Sunday, May 15, 2016

Sunday Poetry - Julia Ward Howe

I'm reading Elaine Showalter's new biography of Julia Ward Howe at the moment so the only possible poem for today is her most famous work, The Battle Hymn of the Republic. It's impossible to begin reading it (or even write the title) without humming the famous tune.

The biography is fascinating as I knew nothing about Julia Ward Howe except the fact that she wrote the Battle Hymn. Her marriage to a famous doctor, Samuel Gridley Howe (he ran the Perkins Institute for the Blind that Dickens visited & wrote about in his American Notes), was fraught with tension. The Civil Wars of the title of Showalter's biography don't just refer to the conflict that began in 1861.

He hath loosed the fatal lightning of his terrible swift sword:
      His truth is marching on.

      His Day is marching on.

      Since God is marching on.”

He has sounded forth the trumpet that shall never call retreat;
      Our God is marching on.

With a glory in his bosom that transfigures you and me:
      While God is marching on.


  1. I have the biography waiting for me,'s always fascinating to learn the 'hidden' stories...and she lived in my neighborhood at one point, so I'm looking forward to reading about that. :) (PS thank you for the BBC link...can't wait to listen to it.)

    1. The biography is excellent. The centre of the book is the relationship between Julia & her husband which is fascinating. even knowing how legally restrictive life was for Victorian women, I was still furious at some of the things SGH did. I'm sure you'll enjoy it, especially as she was a local girl.

  2. I'm just reading this one. Very good indeed.

    1. I enjoyed the biography very much. I knew nothing about her so it was a revelation.