James Russell Lowell
By Rebecca
A Tribute to My Great-Great-Great Grandaddy
1819 - 1891
"No man can produce great things who is not thoroughly sincere in dealing with himself."
- James Russell Lowell
"All the beautiful sentiments in the world weigh less than a single lovely action."
- James Russell Lowell
“The misfortunes hardest to bear are those that never come.”
- James Russell Lowell
"One thorn of experience is worth a whole wilderness of warning.”
- James Russell Lowell
James Russell Lowell was a great American poet, essayist, editor, critic, Harvard professor, and diplomat. He served as Minister to Spain (1877-80) and Ambassador to Great Britain (1880-85). He was also an abolitionist who wrote extensively against slavery and was a Universalist. His poetry and literary contributions are what he is most remembered for. I am his grandchild, third generation.
Information about him on the Web:
His Poems Online
Inspiration
Buy his books online
Biography
A Picture of his home in Cambridge, Massachusetts
A Picture of his Gravesite
The James Russell Lowell School
A Letter to JRL from Edgar Allen Poe
JRL and England (Article)
"There is no good arguing with the inevitable."
~James Russell Lowell
A Glimpse at His Poetry...
“My heart will not forget thee
More than the moaning brine
Forgets the moon when she is set;
The gush when I first met thee.
-Lowell’s Poems, p. 10
“And the new moon, with slender rim,
Through the elm arches gleaming dim,
Filled memory’s chalice to the brim”
-From “A Mystical Ballad”
Fancies About a Rosebud
Thy body sleeps serenely there,
And well for it thy soul may care,
It was so beautiful and fair,
Lilly white so wholly.
From so pure and sweet a frame
Thy spirit parted as it came,
Gentle as a maiden’
Now it lieth full of rest-
Sods are lighter on its breast
Than the great, prophetic guest
Wherewith it was laden
A Reverie
In the twilight deep and silent
Comes thy spirit unto mine,
When the moonlight and the starlight
Over cliff and woodland shine,
And the quiver of the river
Seems a thrill of joy benign.
Then I rise and wander slowly
To the headland by the sea,
When the evening star throbs setting
Through the cloudy cedar tree,
And from under, mellow thunder
Of the turf comes fitfully.