Lew Sarett: Woodsman - Poet Lecturer

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Lew Sarett
Woodsman-Poet
Redpath

Lecturer



LEW SARETT
The Woodsman-Poet
LEW SARETT, poet, woodsman and forest ranger, university professor and lecturer, is one of the unique literary figures of America.  His life is kaleidoscopic.  He came out of the forests of the Lake Superior country as a boy.  In Chicago he was a newsboy, a bundle-carrier in a department store, and a worker in a sweatshop.  He knew poverty, loneliness, and hunger.  Later he found his way back to the North; in turn he became a life-saver, a teacher of woodcraft in sportsmen's camps, a naturalist, a guide in the Canadian North, and a U.S. Ranger in the Rocky Mountains.  After he received his education—on funds that he earned in part by his work in the woods—at the University of Michigan, Beloit College, the University of Illinois, and Harvard University, he became first an instructor at the University of Illinois, and later a professor at Northwestern University.

It would require volumes instead of the few inches of space available to tell the story of his rise from obscurity to his nation-wide distinction as one of the most notable poets of this generation.  Numerous magazines have published biographical articles in the effort to encompass the life and the work of this man who is at once a ranger, a daring woodsman, a professor, and an eminent poet; who is respected in the field of letters, a member of the Society of Midland Authors, and the Authors Club of London, Eng., and contributing editor to various literary journals; and who is equally respected by the voyageurs and lumberjacks with whom his work as a woodsman has thrown him, and by the Indians who have adopted him and have given him the name of Lone-Caribou.

Out of this colorful life grew Lew Sarett's poetry.  He has contributed to the Atlantic Monthly, the Bookman, the Century, the Forum, Poetry Magazine, the North American Review, Saturday Review of Literature, and a dozen other journals.  His poetry is included in many of the school readers and college text-books of our country and in the important anthologies of American literature.  He has won numerous prizes with his poems.  He is the author of four volumes of poetry on the American wilderness: Many Many Moons,The Box of God, and Slow Smoke—a best seller in 1925–26 and winner of the prize offered by Poetry Society of America for the best volume of poetry published in 1925—and Wings Against the Moon.  These volume are marked by such power and beauty that by the general agreement of literary critics they have established his supremacy in this field.



LEW SARETT, THE WOODSMAN AND THE MAN

The American Magazine
—The life-story of Lew Sarett, forest ranger, poet and woodsman of rare ability, is one of the great true romances of America….  A waif of the tenements he was; yet today, with several published volumes, he stands as one of America's finest poets of the wilderness….  Alien he was by parentage; yet today no voice is more American than that of this great teacher and star lecturer….  He was timid and assailed by fears of all sorts from early boyhood; yet today he has, and he deserves, a reputation as a hero for performing deeds of great courage: rescues from drowning, dangerous cruises in the Rocky Mountains, arrests of desperate men while working as a ranger and woodsman, amazing encounters with grizzly bears when a false move by the fraction of an inch could have meant maiming or death….  Thousands of people in all parts of the country have seen and heard Lew Sarett, for in the time he can be induced to devote it—only about eight weeks a year—he is a 
fascinating lecturer on wilderness life, and famous as a reader from his own poems….  The story of this man runs swift and deep with precious meaning for every human being….  Once you have met Lew Sarett, really met him and seen into his heart, you never can forget.  It is a momentous experience.



LEW SARETT, THE POET

Harriet Monroe—The Poetry Magazine
—Lew Sarett has the character equipment to write poems expressive of the particular kind of heroic spirit which is building the future of America while nations are painfully digging their way out of the past….  He is the most intimate friend of the wolves, deer, coyotes, and other beasts of our wilds, among all the poets, living or dead, who have written about them.


Literary Digest International Book Review
—With his third volume, Mr. Sarett reaches the front rank of American poets.  He is assured of a safe place in American Literature.

Printed in U. S. A.



BOOKS BY LEW SARETT


MANY MANY MOONS

$1.75




It is incalculably by far the best book of Indian poems ever published.—
Boston Transcript.




THE BOX OF GOD

$1.75




'The Box of God' means more as an American epic than 'Hiawatha'.  It is a revelation of the soul of a man of deep spiritual nature.  But it is more than that to me.  It is one of the great tragic poems of our generation.—
Harry Hansen, in “Midwest Portraits.”




SLOW SMOKE

$2.00




The Committee declared that it voted 'Slow Smoke' the P. S. A. prize for the best volume poetry published in America in 1925 because of the high and even excellence of its lyric and narrative poetry, its intimacy with earth, its singing quality, its tenderness, its limpid beauty, and its outstanding significance.—
Poetry Society of America Bulletin.




WINGS AGAINST THE MOON

$2.00




This poetry is lyrical, musical, ecstatic.  It is to modern poetry what Brahm's symphonic tone poems are to modern music.—
New York World-Telegram.





PUBLISHERS, HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY
1 Park Avenue   New York City



Lew Sarett's Lectures are More Than Lectures; They Are Beautiful Experiences.
On the theory that a lecture should be in a sense the flowering of a man's life, his experience, his philosophy, Lew Sarett formulated his lectures.  He brings to the platform not only his creative talent, skill in the use of vivid English, originality, freshness of material, and a stimulating outlook on life, but also skill as an orator, unusual dramatic power, a sense of humor, and personal charm.  As a consequence his lectures are so unique that, like the man himself, they defy classification.