Bayard Taylor Biography

Dromo's Den

TAYLOR, (James) Bayard (1825- 78). An American poet, man of letters, journalist, and traveler, born at Kennett Square, Chester Co., Pa. His education was obtained in the common schools of the neighborhood. He became, in 1842, the apprentice of a printer, and here he published his first volume, Ximena: or the Battle of the Sierra Morena, and Other Poems (1844). In 1844- 45 he made a pedestrian tour through Europe, describing his experiences in Views Afoot: or Europe Seen with Knapsack and Staff (1846). The following year, 1847, he joined the New York Tribune, and remained on the staff of that paper as long as he lived, publishing in its pages the sketches of many of his subsequent books. As its special correspondent, he visited California in 1849, where he spent five months among the gold diggers; two years later he was in Egypt, Asia Minor, and Syria; in 1852- 53 in India, crossing from Bombay to Calcutta, and then going to China to join the expedition of Commodore Perry to Japan. From 1862 to 1863 he was secretary of the United States legation at St. Petersburg, and later chargé d’affaires there, and was influential in securing for the northern States the sympathy of Russia. In 1874 he was again in Egypt, and the same year at the Millennial Celebration in Iceland. For several years previously he had lived in Germany, and there, and in America and England, in 1870 he brought out the work for which he is best known, his excellent translation of Goethe’s Faust. In 1876 he wrote the Ode in honor of the opening of the Centennial Exhibition in Philadelphia. In February, 1878, he was appointed Minister to Germany, and went again to that country, but died there towards the end of the same year, leaving unfinished biographies of Goethe and Schiller. He was married in 1850 to Miss May Agnew, who died the same year, and in 1857 to Miss Marie Hansen of Gotha, Germany, who survived him, reëdited his works, and, with H. E. Scudder, wrote his Life and Letters (Boston, 1884).

Taylor’s work is voluminous, and varied both in kind and in quality. He wrote books of travel, of which the chief are: El Dorado: or Adventures in the Path of Empire (1850); A Journey to Central Africa (1854); A Visit to India, China, and Japan (1855); The Land of the Saracen (1854); Northern Travel (1858); Travels in Greece (1859); At Home and Abroad (1859- 62); Colorado (1867); By-Ways of Europe (1869); Egypt and Iceland in the Year 1874 (1874); and others. His novels include: Hannah Thurston (1863); John Godfrey’s Fortunes (1864); The Story of Kennett (1866); Joseph and his Friend (1870). His poems were also numerous; besides Ximena, the notable volumes are: Rhymes of Travel, Ballads, and Other Poems (1848); A Book of Romances, Lyrics, and Songs (1851); Poems of the Orient (1854); Poems of Home and Travel (1855); The Poet’s Journal (1862); The Picture of St. John (1869); The Ballad of Abraham Lincoln (1869); The Masque of the Gods (1872); Lars, A Pastoral of Norway (1873); The Prophet, A Tragedy (1874); Home Pastorals, Ballads, and Lyrics (1875); and The National Ode (1876). Two posthumous collections of Taylor’s miscellanies appeared-- Studies in German Literature (1879) and Essays and Notes (1880). He had a distinct lyrical faculty, but he never seemed able to bring his varied powers under full artistic control. The public persisted in regarding him as a traveler and journalist rather than as a poet, and, despite the remonstrances of some friendly critics, it is probable that the public was right. At most he is a minor poet, a good translator, and a versatile writer of prose.

The New International Encyclopaedia, Vol. XXII (New York: Dodd, Mead & Co., 1920) 21-22.