(1855-1896)
The position which Henry Cuyler Bunner has come to occupy in the
literary annals of our time strengthens as the days pass. If the stream
of his genius flowed in gentle rivulets, it traveled as far and spread
its fruitful influence as wide as many a statelier river. He was above
all things a poet. In his prose as in his verse he has revealed the
essential qualities of a poet's nature: he dealt with the life which he
saw about him in a spirit of broad humanity and with genial sympathy.
When he fashioned the tender triolet on the pitcher of mignonette, or
sang of the little red box at Vesey Street, he wrote of what he knew;
and his stories, even when embroidered with quaint fancies, tread firmly
the American soil of the nineteenth century. But Bunner's realism never
concerned itself with the record of trivialities for their own sake.
When he portrayed the lower phases of city life, it was the humor of
that life he caught, and not its sordidness; its kindliness, and not its
brutality. His mind was healthy, and since it was a poet's mind, the
point upon which it was so nicely balanced was love: love of the trees
and flowers, love of his little brothers in wood and field, love of his
country home, love of the vast city in its innumerable aspects; above
all, love of his wife, his family, and his friends; and all these
outgoings of his heart have found touching expression in his verse.
Indeed, this attitude of affectionate kinship with the world has colored
all his work; it has made his satire sweet-tempered, given his tales
their winning grace, and lent to his poetry its abiding power.
[Illustration: HENRY C. BUNNER]
The work upon which Bunner's fame must rest was all produced within a
period of less than fifteen years. He was born in 1855 at Oswego, New
York. He came to the city of New York when very young, and received his
education there. A brief experience of business life sufficed to make
his true vocation clear, and at the age of eighteen he began his
literary apprenticeship on the Arcadian. When that periodical passed
away, Puck was just struggling into existence, and for the English
edition, which was started in 1877, Bunner's services were secured. Half
of his short life was spent in editorial connection with that paper. To
his wisdom and literary abilities is due in large measure the success
which has always attended the enterprise. Bunner had an intimate
knowledge of American character and understood the foibles of his
countrymen; but he was never cynical, and his satire was without
hostility. He despised opportune journalism. His editorials were clear
and vigorous; free not from partisanship, but from partisan rancor, and
they made for honesty and independence. His firm stand against political
corruption, socialistic vagaries, the misguided and often criminal
efforts of labor agitators, and all the visionary schemes of diseased
minds, has contributed to the stability of sound and self-respecting
American citizenship.
Bunner's first decided success in story-telling was 'The Midge,' which
appeared in 1886. It is a tale of New York life in the interesting old
French quarter of South Fifth Avenue. Again, in 'The Story of a New York
House,' he displayed the same quick feeling for the spirit of the place,
as it was and is. This tale first appeared in the newly founded
Scribner's Magazine, to which he has since been a constant contributor.
Here some of his best short stories have been published, including the
excellent 'Zadoc Pine,' with its healthy presentation of independent
manhood in contest with the oppressive exactions of labor organizations.
But Bunner was no believer in stories with a tendency; the conditions
which lie at the root of great sociological questions he used as
artistic material, never as texts. His stories are distinguished by
simplicity of motive; each is related with fine unobtrusive humor and
with an underlying pathos, never unduly emphasized. The most popular of
his collections of tales is that entitled 'Short Sixes,' which, having
first appeared in Puck, were published in book form in 1891. A second
volume came out three years later. When the shadow of death had already
fallen upon Bunner, a new collection of his sketches was in process of
publication: 'Jersey Street and Jersey Lane.' In these, as in the still
more recent 'Suburban Sage,' is revealed the same fineness of
sympathetic observation in town and country that we have come to
associate with Bunner's name. Among his prose writings there remains to
be mentioned the series from Puck entitled 'Made in France.' These are
an application of the methods of Maupassant to American subjects; they
display that wonderful facility in reproducing the flavor of another's
style which is exhibited in Bunner's verse in a still more eminent
degree. His prose style never attained the perfection of literary
finish, but it is easy and direct, free from sentimentality and
rhetoric; in the simplicity of his conceptions and the delicacy of his
treatment lies its chief charm.
Bunner's verse, on the other hand, shows a complete mastery of form. He
was a close student of Horace; he tried successfully the most exacting
of exotic verse-forms, and enjoyed the distinction of having written the
only English example of the difficult Chant-Royal. Graceful _vers de
societe_ and bits of witty epigram flowed from him without effort. But
it was not to this often dangerous facility that Bunner owed his poetic
fame. His tenderness, his quick sympathy with nature, his insight into
the human heart, above all, the love and longing that filled his soul,
have infused into his perfected rhythms the spirit of universal
brotherhood that underlies all genuine poetry. His 'Airs from Arcady'
(1884) achieved a success unusual for a volume of poems; and the love
lyrics and patriotic songs of his later volume, 'Rowen,' maintain the
high level of the earlier book. The great mass of his poems is still
buried in the back numbers of the magazines, from which the best are to
be rescued in a new volume. If his place is not among the greatest of
our time, he has produced a sufficient body of fine verse to rescue his
name from oblivion and render his memory dear to all who value the
legacy of a sincere and genuine poet. He died on May 11th, 1896, at the
age of forty-one.