The Great Work of Your Life: A Guide for the Journey to Your True Calling (54 page)

  
1
The Civil War “saved” This chapter relies heavily throughout on the argument made by Roy Morris, Jr. in his brilliant examination of Whitman’s life as a volunteer in the hospitals of the Civil War, presented in his
The Better Angel
. Oxford University Press: Oxford, 2000, p. 3.

  
2
“Guilty of that horrible” Jerome Loving.
Walt Whitman: The Song of Himself
. University of California Press: Berkeley, 1999, pp. 184–185.

  
3
“I only gave myself” Whitman, quoted in Morris,
Angel
, p. 5.

  
4
“launch of a great” Emerson, quoted in Justin Kaplan.
Walt Whitman: A Life
. Simon & Schuster: New York, 1979, p. 203.

  
5
“I celebrate myself” Walt Whitman in Lawrence Clark Powell.
Poems of Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass
. Thomas Y. Crowell Company: New York, 1964, p. 72.

  
6
“I loaf and invite” Whitman in Powell,
Leaves
, p. 72.

  
7
“I go around from” Walt Whitman, Walter Loenfels, Nan Braymer.
Walt Whitman’s Civil War
. DaCapo Press: New York, 1989, p. 101.

  
8
“his glassy eyes” Whitman, quoted in Morris,
Angel
, p. 86

  
9
“I sat down by him” Whitman, Loenfels, Braymer,
Whitman
, p. 90.

10
“I cannot give up” Walt Whitman, Edward Haviland Miller,
Selected Letters of Walt Whitman
. University of Iowa Press: Des Moines, 1990, p. 49.

11
“fortifying myself with” Walt Whitman,
Complete Prose Works: Walt Whitman
. [1897] Cornell University Library: Ithaca, 2009, p. 62.

12
“Behold, I do not give” Walt Whitman.
Leaves of Grass
. Sherman and Co: New York, 1881, p. 66.

13
“a silent dark-skinn’d” Whitman, quoted in Morris,
Angel
, p. 127.

14
“Many nights I sat” Walt Whitman, Edward Haviland Miller.
Selected Letters of Walt Whitman
. University of Iowa Press: Des Moines, 1990, p. 78.

15
“I write you this” Walt Whitman, John Harmon McElroy.
The Sacrificial Years: A Chronicle of Walt Whitman’s Experiences in the Civil War
. David R. Godine, Publisher, 1999, p. 54.

16
“to express in a poem” Whitman, Haviland,
Whitman
, p. 109.

17
“I see behind each mask” Whitman,
Leaves
, p. 251.

18
“Our bodies are known” Stoler Miller,
Gita
, 2.18, p. 32.

19
“Weapons do not cut” ibid., 2.23, p. 32.

20
“it is enduring” ibid., 2.24, p. 33.

21
“Old men ought to be” T. S. Eliot,
Four Quartets
, in Sunil Kumar Sarker.
T. S. Eliot: Poetry, Plays and Prose
. Atlantic: New Delhi, 1995, 2008, p. 140.

22
“Our bodies are known” Stoler Miller,
Gita
, 2.18, p. 32.

23
“He was assassinated” Whitman, quoted in Morris,
Angel
, p. 221.

24
“Come lovely and” Whitman in Harold Bloom.
Walt Whitman: Bloom’s Modern Critical Views
. Chelsea House: New York, 2006, p. 104.

25
“Strive constantly to serve”
The Bhagavad Gita: Translated for the Modern Reader by Eknath Easwaran
. Nilgiri Press: Tomales, California, 1985, 3.19, p. 77.

26
“There were years” David S. Reynolds.
Walt Whitman
. Oxford University Press: USA, 2005, p. 127.

  
1
“From around the age of” Hokusai, quoted in Seiji Nagata.
Hokusai: Genius of the Japanese Ukiyo-e
. Kodansha International: Tokyo, 2000, p. 87.

  
2
“I became an artist” Hokusai, in Nagata,
Hokusai
, p. 87.

  
3
“If only heaven” Hokusai, quoted in George Newnes.
The Strand Magazine
, Vol. 15, Jan 1898 No. 85. George Newnes, Ltd: London, 1898, p. 562.

  
4
“Considering your dharma” Easwaran,
Gita
, 2.31, p. 64.

  
5
“The ignorant, indecisive” ibid., 4.40, p. 89.

  
6
“Don’t waste time” Guan Yin Tzu, quoted in Timothy Freke.
Taoist Wisdom: Daily Teachings from the Taoist Master
. Sterling: NY, 2002, p. 123.

