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William
Cullen
Bryant,
(born
Nov.
3,
1794,
Cummington,
Mass.,
U.S.—died
June
12,
1878,
New
York
City),
poet
of
nature,
best
remembered
for
“Thanatopsis,”
and
editor
for
50
years
of
the
New
York
Evening
Post.
A
descendant
of
early
Puritan
immigrants,
Bryant
at
16
entered
the
sophomore
class
of
Williams
College.
Because
of
finances
and
in
hopes
of
attending
Yale,
he
withdrew
without
graduating.
Unable
to
enter
Yale,
he
studied
law
under
private
guidance
at
Worthington
and
at
Bridgewater
and
at
21
was
admitted
to
the
bar.
He
spent
nearly
10
years
in
Plainfield
and
at
Great
Barrington
as
an
attorney,
a
calling
for
which
he
held
a
lifelong
aversion.
At
26
Bryant
married
Frances
Fairchild,
with
whom
he
was
happy
until
her
death
nearly
half
a
century
later.
In
1825
he
moved
to
New
York
City
to
become
coeditor
of
the
New
York
Review.
He
became
an
editor
of
the
Evening
Post
in
1827;
in
1829
he
became
editor
in
chief
and
part
owner
and
continued
in
this
position
until
his
death.
His
careful
investment
of
his
income
made
Bryant
wealthy.
He
was
an
active
patron
of
the
arts
and
letters.
The
religious
conservatism
imposed
on
Bryant
in
childhood
found
expression
in
pious
doggerel;
the
political
conservatism
of
his
father
stimulated
“The
Embargo”
(1808),
in
which
the
13-year-old
poet
demanded
the
resignation
of
President
Jefferson.
But
in
“Thanatopsis”
(from
the
Greek
“a
view
of
death”),
which
he
wrote
when
he
was
17
and
which
made
him
famous
when
it
was
published
in
The
North
American
Review
in
1817,
he
rejected
Puritan
dogma
for
Deism;
thereafter
he
was
a
Unitarian.
Turning
also
from
Federalism,
he
joined
the
Democratic
party
and
made
the
Post
an
organ
of
free
trade,
workingmen’s
rights,
free
speech,
and
abolition.
Bryant
was
for
a
time
a
Free-Soiler
and
later
one
of
the
founders
of
the
Republican
party.
As
a
man
of
letters,
Bryant
securely
established
himself
at
the
age
of
27
with
Poems
(1821).
In
his
later
years
he
devoted
considerable
time
to
translations.
Bryant
will
be
remembered
longest
as
the
poet
of
his
native
Berkshire
hills
and
streams
in
such
poems
as
“Thanatopsis”
and
“To
a
Waterfowl.”
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