易斯的约翰·巴勒斯中学。
[编辑] 写作
巴勒斯的许多散文在流行杂志上首发，他对观鸟、花草和乡间情景的描写广为人知，其散文还涉及宗教和文学。他是沃尔特·惠特曼何拉尔夫·沃尔多·爱默生的忠实支持者，对亨利·戴维·梭罗则有所批评。
[编辑] 约翰·巴勒斯协会
为了纪念巴勒斯，在其1921年去世后，成立了约翰·巴勒斯协会。
[编辑] 书目
Notes on Walt Whitman as Poet and Person (1867)
Wake Robin (1871)
Winter Sunshine (1875), (travel sketches)
Birds and Poets (1877)
Locusts and Wild Honey (1879)
Pepacton (1881)
Fresh Fields (1884), (travel sketches)
Signs and Seasons (1886)
Birds and bees and other studies in nature (1896)
Indoor Studies (1889)
Riverby (1894)
Whitman: A Study (1896)
The Light of Day (1900)
Squirrels and Other Fur-Bearers (1900)
Songs of Nature (Editor) (1901)
John James Audubon (1902), (biography)
Literary Values and other Papers (1902)
Far and Near (1904)
Ways of Nature (1905)
Camping and Tramping with Roosevelt (1906)
Bird and Bough (1906), (poetry)
Afoot and Afloat (1907)
Leaf and Tendril (1908)
Time and Change (1912)
The Summit of the Years (1913)
The Breath of Life (1915)
Under the Apple-Trees (1916)
Field and Study (1919)
Accepting the Universe (1920)
Under the Maples (1921)
The Last Harvest (1922)
My Boyhood, with a Conclusion by His Son Julian Burroughs (1922)
Books About John Burroughs
Our Friend John Burroughs by Clara Barrus (Boston and New York, Houghton Mifflin Company, The Riverside Press Cambridge, 1914)
John Burroughs Boy and Man by Clara Barrus (Garden City New York Doubleday, Page & Company, 1920)
The Life and Letters of John Burroughs by Clara Barrus (Volume 1, Boston and New York, Houghton Mifflin Company, The Riverside Press Cambridge, 1925)
John Burroughs: An American Naturalist by Edward J. Renehan Jr. (Chelsea, VT: Chelsea Green, 1992; paperback - Hensonville, NY: Black Dome Press, 1998)
John Burroughs and The Place of Nature by James Perrin Warren (Athens, GA: University of Georgia Press, 2006)
John Burroughs: An American Naturalist by Edward J. Renehan, Jr. (Black Dome Press)
Sharp Eyes: John Burroughs and American Nature Writing edited by Charlotte Zoe Walker, ed. (Syracuse University Press)
The Art Of Seeing Things by John Burroughs edited by Charlotte Zoe Walker, ed. (Syracuse University Press)
John Burroughs: The Sage of Slabsides by Ginger Wadsworth (Clarion Books)
[编辑] 注释
^ 1.0 1.1 有翻译作《延龄草》，另有简体中文译本《醒来的森林》，生活·读书·新知三联书店，2004年
^ Buffalo Grove
^ Our Friend John Burroughs / Barrus, Clara
^ Adirondack-style，阿尔岗金族属于印第安人，这种风格的建筑采用原木搭建，强调自然的感觉
[编辑] 外部链接
维基共享资源中相关的多媒体资源：
约翰·巴勒斯
维基语录上的相关摘录：
约翰·巴勒斯
维基文库中相关的原始文献：
约翰·巴勒斯
http://zh.wikisource.org/wiki/约翰·巴勒斯
John Burroughs的作品 - 古腾堡计划
约翰·巴勒斯协会
卡兹奇山档案的约翰·巴勒斯页
约翰·巴勒斯的作品
American Memory In the Catskills
Afterword to John Burroughs: An American Naturalist by Edward J. Renehan Jr.（约翰·巴勒斯：美国自然主义者）
The Half More Satisfying Than the Whole: John Burroughs and the Hudson by Edward J. Renehan Jr.
