Books About Vachel
The books described here are part of Job Conger’s collection of Lindsayana.
Descriptions are revised transcriptions from Vachel Lindsay: Strange Gold published
in 2003.
Tramping With a Poet Through the Rockies
by Stephen Graham
1922 – D. Appleton and Company, 122 pages
This engaging romp includes poems by the book’s author
and 38 minimalist drawings (called "emblems") by Vernon Hill. It is a
fast-moving first-person accounting of Grahams’s interaction with Vachel in 38 small
chapters. This includes Graham’s visit to Springfield, hiking amd camping through the
mountains of Glacier National Park into Canada and back. The first Vernon emblem is
appropriately entitled The World is my parish,"referring, or course to his
understanding of Vachel. This is a first-rate effort.
Vachel Lindsay, Adventurer
by Albert Edmund Trombley
1929 – Lucas Brothers, 164 pages
The only biography published during his life, it’s a
simple effort with chapters dealing with "Biographical," "The Prose
Books," "The Poems," "The Picture Books," "Conclusion,"
and "Bibliography." Much of the text is set in present tense with many quotes
from Vachel and those he knew. The bibliography, with its list of articles by Lindsay and
about him, including one by Edgar Lee Masters, shows the poet to have been a far more
frequent contributor to periodicals than may have been previously thought.
Vachel Lindsay, a Biography
by Edgar Lee Masters
1935 – Charles Scribners & Sons, 392 pages
If you want to understand how successful lawyers of the 30ss
wrote, compared with successful poets named Vachel Lindsay, this book will show you.
Masters’ success as a lawyer, and the authenticity of his friendship with Vachel and
Elizabeth are indisputable. His verbose, pedantic biography may have been exemplary,
"the style," for 1935, but I have found Henry James and Henry David Thoreau
easier to read. Masters has revealed the story of the poet as Condoleeza Rice might reveal
the story of George W. Bush. Never-the-less, Masters’ magnum opus is a
valuable slice of life of the poet and his time. The pictures, including one of
Vachel’s death mask, his drawing of The Map of the Universe and an
unattributed drawing of the Lindsay house could have been included only with the asset of
the Springfield poet’s widow. This is the only book in my Lindsay collection which I
have not had the intestinal fortitude to slog through from start to finish. I am confident
that other readers who enjoy mental self-immolation will be able to succeed where I
failed, and I wish them well in their time of trial.
City of Discontent
by Mark Harris
1952 -- The Hobbs-Merril Co., 403 pages
In Vachel’s poem Springfield Magical, Vachel
writes,
"In this, the City
of my Discontent,
Sometimes there comes a
whisper from the grass," . . . .
and from those lines, springs the title of a wonderful book. This "interpretive
biography" was the first bio I read of Vachel. Harris’ twist, his license to
fictionalize with his imagination, roped me into the story like a lariat embracing a
wayfaring brisket of beef on the Brazilian pampas. I have not been able to extricate
myself from this embrace in the 14 years hence, and that’s okay. If one comes away
from the story’s last words, unable to separate the facts of Vachel’s life from
the fictions, that is also okay. It is an eloquent, inspiring, engrossing, excellent read!
The West-Going Heart, A Life of Vachel Lindsay
by Eleanor Ruggles
1959 – W.W. Norton & Company, 448 pages
If you purchase one more book about Vachel – after you
purchase Vachel Lindsay: Strange Gold by Job Conger – Ruggles’ book is
the one to buy. This biography is an elegant fabric of well-woven insights and tales of
the poet’s life. The pictures, including one of Vachel and Stephen Graham, are some
of the best produced in print. The book is more than one to read; it is one to re-read.
Highly recommended.
A City Is Not Builded in a Day
by Frances S. Ridgely
1968 – Vachel Lindsay Association softbound booklet, 34 pages
The author, a charter member of the Vachel Lindsay
Association, shares the Association’s consensus (They would not publish what they did
not approve.) of what central Illinois citizens and visitors should know about Vachel.
There is not one poem reprinted in its entirety in this book, though "The
MacMillan" is acknowledged for granting permission to share what they did. There are
fragments of Vachel’s drawings and also illustrations by Frances Ridgely. The focus
is on the Springfield years: before he was born, and Vachel’s early life in his home
town. There is no mention of Gulf Park or Spkane years, his marriage, his return to
Springfield or his death.
Vachel Lindsay, Field Worker for the American Dream
by Ann Massa
1970 – Indiana University Press, 370 pages
Probably the best consideration of the poet’s many artistic
elements, including his visual art and philosophies, it describes the man by topic:
Regionalism, The American Present, Religion, Equality, and a major examination of The
Golden Book of Springfield. Included are many Vachel drawings and excerpts from Vachel
poems. It is excellent scholarship, style, and a very enjoyable read.
