Bloomfield in America

Abstract

ABSTRACT This paper examines the early printings of Bloomfield's works in the USA, of which there were very many. Some tried to duplicate the British illustrations; others did not. Some were illustrated anew by American printmakers. All of the efforts show an effort to domesticate Bloomfield, the working-class poet, to the American landscape, or to an idea of America as a society in which the class distinctions that marked Bloomfield’s life and career would be erased. The paper concentrates on the early American editions of The Farmer’s Boy and Rural Tales, Ballads, and Songs, with particular attention to the paratextual matter, especially where it modifies information in the British editions, to the illustrations (if any), and to reviews and advertisements for Bloomfield’s poems in American journals and newspapers. The aim is to lay the groundwork for an examination of the ways in which Bloomfield’s poetry served as an inspiration for young American poets, a subject almost entirely unexplored.