Rediscovering John Burroughs' Catskills Retreat: Woodchuck Lodge by Edward J. Renehan Jr.
Bird and Bough by John Burroughs. Complete text of his only book of published poems plus poems published in periodicals; also public domain recordings of his poems.
Quotes by John Burroughs
取自"http://zh.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=%E7%BA%A6%E7%BF%B0%C2%B7%E5%B7%B4%E5%8B%92%E6%96%AF&variant=zh-cn"
>> Burroughs, John (1837-1921)
Essayist, Journalist, Biographer, Travel Writer.
Remembered primarily as a naturalist writer, Burroughs grew up on a dairy farm in rural New York state, the seventh of ten children. Burroughs' reading of Emerson's essays is remarked upon as "the first great galvanizing contact for the young writer" (J. P. Warren). At the start of his literary career, Burroughs published in Henry Clapp's Saturday Press. One of the pieces published under the pseudonym "All Souls" was "Fragments from the Table of an Intellectual Epicure." His essay, "Expression" was so reminiscent of Emerson's style that James Russell Lowell, editor of The Atlantic Monthly to which he had submitted the work, reviewed all of Emerson's published works to ensure that the essay was not plagiarized (Warren). In addition to publishing almost thirty books, Burroughs also wrote essays and sketches for magazines like Appleton's, The Atlantic Monthly, Century, Galaxy, and Scribner's Monthly.
Though he may have encountered Walt Whitman at Pfaff's, the two developed a lifelong friendship when Burroughs moved to Washington in the fall of 1863 to work for the Currency Bureau of the Treasury Department. Burroughs accompanied Whitman on walks and on his visits to the army hospitals. This friendship inspired Burroughs to write "Walt Whitman and His 'Drum-Taps,'" published in the December 1866 issue of Galaxy. In 1867 he expanded on this theme, writing Notes on Walt Whitman as Poet and Person, the composition of which, he later stated, was influenced by Whitman himself. Describing the friendship, Burroughs states that "I loved him as I never loved any man. We were companionable without talking. I owe more to him than to any other man in the world. He brooded me; he gave me things to think of; he taught me generousity, breadth, and an all-embracing charity" (Life and Letters 1:113). After serving as a pall bearer at Whitman's funeral in 1892, Burroughs wrote a series of 18 essays which he collected into a book, Whitman: A Study (1896).
Although Burroughs preferred to remain close to home, he periodically explored other parts of the country and the world. He traveled to Jamaica, Bermuda, Hawaii, Canada, Alaska, and Europe, and also to various parts of the western and southern United States. His European travels are described in Fresh Fields (1885), and details about his camping trip in Yellowstone with President Roosevelt appear in Camping and Tramping with Roosevelt (1907). In his later years, Burroughs became more interested in the world of science. He published four books between 1919-1922 "in which he sought, with an increasing melancholy, to make the best of a dubious universe" (N. Foerster).
