Wallace Stevens Paper

Thomas Woolley

Period 3

May 9, 2016

Mrs. Field

Wallace Stevens: Poetry Project

Part I: The Poet’s Life

        Wallace Stevens was born in Reading, Pennsylvania on October 2, 1879. He was the second of five children born to parents Garret Barcalow and Margaretha Catharine Zeller. According to Joan Richardson, Stevens was raised under Puritan ethics of “industry, sobriety, and thrift.” (qtd. in Billingsley). Stevens was an accomplished student, making the honor roll twice and writing for the school paper at Reading Boys High School. In 1987, he began his college career at Harvard University where he displayed a keen interest in literature. Stevens studied English literature and was the senior editor of Harvard’s literary magazine. He befriended philosopher George Santayana who helped develop Stevens’ aesthetic philosophy, which became a recurring theme in his work. In 1901, Stevens left Harvard without a degree due to financial difficulties within his family. Forced to make a living on his own, he moved to New York City to pursue a literary career (Billingsley).

        In New York, Stevens wrote for The New York Tribune. Joan Richardson describes how New York was “The electric town which he adored” (qtd. in Billingsley). Over time, though, Stevens grew tired of his rather monotonous life as a journalist. He pondered devoting his life to writing his own literature, but his father, though fond of literature, encouraged him to pursue a law career. Persuaded by his father’s suggestion, Stevens enrolled in the New York Law School in 1901. In 1904, he was admitted to the New York Bar thus beginning his dual life as a poet and business man (“Wallace Stevens”, Poetry Foundation).

After earning his law degree, Stevens worked for various law firms and eventually accepted a post at the American Bonding Company, an insurance firm. It was at this point in life when Stevens met his eventual wife, Elsie Viola Kachel, whom he married on September 21, 1909.  He spent the next seven years in New York City with his bride. The couple had one daughter, Hollie Stevens. In 1913, Stevens was enjoying great success in the field of law and decided to return to resume his writing career (“Wallace Stevens”, Poetry Foundation). In 1916, while writing his first collection, Harmonium, he moved to Hartford Connecticut and accepted a job at the Harford Accident and Indemnity Company where he would spend the rest of his business career (Billingsley).

        “It’s hard to think of a more vivid illustration of T. S. Eliot’s principle of the separation between ‘the man who suffers and the mind which creates’” (Schjedahl). Of all the renowned American poets with whom Stevens shares status, he is the most “ordinary”. T.S Eliot’s quote describes the struggle between “suffering”, meaning ordinary, monotonous life, and the brilliant mind which creates. This quote applies directly to Stevens. He was able don a three-piece suit for work everyday while maintaining “a mind like a solar system, with abstract ideas orbiting a radiant lyricism” (Schjedahl). Even when Stevens became a very lucrative poet and could have worked as an esteemed English professor, he kept his job at the insurance firm. Perhaps this was out of fear of becoming isolated, or maybe he simply enjoyed balancing the dual life (“Wallace Stevens”, Poetry Foundation).