DM Literary Quiz. The Victorian clergyman who "cleaned up" Longfellow's poem "The Wreck of the Hesperus"

[ALFREDDUST]

Still looking for the answer to the above. Any one find the correct answer yet?

[Celtigra3]

Thomas Bowdler

[ALFREDDUST]

Its not Bowdler. He died before Longfellow wrote the poem.

[Celtigra3]

Gosh, thanks for letting me know. I will have to go hunting for the answer again!

[Celtigra3]

I've had another look and it is Thomas Bowdler - he also cleaned up some of Byron's poems as he was a publisher. Well I am putting it down as that anyway.

[Celtigra3]

Bowdler

Victorian to the core, the English editor Thomas Bowdler earned a measure of fame for his "bowdlerized" versions of various works, among them a child-friendly Old Testament and a 10-volume Family Shakerpeare, from which all traces of sexual allusion and baudy language had been carefully excised. Bowdler also "cleaned up" Longfellow's poem The Wreck of the Hesperus, expurgating, for example, the offensive term "bull." His substitution? "Gentleman cow."

[The term 'gentleman cow' is still used to refer to extreme cases of censorship.]

[Trivia: It was common practice during the Middle Ages for animals to be tried for injuring human beings. The French parliament once ordered the execution of a cow; it was hanged, then burned at the stake.]


Bowdler, Thomas (1754-1825) English editor [noted for his "bowdlerized" versions of various works, among them the Old Testament and his 10-volume Family Shakerpeare]

[Sources: Agel and Glanze, Cleopatra's Nose; Isaac Asimov's Book of Facts]

More Thomas Bowdler anecdotes

Related Anecdote Keywords:
Literature Poems Poetry Bible Editing Swearing Profanity Censorship Absurdity Prudery Cows Substitutions Victorians

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10987654321 Ratings: 7.82 [11 vote(s)]

[ALFREDDUST]

Many thanks for your efforts Celtigra3. I'm pretty sure that this is going to be the answer,but I think the question is ambiguous.. Thomas Bowdler died in 1825 and the wreck of the Hesperus actually occurred in Boston Harbour in 1839. Longfellow wrote the poem shortly after. So I don't see how Bowdler could have 'censored it'

ALFREDDUST

[ALFREDDUST]

Another thought. The question contains the reference to a Victorian clergyman yet Bowdler died in 1825 well before Victorian times. To my knowledge Bowdler was never a clergyman.

[ALFREDDUST]

Although he published more than 30 poems in newspapers and magazines while an undergraduate at Bowdoin, Longfellow wrote few original poems in the eleven years following his graduation in 1825. Of the poems printed in this volume, only "The Spirit of Poetry," composed in 1825, was written before 1838. It was later published in The Voices of the Night (1839), Longfellow's first volume of poems, which also included "Hymn to the Night," "A Psalm of Life," "The Light of Stars," and "Footsteps of Angels," written in 1838 or 1839. "The Skeleton in Armor," "The Wreck of the Hesperus," "The Village Blacksmith," "It Is Not Always May," "The Rainy Day," "God's-Acre," "To the River Charles," "The Goblet of Life," and "Excelsior," poems written between December 1839 and November 1841, were published in Ballads and Other Poems (1842). Longfellow wrote "The

[prewch]

Not that it helps much, but to support ALFREDDUST's contention I have a very old book entitled Longfellow's Poetical Works.

In the notes to the works there is the following

"Dec. 17 1839. - News of shipwrecks horrible ..... many ships including among others the schooner Hesperus. ...I must write a ballad upon this.

"Dec. 30, 1839 ..suddenly it came into my mind to write the ballad of the schooner Hesperus"

Clearly Thomas Bowdler had been dead for around 14 years by htis time.

[Celtigra3]

Maybe it is a different Thomas Bowdler! I am going with my answer anyway!!

[prewch]

One final thought. Perhaps this is a case of a question writer blythely believing something that was found on the internet. I have found a site http://www.anecdotage.com/index.php?aid=13621 which clearly states that (the deceased?) Thomas Bowdler cleaned up Longfellow's Wreck of the Hesperus as suggested in the question.

Of course there may have been two Bowdlers...? Its going to be interesting to see the answer publishe in the DM.

[ALFREDDUST]

I think you're right prewch. I'm pretty sure the answer is going to be Thomas Bowdler though the facts and dates don't bear it out.

ALFREDDUST

[Bekky27]

Hi, I am also having difficulty with this question and I would agree with you in that a question writer may have read the article and assumed it was true, except that in the article it does not say anywhere that Thomas Bowdler was a clergyman. It only says he was an editor, so if the Daily Mail did get their question here surely they would have put 'which Victorian editor...', not clergyman?

[boatinbird]

Hi there!! I have also answered Thomas Bowdler, and it is not the first time that a quiz writer has relied on an article/website that has incorrect information on it...see below....

.e.g....For anyone that is doing the Daily telegraph quiz (holiday to Morocco) the answer to Q15 appears to be (a) Saltfish, but any observant internet user will realise that the correct answer is in fact a sweet dumpling/dessert - but that answer option is not given. I have checked on the internet and there is ONE incorrect reference to saltfish being the correct answer, and where does it come from?....someone who wrote an article for the DAILY TELEGRAPH who are organising the quiz!!!!!!

So sometimes, they do get it wrong!!!!

Good luck to all of you out there who have spent most of christmas trying to find answers to badly worded questions with unfathomable/invisible/incorrect answers!!!

Clare (aka boatinbird)

[lapsapchung]

I've been convinced that the answer can't be Bowdler because although I hadn't thought about dates (smack on my own wrist) he was an editor and a physician but never a clergyman. However having read this thread it appears to me that it's a badly researched question and Bowdler is the answer they are looking for. Thanks for putting me out of my misery!

[Celtigra3]

I think we are all agreed then, it is Thomas Bowdler, even if the compiler got it wrong! Good luck with your entries everyone! I think it would only be fair that someone from Answerbank got the prize, considering all the efforts we've all put in!