[view works by this person]
References & Biographical Resources
Allen, Gay Wilson. The Solitary Singer: A Critical Biography of Walt Whitman. New York: MacMillan, 1955. [more about this work]
Allen writes that Burroughs became an "intimate friend" of Whitman in 1863. Burroughs estimated that the sales of the 1860 edition of Leaves of Grass were between 4,000 and 5,000 copies (267). Allen calls Whitman's friendship with Burroughs "one of the truly major friendships in Whitman's life" (299). Burroughs had been reading Leaves of Grass for about two or three years and made at least one unsuccessful attempt to meet Whitman in New York. Burroughs did not meet Whitman until October 1863, in Washington, after Burroughs left his job as a schoolteacher. The two men became friends immediately, and Burroughs began to join the group that gathered at the O'Connor home (299-301).Burroughs was a "constant reader" and contributor to the Saturday Press, read Leaves of Grass, and traveled to New York with the purpose of meeting Whitman. When the Saturday Press no longer existed, Burroughs called at the Leader office, where several of the Bohemians, including Clapp and Clare, were working and writing. Clapp told Burroughs that "Whitman was at Pfaff's almost every night." In the fall of 1862, Burroughs wrote to a friend that Whitman was dining at Pfaff's (273). Clapp also told Burroughs during the fall of 1862 that "Whitman managed to exist on his earnings of six or seven dollar 'per week writing for the papers'" (280).Clara Barrus claimed that Burroughs attempted to get Juliette Beach to publish the letters she wrote to Whitman (262).Allen mentions that Burroughs was among some of Whitman's friends who questioned the accuracy of Horace Traubel's records (531).Extra page #s: 516, 531-532, 537, 541, 571(n63), 576(n48), 594(n153), 584(n147). [pages: 262, 267, 273, 280, 299-301, 309, 315, 334-335, 363, 374-375, 384, 388, 391-392, 398, 422, 435, 445, 446, 451, 452, 454, 455, 471, 475, 482, 483, 484-]
Baker, Portia. "Walt Whitman and the Atlantic Monthly." American Literature. 1934. 283-301. [more about this work]
Baker notes that Burroughs distrusted Howells' friendliness/relationship to Whitman in 1866. [pages: 289]
Benton, Joel. "John Burroughs." Scribner's Monthly. Jan. 1877: 336-342. [more about this work]
[pages: 336-342, 336(ill.)]
Boynton, Percy Holmes. A History of American Literature. New York: Gin and Company, 1919. 513 p. [more about this work]
"John Burroughs tells of the staff of a leading daily paper in New York, assembled on Saturday afternoon to be paid off, greeting the passages that were read aloud to them with 'peals upon peals of ironical laughter.' Whitman's family were indifferent. His brother George said he 'didn't read it at all-didn't think it worth reading- fingered it a little. Mother thought as I did...Mother said that if 'Hiawatha' was poetry, perhaps Walt's was'" (364).After Swinburne's fiercest attack on Whitman, Burroughs recalls: "I could not discover either in word or look that he [Whitman] was disturbed a particle by it. He spoke as kindly of Swinburne as ever. If he was pained at all it was on Swinburne's account and not on his own. It was a sad spectacle to see a man retreat upon himself as Swinburne had done'" (375). [pages: 229, 364, 375]
Burroughs, J. "To E.M.A." New-York Saturday Press. 24 Nov. 1860: 1. [more about this work]
Epstein, Daniel Mark. Lincoln and Whitman: Parallel Lives in Civil War Washington. New York: Random House Trade Paperbacks, 2004. 379 p. [more about this work]
Mentioned in the 1861 chapter. [pages: 54]
Foerster, Norman. "John Burroughs." Dictionary of American Biography. Base Set. American Council of Learned Societies, 1928-1936. Reproduced in Biography Resource Center. Farmington Hills, Mich.: Thomson Gale, 2006. http://www.galenet.com/servlet/BioRC. [more about this work]
Folsom, Ed and Kenneth M. Price. Re-Scripting Walt Whitman: An Introduction to His Life and Work. Malden, MA: Blackwell, 2005. [more about this work]
Burroughs first met Whitman in Washington, D.C., in 1863 but he "had started frequenting Pfaff's beerhall in New York [several years earlier] in the hope of meeting Whitman, whose work he greatly admired" (87). [pages: 87]
Killingsworth, M. Jimmie. "The Saturday Press." American Literary Magazines: The Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries. Ed. Edward E. Chielens. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1986. 357–364. [more about this work]
Burroughs wrote for The Saturday Press under the pseudonym of "All Souls."
