Original research and riffs on Herman Melville, authorship, and nineteenth-century American literature.
The Piazza Tales. By Herman Melville, author of "Typee," "Omoo," &c. N. York: Dix & Edwards. Dubuque: Sold by L. A. Babcock & Co. 1 vol. 12mo.
These lively sketches have appeared in Putnam's Monthly, where we remember to have read some of them with interest, particularly "Benito Cereno." Mr. Melville is a very popular author.
CHARLES WHITNEY, dramatic reader and author of wide celebrity, was born at Chenango Point, now Binghamton, N.Y., April 1, 1815, a son of General Joshua Whitney, of whom see the very interesting biographical sketch on another page. The Whitney family is one of the best known in the annals of this city.In February 1859, Herman Melville opened for Professor Whitney in Chicago. Or put it this way: Whitney closed out Melville's Chicago lecture on The South Seas. In Melville as Lecturer, Merton M. Sealts, Jr. cited Whitney's performance as evidence of the unrefined "western" appetite for popular entertainment:
The subject of this brief memoir, who died suddenly, April 17, 1885, at his home, No. 7 North Street, Binghamton, received a good education, attending some of the best institutions of learning in the State of New York at the time of his school-days in the early part of the century. He held first rank as a dramatic reader, and was especially versed in Shakespearean literature, to which he was so devoted that every room in his house had some appropriate quotation from the bard of Avon painted on the walls. He was a man of great ability as a writer, and was a correspondent for various New York papers for many years.
At the age of forty he married Miss Emily Clark, a most gifted and intelligent lady, who was born in Halifax, Nova Scotia. She died March 10, 1892, on the home farm in the town of Conklin, N.Y., where she and the family had lived since the death of her husband. They had a family of five children, of whom only two are now living, Mary E. and Jennie J. Mary E. was born in Boston, Mass., and is an artist of rare merit, and also a well-known author. She and her sister are graduated of St. Agnes Church School at Albany, N.Y., and are brilliantly educated young women. They managed the farm in the town of Conklin, where they reside, and which consists of one hundred and sixty acres of excellent and productive land. Miss Mary devoted herself principally to her paintings, for which she receives many valuable orders; and her literary work appears in the best magazines of the day.
Mr. and Mrs. Whitney were communicants of the Episcopal church, and in politics he voted with the Democratic party.
Here the atmosphere was quite different from that of the eastern lecture halls, for after Melville had finished speaking, "Professor Charles Whitney...announced his entertainment to take place this evening...and gave an admirable impersonation of the eccentric John Randolph, closing with a rendition of Boker's fine ballad of Sir John Franklin." --Melville as Lecturer, 81-2Hershel Parker adds:
"Melville was most likely trapped on the stage for this quintessentially academic self-promotion." --Herman Melville: A Biography, v2.393Despite Whitney's self-promoting title of "Professor," his career as dramatic speaker or "elocutionist" now looks more theatrical than academic. Possibly Melville enjoyed the show, if he stayed. And if, say, Whitney did his celebrated imitation of Red-Jacket. And I'm wondering, too--would Melville have known of Whitney already, before encountering him live in Chicago? In August 1838, a few months after Melville's family moved from Albany to Lansingburgh, Whitney lectured in Troy.
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| Troy Daily Whig, Monday Evening, August 6, 1838 |
"deliver a Lecture on the Art of Speaking, explanatory of his mode of teaching this science, and illustrate its principles, by appropriate reading and recitations--exhibit a natural and easy mode of acquiring the beautiful falsetto, and the Vocal Echo,--Mr. Whitney will also, explain the amusing art of Ventriloquism, or Vocal Modulation."
Notice and ad both found at Fulton History.
--from the American Masonic Register and Literary Companion (March 14, 1840).Charles Whitney's fifth Albany lecture received this rave advance review in the Albany Argus (dated Thursday Morning, April 2, 1840), signed "H.":
Mr. WHITNEY delivers his fifth lecture on Oratory, this evening at the Apollo Saloon, Green street. Among the compositions selected in illustration of his subject, are Milton’s Apostrophe to Light, and the Female Maniac, by Lewis—both admirable subjects—the former as portraying in sublime yet touching language, the loss of those “orbs” for which the lofty conceptions of the poet, could scarcely compensate, and the latter exhibiting a fine mind gradually sinking beneath a weight of injustice and misery into madness.— Mr. W’s delineation is perfect. These two pieces are alone worth the whole price of admission, and no doubt a goodly portion of our citizens will avail themselves of this truly intellectual entertainment. H.Later in his career as a dramatic speaker Whitney won a reputation for
"celebrated impersonations of orators and imitations of American and Indian speeches." --Washington Daily Union, February 7, 1851Related melvilliana post: Melville's lecture on The South Seas
THE YOUNG MEN’S ASSOCIATION LECTURE TONIGHT.
