Jones Very

Jones Very was born in 1813 in Salem, Massachusetts. His parents, Lydia Very and Captain Jones Very, were first cousins, who never married. Captain Very spent little time with his family, but when the younger Very was nine years old, the sea captain did take his son on a voyage to Kronborg Castle, on which Shakespeare modeled the castle of Elsinore in The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark. This voyage greatly influenced the young Jones Very, who later in his life would write many sonnets that are obviously inspired by Shakespeare's sonnets.

Despite his poverty Jones Very was a good student and was accepted to Harvard, from which he graduated second in his class. He decided to become a Unitarian minister/poet and became engrossed in his studies. He read voraciously of the Romantics both British and German, and he fell completely under the spell of Shakespeare. He enjoyed Lord Byron for a time but later rejected him as he grew closer to his faith. His mother was an atheist, and he wholly rejected that stance, and he could not abide even the questioning of a divine force, as he found in Byron.

Just before graduation from Harvard, Very underwent a transformation that has been variously called crazy and eccentric, and one biographer explains it this way:

During this period he purchased his ticket to the ascetic train which was to carry him to the end of line, the eventual obliteration of self and immersion in the will of God. (Gittleman)

Very became so entrenched in his claims of holiness that he alienated many of those who had been his admirers. Emerson felt he had taken the basic ideals of Transcendentalism too far, and Reverend Upham had Very committed to McLean Hospital in Charlestown. He was soon released because the hospital administrators realized they could not change him, and they also insisted that he was not dangerous to himself or others.

As with Walt Whitman, Jones Very enlisted the aid of that master Transcendentalist Ralph Waldo Emerson. Emerson recognized in Very a unique talent, and when asked to help Very edit a volume of poems and essays for publication, Emerson agreed to do so, despite that fact that Very was reluctant follow Emerson's guidance.

The volume appeared, titled Essays and Poems by Jones Very which included Very's essays "Shakespeare" and " Hamlet." Emerson reviewed the volume in the Dial; however it received little attention.

I find Very's poetry rather bland, a fact that surprised me. His background and his strong faith made me think his poetry would shine with new insights, but at least at this point, I don't find such insights in his writing.

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