Morris, Roy Jr. The Better Angel: Walt Whitman in the Civil War. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000. [more about this work]
[pages: 4-5, 39, 150-54, 164-65, 186-87, 211, 240,]
"Notes of the Week." New-York Saturday Press. 19 May 1866: 4. [more about this work]
The column reports that Burroughs's "In the Hemlocks" has been published in the most recent edition of the Atlantic Monthly (4). [pages: 4]
O'Higgins, Harvey. Alias Walt Whitman. Newark, NJ: Carteret Book Club, 1930. [more about this work]
O'Higgins mentions that Whitman co-authored Burroughs's biography, Notes on Walt Whitman, but says nothing of the time Whitman and Burroughs spent at Pfaff's. [pages: 32-33,40-41]
Parry, Albert. Garrets and Pretenders: A History of Bohemianism in America. New York: Covici, Friede, 1933. [more about this work]
Parry quotes Burroughs's 1862 description of Ada Clare: "She is really beautiful, not a characterless beauty, but a singular, unique beauty" (18). Parry also cites evidence of Burroughs firing back at Clare, "this caustic woman" who "ought to be sentenced to forty years' silence: 'My heart bleeds for Abbey!'" for her reviews of H.A. Abbey's book of poems, May Dreams (29).Parry uses the example of Burroughs's "Fragments from the Table of an Intellectual Epicure" signed by "All Souls" as an example of the "fancy titles and pen names [that] added to the novel appeal of the sheet [the Saturday Press]" (24). Burroughs met Whitman through Clapp and the Saturday Press; Whitman first caught Burrough's attention when Clapp published "A Child's Reminiscence" in the Saturday Press December 24, 1859. The two men would later be introduced at Pfaff's during a meeting arranged by Clapp; "and Burroughs left completely charmed, to become one of the first apostles of the Great Loafer" (40-41). [pages: 18,24,29,40-41]
Renehan, Edward, Jr. John Burroughs: An American Naturalist. New York: Black Dome Press, 1998. [more about this work]
Warren, James Perrin. "John Burroughs." Dictionary of Literary Biography, Volume 275: Twentieth-Century American Nature Writers. Eds. Roger Thompson and J. Scott Bryson. Detroit: Gale, 2003. 72-89. [more about this work]
Whitman, Walt. Letter to John Burroughs. 1866. 281. [more about this work]
Whitman, Walt. Letter to William D. O'Connor. 1867. 342-343. [more about this work]
Wilson, James Grant and John Fiske, eds. Appletons' Cyclopaedia of American Biography, Volume I, Aaron-Crandall. New York: D. Appleton & Co., 1888. [more about this work]
Omitting his time in New York, Appleton mentions Burroughs' work with the treasury department in 1864 and his position as receiver for Wallkill national bank. [pages: 470]
Essayist, Journalist, Biographer, Travel Writer.
Remembered primarily as a naturalist writer, Burroughs grew up on a dairy farm in rural New York state, the seventh of ten children. Burroughs' reading of Emerson's essays is remarked upon as "the first great galvanizing contact for the young writer" (J. P. Warren). At the start of his literary career, Burroughs published in Henry Clapp's Saturday Press. One of the pieces published under the pseudonym "All Souls" was "Fragments from the Table of an Intellectual Epicure." His essay, "Expression" was so reminiscent of Emerson's style that James Russell Lowell, editor of The Atlantic Monthly to which he had submitted the work, reviewed all of Emerson's published works to ensure that the essay was not plagiarized (Warren). In addition to publishing almost thirty books, Burroughs also wrote essays and sketches for magazines like Appleton's, The Atlantic Monthly, Century, Galaxy, and Scribner's Monthly.
Though he may have encountered Walt Whitman at Pfaff's, the two developed a lifelong friendship when Burroughs moved to Washington in the fall of 1863 to work for the Currency Bureau of the Treasury Department. Burroughs accompanied Whitman on walks and on his visits to the army hospitals. This friendship inspired Burroughs to write "Walt Whitman and His 'Drum-Taps,'" published in the December 1866 issue of Galaxy. In 1867 he expanded on this theme, writing Notes on Walt Whitman as Poet and Person, the composition of which, he later stated, was influenced by Whitman himself. Describing the friendship, Burroughs states that "I loved him as I never loved any man. We were companionable without talking. I owe more to him than to any other man in the world. He brooded me; he gave me things to think of; he taught me generousity, breadth, and an all-embracing charity" (Life and Letters 1:113). After serving as a pall bearer at Whitman's funeral in 1892, Burroughs wrote a series of 18 essays which he collected into a book, Whitman: A Study (1896).
