![[Autographs & Manuscripts] Burroughs, John, Holograph](https://gcp-la8-storage-cdn.lot-art.com/public/upl/3/Autographs-and-Manuscripts-Burroughs-John-Holograph_1588732670_6017.jpg "[Autographs & Manuscripts] Burroughs, John, Holograph")
[Autographs & Manuscripts] Burroughs, John, Holograph
[Autographs & Manuscripts] Burroughs, John
Holograph of "Waiting"
No place, 1878. One sheet of ruled paper, 8 x 5 in. (20.3 x 12.7 cm), folded once but now separated at middle fold, consisting of six four-line stanzas, signed and dated by Burroughs, July, (18)78. Signed on verso "M.A. Smith...". Creasing from original folds, tape repairs on verso. John Burroughs (1837-1921) was an American essayist and naturalist. "Waiting", his most famous poem, was written in the fall of 1862 at a time, as Burroughs recounts, "My outlook upon life was anything but encouraging. I was poor. I had no certain means of livelihood...The Civil War was raging, and that disturbed me too. It sounded a call of duty which increased my perturbations; yet something must have said to me, 'Courage! all will yet be well. You are bound to have your own, whatever happens'. Doubtless this feeling had been nurtured in me by the brave words of Emerson". Reflecting on the poem's success years later, Burroughs wrote, "The secret of its success is its serious religious strain, or what people interpret as such. It embodies a very comfortable optimistic philosophy which it chants in a solemn, psalm-like voice. Its sincerity carries conviction. It voices absolute faith and trust in what, in the language of our fathers, would be called the ways of God with man..." (Clara Barrus, Our Friend John Burroughs, p. 177-184)
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[Autographs & Manuscripts] Burroughs, John
Holograph of "Waiting"
No place, 1878. One sheet of ruled paper, 8 x 5 in. (20.3 x 12.7 cm), folded once but now separated at middle fold, consisting of six four-line stanzas, signed and dated by Burroughs, July, (18)78. Signed on verso "M.A. Smith...". Creasing from original folds, tape repairs on verso. John Burroughs (1837-1921) was an American essayist and naturalist. "Waiting", his most famous poem, was written in the fall of 1862 at a time, as Burroughs recounts, "My outlook upon life was anything but encouraging. I was poor. I had no certain means of livelihood...The Civil War was raging, and that disturbed me too. It sounded a call of duty which increased my perturbations; yet something must have said to me, 'Courage! all will yet be well. You are bound to have your own, whatever happens'. Doubtless this feeling had been nurtured in me by the brave words of Emerson". Reflecting on the poem's success years later, Burroughs wrote, "The secret of its success is its serious religious strain, or what people interpret as such. It embodies a very comfortable optimistic philosophy which it chants in a solemn, psalm-like voice. Its sincerity carries conviction. It voices absolute faith and trust in what, in the language of our fathers, would be called the ways of God with man..." (Clara Barrus, Our Friend John Burroughs, p. 177-184)