— Most of our readers have doubtless heard of, if they have not read, those most delightful volumes anent Pacific ocean and island life, entitled "Typee" and "Omoo," which were so highly praised, at the date of their publication, by the pen of this country and Great Britain. The author of them, Herman Mellville, Esq., delivers a lecture before the Young Men's Association, this evening, in Metropolitan Hall. Subject, “The South Seas." Prof. Whitney will, on the conclusion of the lecture, give a number of his inimitable impersonations. Admittance twenty five cents. We trust there will be a full house. --Chicago Daily Press and Tribune, Thursday Morning, February 24, 1859.The next day Melville's South Sea lecture received this extensive review in the Chicago Tribune:
EVENINGS WITH THE ORATORS.—Prof. Charles Whitney’s entertainment of impersonations, readings and recitations, should not be forgotten by the lovers of elocution and good reading. The specimen of his style at the close of Mr. Melville’s lecture on Thursday evening, was received with much applause.This Whitney was a well-traveled speaker and showman. Almost twenty years before he closed Melville's "South Seas" lecture in Chicago, "Charles Whitney, Professor of Elocution" was giving lectures in Albany and Schenectady “upon the art of speaking." Whitney's performances back then featured illustrative imitations of "distinguished orators and tragedians" including scenes from Shakespeare declaimed in the manner of celebrated actors like Vandenhoff, Forest, Booth, Garrick, McCready, Kean. Whitney in 1840 also did impressions of politicians, specifically "McDuffie, Clay, Wise, Hayne, Preston, &c.” (Schenectady Cabinet, Tuesday, February 25, 1840)
He was to have made his appearance before an audience in his first entertainment in this city, at Mechanics’ Institute Hall, last evening, but generously yielded the use of the Hall for the Republican Ratification meeting. He will make his first appearance on Monday evening next, and deserves a full house. He stands confessedly among he foremost in his art of impersonating those who have in their day moved listening Senates, and swayed the people by the magic power of eloquence. --Chicago Daily Press and Tribune, Saturday Morning, February 26, 1859.
Professor Charles Whitney has arrived in this city, and purposes to give lectures, as well as his celebrated impersonations of orators and imitations of American and Indian speeches. The English papers were full of complimentary paragraphs upon his exhibitions when he was in England and Ireland. He returned to this country about six weeks ago. The Dublin Freeman’s Journal speaks of his depicting with effect “the finest and tenderest feelings.” Messers. Clay, Webster, John Randolph, Wirt, Calhoun, McDuffie, and Preston, are among the orators whom he impersonates. He is the person whose repetition of Patrick Henry’s speech on liberty in Dublin, whilst Ireland was so much excited, called down upon him the surveillance of the government. His first night’s lecture in Washington will be announced hereafter.Wait, Indian speeches? Yes, Whitney could do Red Jacket as well as Hamlet. From the Albany Atlas and Argus, Saturday Morning, April 12, 1856:
So delighted were the large and fashionable audience at the marvelous transformation of Mr. Charles Whitney into Hayne and Webster, Shiel and John Randolph, Hamlet and Red Jacket, that they have requested him to appear once more, on Monday evening, 14th inst.A brief notice in New York Evening Post, February 11, 1868, finds Whitney still doing "remarkably good imitations of famous orators" at Dodworth Hall.
What can be more enchanting than the play and strife of intellect as portrayed in the Senatorial conflict between Hayne and Webster, Clay and Randolph, McDuffie and Tristram Burgess? Or, the passage in the British Parliament,—Shiel’s scathing invective against Lord Lyndhurst; or the Indian Council fire, where Red Jacket portrays the usurpations of the white man; or, the ridiculous appearance of Counsellor Scolper? Mr. Whitney’s voice is both full and majestic, and its low tones search every thread and fibre of the heart. We are sure Association Hall will again be crowded with the beauty and fashion of the town.