Although Burroughs preferred to remain close to home, he periodically explored other parts of the country and the world. He traveled to Jamaica, Bermuda, Hawaii, Canada, Alaska, and Europe, and also to various parts of the western and southern United States. His European travels are described in Fresh Fields (1885), and details about his camping trip in Yellowstone with President Roosevelt appear in Camping and Tramping with Roosevelt (1907). In his later years, Burroughs became more interested in the world of science. He published four books between 1919-1922 "in which he sought, with an increasing melancholy, to make the best of a dubious universe" (N. Foerster).
[view works by this person]
References & Biographical Resources
Allen, Gay Wilson. The Solitary Singer: A Critical Biography of Walt Whitman. New York: MacMillan, 1955. [more about this work]
Allen writes that Burroughs became an "intimate friend" of Whitman in 1863. Burroughs estimated that the sales of the 1860 edition of Leaves of Grass were between 4,000 and 5,000 copies (267). Allen calls Whitman's friendship with Burroughs "one of the truly major friendships in Whitman's life" (299). Burroughs had been reading Leaves of Grass for about two or three years and made at least one unsuccessful attempt to meet Whitman in New York. Burroughs did not meet Whitman until October 1863, in Washington, after Burroughs left his job as a schoolteacher. The two men became friends immediately, and Burroughs began to join the group that gathered at the O'Connor home (299-301).Burroughs was a "constant reader" and contributor to the Saturday Press, read Leaves of Grass, and traveled to New York with the purpose of meeting Whitman. When the Saturday Press no longer existed, Burroughs called at the Leader office, where several of the Bohemians, including Clapp and Clare, were working and writing. Clapp told Burroughs that "Whitman was at Pfaff's almost every night." In the fall of 1862, Burroughs wrote to a friend that Whitman was dining at Pfaff's (273). Clapp also told Burroughs during the fall of 1862 that "Whitman managed to exist on his earnings of six or seven dollar 'per week writing for the papers'" (280).Clara Barrus claimed that Burroughs attempted to get Juliette Beach to publish the letters she wrote to Whitman (262).Allen mentions that Burroughs was among some of Whitman's friends who questioned the accuracy of Horace Traubel's records (531).Extra page #s: 516, 531-532, 537, 541, 571(n63), 576(n48), 594(n153), 584(n147). [pages: 262, 267, 273, 280, 299-301, 309, 315, 334-335, 363, 374-375, 384, 388, 391-392, 398, 422, 435, 445, 446, 451, 452, 454, 455, 471, 475, 482, 483, 484-]
Baker, Portia. "Walt Whitman and the Atlantic Monthly." American Literature. 1934. 283-301. [more about this work]
Baker notes that Burroughs distrusted Howells' friendliness/relationship to Whitman in 1866. [pages: 289]
Benton, Joel. "John Burroughs." Scribner's Monthly. Jan. 1877: 336-342. [more about this work]
[pages: 336-342, 336(ill.)]
