Caroline Sturgis Tappan
Caroline Sturgis Tappan (* 1818 in Boston , Massachusetts ; † 1888 ) was an American poet of transcendentalism .
life and work
Caroline Sturgis Tappan was born in Boston in 1818 as the younger sister of Ellen Sturgis Hooper, who was also active as a writer. The city became the center of the transcendentalist movement which sought a philosophical, religious, social and aesthetic renewal of American culture in the succession of German idealism and romanticism . Sturgis Tappan frequented these circles and was well known to Ralph Waldo Emerson and, since 1839, Margaret Fuller . With Henry James she shared personal and artistic admiration.
As a writer, she mainly created poems whose characters are characterized by melancholy , but are sometimes also socially critical . Some of her poems appeared in the transcendentalist magazine The Dial .
Poem example
Lyric
The star coldly glimmer-
And I am alone.
The pale moon grows dimmer,
And now it has gone.
Loud shrieks the owl, night presses round,
The little flowers lie low on the ground
And sadly moan.
Why is the earth so sad?
Why doth she weep?
Methinks she would be glad
Calmly to sleep.
But the dews are falling, heavy and fast,
Sadly sighs the cold night-blast,
Loud roars the deep.
I press my hands upon my heart-
'Tis very cold!
And swiftly through the forest dart
With footsteps bold.
What shall I seek? Where shall I go?
Earth and ocean shudder with woe!
Their tale is untold!
literature
- Perry Miller (ed.): The Transcendentalists. To Anthology, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts 1950, pp. 403-404.
Web links
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Tappan, Caroline Sturgis |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | American poet |
| DATE OF BIRTH | 1818 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Boston , Massachusetts |
| DATE OF DEATH | 1888 |