  
7
“One of the few things” Annie Dillard.
The Writing Life
. HarperCollins: New York, 1989, p. 78.

  
8
“The disunited mind” Easwaran,
Gita
, 2.66, p. 68.

  
9
“must overcome the confusion” ibid., 2.52, p. 67.

  
1
“Two roads diverged” Robert Frost. “The Road Not Taken.”
Mountain Interval
. Henry Holt: New York, 1915, p. 9.

  
2
“For me the initial delight” Frost, quoted in Edward C. Lathem, Lawrence R. Thompson.
The Robert Frost Reader: Poetry and Prose
. Holt Paperback: New York, 2002, p. 440.

  
3
“meets himself” Frost, in Lathem,
Frost Reader
, p. 440.

  
4
“Some say the world” Robert Frost. “Fire and Ice,”
Harper’s Magazine
, December 1920, p. 67.

  
5
“They would not find me” Robert Frost, in Lawrence Untermeyer.
The Road Not Taken: A Selection of Robert Frost’s Poems
. Holt: New York, 2002, p. xxiv.

  
6
“I liked to try myself” Deirdre J. Fagan.
Critical Companion to Robert Frost
. Facts on File: New York, 2007, p. 5.

  
7
“I wrote it all” Natalie S. Bober.
A Restless Spirit: The Story of Robert Frost
. Henry Holt: New York, 1998, p. 49.

  
8
“something was happening” ibid., p. 42.

  
9
“The most demanding” Annie Dillard.
The Writing Life
. HarperCollins: New York, 1989, p. 68.

10
“To love poetry is to” Frost quoted in Jay Parini.
Robert Frost: A Life
. Henry Holt: New York, p. 44.

11
“Specifically speaking, the few” K. Harris.
Robert Frost: Studies of the Poetry
. G. K. Hall and Co., 1980, p. 4.

12
“a more elevated” Parini,
Frost
, p. 45.

13
“Too close to” ibid., p. 46.

14
“Perhaps when that preacher” Peter James Stanlis.
Robert Frost: The Poet as Philosopher
. Second Edition. Intercollegiate Studies Institute, 2008, p. xiii.

15
“talk songs” Parini,
Frost
, p. 76.

16
“is lifted just enough” ibid., p. 77.

17
“sound of sense” ibid., p. 77.

18
“The sound of” Jesse Zuba, Harold Bloom.
Robert Frost: Bloom’s Modern Critical Views
. Chelsea House: London, 2003, p. 208.

19
“From all sides” Parini,
Frost
, p. 72.

20
“This was a time” ibid., p. 91.

21
“It was a necessary” ibid., p. 85.

22
“It all started” ibid., p. 72.

23
“No man can know” ibid., p. 115.

24
“a life that followed” ibid., p. 113.

25
“Until one is committed” W. A. Murray.
The Scottish Himalayan Expedition
. J. M. Dent and Sons Ltd: London, 1951, p. 6.

  
1
“singleness of purpose” Easwaran,
Gita
, 2.41, p. 65.

  
2
“For those who lack” ibid., p. 65.

  
3
“disunited” ibid., 2.66, p. 68.

  
4
focus as an essential Stephen Covey.
The Seven Habits of Highly Successful People
. Free Press: New York, 1989, p. 9.

  
5
“winners focus, losers spray” Sydney J. Harris.
Winners and Losers
. Argus Communications: New York, 1973, p. 2.

  
6
“These old Bachelors” Jean H. Baker.
Sisters: The Lives of America’s Suffragists
. Hill and Wang: New York, 2006, p. 62.

  
7
“When I am crowned” Elizabeth Cady Stanton.
Eighty Years and More: 1815–1898, Reminiscences of Elizabeth Cady Stanton
. Indy Publishing, 2004, p. 172.

  
8
“I will show you” Charlotte Brontë in Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell.
The Life of Charlotte Brontë: Vol II
. Smith, Elder and Co: London, 1857, p. 11.

  
9
“The true woman will” Susan B. Anthony, in Lynn Sherr.
Failure Is Impossible: Susan B. Anthony in Her Own Words
. Times Books: Toronto, 1995, p. 297.

10
“I am tired of theory” Ann M. Todd.
Susan B. Anthony: Activist
. Chelsea House: London, 2008, p. 27.

11
“the sisters were not” Susan B. Anthony, quoted in Kathleen Barry.
Susan B. Anthony: A Biography of a Singular Feminist
. First Books: Bloomington, IN, 2000, p. 71.