From the Lindsay Scrapbook: Cousin Vachel
by Eudora Lindsay South
1978 – Joy Anne Blair (publisher), soft cover, 100 pages
The authors mother was the older sister of Dr. Lindsay.
There is priceless family history here, more narrative recollections of family life than
the title suggests. Also included are transcriptions of letters from her cousin Vachel,
other family members and friends. Some of Vachel’s long-hand letters are shared as
pictures, revealing writing almost as stylized as his drawings. Also invaluable are the
descriptions of the poet’s ties to many Springfieldians, friends and associates. The
photographs include probably the only published views of him at Gulf Park College and
others of family and poet I have not seen elsewhere. This is a delightful book.
The Poetry of Vachel Lindsay
complete with Vachel Lindsay’s drawings
Volume 1
edited by Dennis Camp
1984 – Spoon River University Press, 429 pages
There are no three books which reveal more of the poet than
this landmark series by a former Sangamon State University professor. This first volume
contains some of the poet’s art and poems to 1919. This is impeccable scholarship,
easy to read.
The Poetry of Vachel Lindsay
complete with Vachel Lindsay’s drawings
Volume 2
edited by Dennis Camp
1984 – Spoon River University Press, 422 pages
Vachel often wrote poems to explain, or at least appear
adjacent to his drawings and paintings. This volume includes many paired renderings. Also
included are poems not published in books, including what is probably his last poem,
written in summer 1931.
The Poetry of Vachel Lindsay
complete with Vachel Lindsay’s drawings
Volume 3
edited by Dennis Camp
1984 – Spoon River University Press, 192 pages
Notes about poems shared in the first two volumes, a title index
which helps the reader find poems in the first two, and just a few examples of his art are
included here. One of the two, The Potatoes’ Dance which also graces the dust jacket,
is hung in the living room of the restored family home at 603 S. Fifth Street in
Springfield, Illinois. I turn to my working set of "The Vachel Trilogy" often,
and am confident any Vachel fan will too.
Letters of Vachel Lindsay
edited by Marc Chenetier
1979 – Burt Franklin & Co., 474 pages
Scholastic folks highly regard letters because they reveal
what was not obvious to those who witnessed only the public persona. Chenetier has
corrected spelling and punctuation of Vachel’s letters, but that’s all. They
reveal a great deal about the poet. BUT keep in mind that the book shares only some
of the letters which survive in university archives. Like most letters, many of these are
"chatty," and the reader must sift a lot of sand to find a clam with perhaps a
pearl therein. With all that caveat, I hasten to note that it’s an excellent
presentation and merits a place on any shelf of American literature.
Vachel Lindsay: Poet in Exile
by Mildred Weston
1987 – Ye Galleon Press, 94 pages
Lost to many beyond Spokane, Washington is Vachel’s
life as he probably would have preferred to live it in his family’s home in
Springfield. The book is an engaging detail-rich glimpse of the poet’s life in
Spokane with better descriptions of his "eccentricities" than readers will find
in any other book which I have encountered. Included are a picture of a portrait painted
by a Spokane artist, a few of his drawings accompanied by short Vachel poems. This is an
easy, illuminating and richly rewarding read!
Vachel Lindsay Troubadour in "The
Wildflower City"
Collected Writings from The Spokesman-Review and Spokane
Chronicle
by Shaun O’L. Higgins
1999 – New Media Ventures, Inc., 150 pages
Retrieved from the back pages of history is this gathering
of poems and prose Vachel shared, almost exclusively with the people of Spokane. It will
surprise many to learn he wrote a regular column for Spokane’s newspaper, essays
which reveal a lot about the city, his view of the arts and his outlook on life as he
lived it there. There are many pictures of people and places connected to him during his
three years in a city he appears to have loved almost as much as Springfield, Illinois. It
is a well-organized, well-produced book.
Vachel Lindsay: Strange Gold
by Job Conger
2003 – self-published, softbound, 148 pages
Central Illinois’ best-known reciter of Vachel Lindsay
may become his best-known biographer in the 21st century (but we
wouldn’t bet on it). Conger’s compendium blends notes about Springfield history
into a concise biography, never-before-published photos, an annotated bibliography and
lyrics to Conger’s own unique ballad about his literary Ursa Major. The book
is very comprehensive for its size, and it is highly recommended by the author.
AN INVITATION TO READERS
Vachel Lindsay: Strange Gold is sold out. I loved every minute putting it together,
and am embarking on an effort to publish a second edition. If you would like to be
notified by email when the second edition is available for purchase and anytime I update
my Vachel Lindsay pages, please drop a note to me at writer@eosinc.com
Visit Books By Vachel Lindsay by clicking here
Visit my Vachel Lindsay home page by clicking here