Sidney Lanier

It cannot be said, however, that Lanier's rank as a poet -- even in American, to say nothing of English literature -- is yet fixed. He is a very uneven writer, and his defects are glaring. Some of the best American critics -- men who have a right to speak with authority -- shake their heads in disapproval at what they call the Lanier cult. Abroad he has had no vogue, as have Emerson and Poe and Walt Whitman. The enthusiastic praise of the "Spectator" has been more than balanced by the indifference of some English critics and the sarcasm of others. Mme. Blanc's article in the "Revue des Deux Mondes", setting forth the charm of his personality and the excellence of his poetry, met with little response in France. In view of this divergence of opinion among critics, it may be doubted if the time has yet come for anything approaching a final valuation of Lanier's work. In the later pages of this book an attempt will b