Whittier’s Critical Creed
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ences and simple feelings had as much wonder and beauty
as his former dreams “of lands of gold and pearl, / Of loving
knight and lady” (“Burns”). This theory of the beauty of the
commonplace formed the cornerstone for his finest poems
written in the 1850’s. Now his subject matter, an old rhyme
about a calloused Marblehead skipper, his birthplace in a
snowstorm, a girl raking hay on a summer’s day, a local tale
about a Hampton witch, was based directly on the common-
place incidents of his own experience.
Associated with this final understanding of the proper mate-
rial for his writing was the problem of finding the appropri-
ate manner for expressing these feelings. From his earlier
Uterary experiments he came to believe that style was the
communication of an emotion or an idea, usually associated
with some ethical or practical end, in the clearest, most direct
manner. In his essay on Robert Dinsmore he praises that
rural poet for calling things by their right names without any
euphuisms or transcendental terms. Similarly he approves
E. P. Whipple’s prose, because “he wrote with conscience
always at his elbow, and never sacrificed his real convictions
for the sake of epigram or antithesis” (Works, VI, 318). In-
creasingly he emphasized the necessity of dressing truth in a
somber guise, rather than garnishing it by ornamentation or
elaborate stylistic devices. This truth of style actually meant
a fidelity to personal experience, a realization of one’s own
powers and insights, and an attempt to present them in the
clearest possible manner. Numerous critical comments
stressed the intention of the author and the relationship be-
tween the emotional experiences of the man and his method
of expression.15 In theory, at least, Whittier was presenting
the organic belief that form should follow function. When
joined to his love of the commonplace, this truth of style