... at a figure unfairly caricatured: William Jennings Bryan. Here is Len Boasberg's Inquirer review of Michael Kazin's A Godly Hero: Portrait of W.J. Bryan, orator for ordinary folk. And here's Scott McLemee's interview with Kazin: Doing the Lord’s Work. And here's Vachel Lindsay's "Bryan, Bryan, Bryan, Bryan." Lindsay, who came to a sad end, is himself scarcely remembered these days, but what with all the poetry slamming maybe he deserves another look: Vachel Lindsay as Performer.
A quibble: Scott calls Bryan a "fundmentalist." As I understand it, a fundmentalist is someone who takes the Bible literally. Bryan didn't. (I have myself never understood how anybody could. Reading anything strictly literally is to reduce words to mere signs, like "Stop" and "Go.")
Update: Since there seem to be some Vachel Lindsay fans out there, I thought I'd link to my favorite of his poems, "The Eagle That Is Forgotten."
I heard a bit about the new Bryan bio on Fresh Air with Terry Gross. Apparently, Bryan's involvement in the Scopes trial and his opposition to teaching evolution in the schools came out of a fear of "social Darwinism". Not an ungrounded fear considering the Indiana Laws that would prevent certain people from procreating and were an inspriration for Hilter.
ReplyDeleteI serve as the Secretary of the Vachel Lindsay Association. Our mission is to keep Lindsay's flame alive. We preserved his home and bequeathed it to the State of Illinois as a state historic site.
You can walk from the home to the State Capitol grounds where Bryan gave the speech that Lindsay immortalized and easily imagine the scene he described.
Speaking of "The Congo", you should hear it performed by an African-American sometime.
It's great to see so many people still discussing Lindsay these days. Maybe some day he'll get his due.
Well, I'm glad to hear about the Vachel Lindsat Association. Someone should make a movie about Lindsay or maybe stage a play about him. Like Arthur, I remember him from my school days.
ReplyDeleteAs for Bryan, apparently he was one of the few people at the Scopes trial who had actually read Darwin. That he was inconsistent and contracdictory I have no doubt. But, as Emerson and Whitman argued, that's pretty much the American way.