12
“We are heartily sick and tired” Susan B. Anthony, in
Elizabeth Cady Stanton: The Right Is Ours
. Oxford University Press: USA, 2001, p. 61.

13
“Dress loose, take a” ibid., p. 61.

14
“I have no doubt” Susan B. Anthony, Susan Brownell Anthony, Ann D. Gordon.
The Selected Papers of Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony, Vol. 4
. Rutgers University Press: Rutgers, 1997, p. 198.

15
“it is most invigorating” Ida Husted Harper.
The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony, Vol I
. University of Michigan Library: Ann Arbor, 1898, p. 66.

16
“Take a concrete issue” Barry,
Anthony
, p. 76.

17
“With a degree of impiety” Sherr,
Failure
, p. 146.

18
“The mob represents more” Anthony in Barry,
Anthony
, p. 83.

19
“The important thing” ibid., p. 91.

20
“This was the real” ibid.

21
“Susan B. Anthony came to” ibid., p. 111.

22
“[The Master] doesn’t glitter” Stephen Mitchell.
Tao te Ching
. HarperPerennial: New York, 1991, Saying 39.

23
“While we differ widely” Geoffrey C. Ward.
Not for Ourselves Alone: The Story of Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony—An Illustrated History
. Knopf: New York, 1999.

24
“She did not mince words” Barry,
Anthony
, p. 114.

25
“Until women are made” Anthony in Sherr,
Failure
, p. 66.

26
“Woman and her” ibid., p. 61.

27
“failure is impossible” ibid., xiii.

28
“Not in our day” Anthony in Barry,
Anthony
, p. 132.

29
“Do you pray” Sherr,
Failure
, Chapter 20 “Divine Discontent.”

30
Just three years details of scene imagined by the author, drawing on fact, see Barry,
Anthony
, p. xi.

31
“When a person” Easwaran,
Gita
, 7.21, p. 117.

32
“How you spend your” Dillard,
Writing
, p. 32.

  
1
“so many great works” Monet, quoted in Madeleine Hours.
Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot
. The Easton Press: Norwalk, CT, 1984, pp. 41-42.

  
2
“There is only one” ibid., p. 42.

  
3
“This is the saddest” ibid., p. 42.

  
4
In the Light of Italy
This exhibition was held at the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., May 29–September 2, 1996.

  
5
“They are an idea of an” Robert Frost, quoted in Parini,
Frost
, p. 283.

  
6
“the artist had captured” Corot, quoted in Patrick Noon.
Crossing the Channel: British and French Painting in the Age of Romanticism
. Tate Publishing: Mustang, OK, 2003, p. 201.

  
7
“to pursue your” Hours,
Corot
, p. 30.

  
8
“Do you really think” ibid., p. 30.

  
9
“Do not follow others” Corot, quoted in Everard Meynell.
Corot and His Friends
. Methuen and Co: London, 1908, p. 97.

10
“You could not imagine” Corot, quoted in Peter Galassi.
Corot in Italy: Open-air Painting and the Classical Landscape Tradition
. Yale University Press: New Haven, 1991, p. 136.

11
“Corot is our master” ibid., p. 152.

12
“One must be severe” ibid.

13
“Many of Corot’s best” ibid., p. 191.

14
“Expert Performance” K. Anders Ericsson and Neil Charness. “Expert Performance: Its Structure and Acquisition,”
American Psychologist
, Vol. 49, No. 8, August 1994, pp. 725–747.

15
“All I really want” Corot, quoted in Linello Venturi.
Corot: 1796–1875
. Philadelphia Museum of Art: Philadelphia, 1946, p. 20.

16
“Ceaseless work, either” Corot, quoted in Keith Roberts.
Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot: 1796–1875
. Spring Books: London, 1965, p. 33.

17
“I could be gay” Corot, quoted in Meynell,
Corot
, p. 76.

18
“When you write” Dillard,
Writing
, p. 3.

19
“All must be governed” Corot, quoted in Roberts,
Corot
, p. 37.

20
“You have no idea of the things” Corot, quoted in Meynell,
Corot
, p. 31.

  
1
“You have the right to work” Easwaran,
Gita
, 2.47, p. 66.

  
2
“You should never engage” ibid., p. 66.

  
3
“Those who are motivated” ibid., 2.49, p. 66.

  
4
“When you keep thinking” ibid., 2.62, p. 68.

  
5
“Seek refuge in the” ibid., 2.49, p. 66.

  
6
“Neither agitated by” ibid., 2.56, p. 67.

  
7
“When consciousness is unified” ibid., 2.49, p. 66.

  
8
“When you move” ibid., 2.62., p. 68.