William Cullen Bryant (1794–1878) was an American poet and journalist, the author of Thanatopsis, and for half a century editor of the New York Evening Post. One of the Fireside Poets, he was also an advocate of abolition and of Central Park.
Massachusetts
William Cullen Bryant was born on 3 November 1794 at Cummington, Massachusetts, the son of a country doctor. A precocious poet, he published at thirteen a satirical poem against President Jefferson, The Embargo.
He studied briefly at Williams College and then law, and practised as a lawyer in Great Barrington.
Thanatopsis
He wrote a first version of Thanatopsis, a meditation on death and nature, as a teenager. His father found it and sent it to the North American Review, which published it in 1817 and doubted that a young American could have written it.
His first collection, Poems, a slim book of eight pieces, appeared in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in 1821.
The Evening Post
In 1825 Bryant moved to New York. He joined the New York Evening Post in 1827 and was its editor and part owner from 1829 until his death, defending free trade, the rights of workers and the abolition of slavery.
He campaigned for the creation of Central Park, translated the Iliad and the Odyssey, and was a founder of the Republican Party. He died in New York on 12 June 1878; Bryant Park is named after him.
Anecdotes
Introducing Lincoln
In February 1860 Bryant presided at the Cooper Union in New York when Abraham Lincoln gave the speech that made him a serious candidate for the presidency.
A poem found in a desk
According to family tradition, Bryant's father discovered Thanatopsis in a desk drawer and, moved to tears, took it to Boston for publication.
Frequently asked questions
What is Thanatopsis?
A meditation on death, whose title means 'view of death' in Greek, first published in 1817.
What newspaper did Bryant edit?
The New York Evening Post, from 1829 to 1878.
What is named after Bryant?
Bryant Park in Manhattan, next to the New York Public Library.