Boynton, Percy Holmes. A History of American Literature. New York: Gin and Company, 1919. 513 p. [more about this work]
"John Burroughs tells of the staff of a leading daily paper in New York, assembled on Saturday afternoon to be paid off, greeting the passages that were read aloud to them with 'peals upon peals of ironical laughter.' Whitman's family were indifferent. His brother George said he 'didn't read it at all-didn't think it worth reading- fingered it a little. Mother thought as I did...Mother said that if 'Hiawatha' was poetry, perhaps Walt's was'" (364).After Swinburne's fiercest attack on Whitman, Burroughs recalls: "I could not discover either in word or look that he [Whitman] was disturbed a particle by it. He spoke as kindly of Swinburne as ever. If he was pained at all it was on Swinburne's account and not on his own. It was a sad spectacle to see a man retreat upon himself as Swinburne had done'" (375). [pages: 229, 364, 375]
Burroughs, J. "To E.M.A." New-York Saturday Press. 24 Nov. 1860: 1. [more about this work]
Epstein, Daniel Mark. Lincoln and Whitman: Parallel Lives in Civil War Washington. New York: Random House Trade Paperbacks, 2004. 379 p. [more about this work]
Mentioned in the 1861 chapter. [pages: 54]
Foerster, Norman. "John Burroughs." Dictionary of American Biography. Base Set. American Council of Learned Societies, 1928-1936. Reproduced in Biography Resource Center. Farmington Hills, Mich.: Thomson Gale, 2006. http://www.galenet.com/servlet/BioRC. [more about this work]
Folsom, Ed and Kenneth M. Price. Re-Scripting Walt Whitman: An Introduction to His Life and Work. Malden, MA: Blackwell, 2005. [more about this work]
Burroughs first met Whitman in Washington, D.C., in 1863 but he "had started frequenting Pfaff's beerhall in New York [several years earlier] in the hope of meeting Whitman, whose work he greatly admired" (87). [pages: 87]
Killingsworth, M. Jimmie. "The Saturday Press." American Literary Magazines: The Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries. Ed. Edward E. Chielens. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1986. 357–364. [more about this work]
Burroughs wrote for The Saturday Press under the pseudonym of "All Souls."
Morris, Roy Jr. The Better Angel: Walt Whitman in the Civil War. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000. [more about this work]
[pages: 4-5, 39, 150-54, 164-65, 186-87, 211, 240,]
"Notes of the Week." New-York Saturday Press. 19 May 1866: 4. [more about this work]
The column reports that Burroughs's "In the Hemlocks" has been published in the most recent edition of the Atlantic Monthly (4). [pages: 4]
O'Higgins, Harvey. Alias Walt Whitman. Newark, NJ: Carteret Book Club, 1930. [more about this work]
O'Higgins mentions that Whitman co-authored Burroughs's biography, Notes on Walt Whitman, but says nothing of the time Whitman and Burroughs spent at Pfaff's. [pages: 32-33,40-41]
Parry, Albert. Garrets and Pretenders: A History of Bohemianism in America. New York: Covici, Friede, 1933. [more about this work]
Parry quotes Burroughs's 1862 description of Ada Clare: "She is really beautiful, not a characterless beauty, but a singular, unique beauty" (18). Parry also cites evidence of Burroughs firing back at Clare, "this caustic woman" who "ought to be sentenced to forty years' silence: 'My heart bleeds for Abbey!'" for her reviews of H.A. Abbey's book of poems, May Dreams (29).Parry uses the example of Burroughs's "Fragments from the Table of an Intellectual Epicure" signed by "All Souls" as an example of the "fancy titles and pen names [that] added to the novel appeal of the sheet [the Saturday Press]" (24). Burroughs met Whitman through Clapp and the Saturday Press; Whitman first caught Burrough's attention when Clapp published "A Child's Reminiscence" in the Saturday Press December 24, 1859. The two men would later be introduced at Pfaff's during a meeting arranged by Clapp; "and Burroughs left completely charmed, to become one of the first apostles of the Great Loafer" (40-41). [pages: 18,24,29,40-41]
Renehan, Edward, Jr. John Burroughs: An American Naturalist. New York: Black Dome Press, 1998. [more about this work]
Warren, James Perrin. "John Burroughs." Dictionary of Literary Biography, Volume 275: Twentieth-Century American Nature Writers. Eds. Roger Thompson and J. Scott Bryson. Detroit: Gale, 2003. 72-89. [more about this work]
Whitman, Walt. Letter to John Burroughs. 1866. 281. [more about this work]
Whitman, Walt. Letter to William D. O'Connor. 1867. 342-343. [more about this work]
Wilson, James Grant and John Fiske, eds. Appletons' Cyclopaedia of American Biography, Volume I, Aaron-Crandall. New York: D. Appleton & Co., 1888. [more about this work]
Omitting his time in New York, Appleton mentions Burroughs' work with the treasury department in 1864 and his position as receiver for Wallkill national bank. [pages: 470]
