The Quaker Graveyard in Nantucket (1946). Content and Description

Dedicated to his cousin Warren Winslow, who died while serving in World War II, “The Quaker Graveyard in Nantucket” first appeared in the Partisan Review in 1945. It was later revised and collected in Lord Weary’s Castle with additional passages not originally published. Structured in seven parts, with various rhyme schemes, the poem exhibits Lowell’s early preoccupation with formalism and the aural qualities of his poetry. It also demonstrates his tendency to pull together literary, biblical, classical, historical, and biographical allusions into one complicated arrangement.

Allusion in poetry functions by indirectly referencing another work and thereby incorporating already established symbolic meaning. Many critics argue that “Graveyard” exemplifies Lowell’s ability to cultivate powerful symbolism by alluding to the long tradition within which he writes. Others, however, argue that the barrage of references con- volutes the meaning and detracts from the poem’s overall success.

Whether successful or not, the poem certainly demands that the reader have a lot of prior knowledge in order to attempt to understand even its most basic meanings. It helps to know, for instance, that Ahab is in Herman Melville’s novel Moby-Dick (1851) and is captain of a ship named the Pequod. Ahab hunts Moby Dick, the mythical white sperm whale, for revenge but eventually drowns trying to kill him. Lowell associates this character with America’s fanatical idealism. In an interview he explained, “I always think there are two great symbolic figures that stand behind American ambition and culture.

One is [John] Milton’s Lucifer and the other is Captain Ahab: these two sublime ambitions that are doomed and ready, for their idealism, to face any amount of violence” (Meyers 105). “Graveyard” includes numerous mentions of Ahab’s enemy, the white whale, but they do not establish a clear significance. He appears alternately as the “hurt beast” and the “whited monster,” embodying contradictory personae that resist interpretation with a single symbolic value.

The sea—actually the Atlantic Ocean—takes on similarly complicated and contradictory meanings in the poem. Toward the end of the first section, Lowell writes, “When you are powerless / To sandbag this Atlantic bulwark, faced / By the earth- shaker” (14). The “earth-shaker” refers to Poseidon, the Greek god of the seas and earthquakes, and suggests a violent and defensive sea. In that sense we can understand Moby Dick, the whale, as being an agent of the sea’s anger, or an instrument of God.

There are also several references throughout the poem to leviathans, which in the Bible is a scaly sea monster. In the more secular usage, though, the word leviathan refers to large creatures and has been used to describe both whales and ships. The different denotations complicate Lowell’s meaning, of course, as the reader attempts to parse out the relationships among the sea, the seagoers, and the sea creatures.

The sea’s changing demeanor makes it difficult to settle on any absolute understanding. In the first section we find an unforgiving and powerful sea. In the second we see an image of the sea as vulnerable as the Quakers it kills: “The wind’s wings beat upon the stones, / Cousin, and scream for you and the claws rush / At the sea’s throat and wring it in the slush” (15). Finally, at the end of the poem we learn that the Atlantic is “fouled” by people, monsters, and fishes, suggesting that it once had a purity found in none of the others.

The poem fails to attach particular values to its many images and allusions. That failure, though, allows Lowell to convey the difficulty of working within such a large and violent tradition. “Graveyard” takes on symbolism as a sinking ship takes on water. By becoming inundated it demonstrates the hardship of relating to a tradition that presents contradictions and confusions. Under Lowell’s control, however, the rhythmic structures and imagery retain clarity and make reading the poem an engaging experience. The final passage, for instance, suggests resolution through a careful shift in tone. The last line, however, has sparked a deluge of critical curiosity and speculation denying us a resolution and instead forcing us to reconsider the poem at every turn.

For Discussion or Writing:
1. The first half of the first stanza borrows imagery from the first chapter of Henry David Thoreau’s Cape Cod (1865). Lowell’s later poem “The Dolphin” repeats the imagery of drowning entangled by knots. Read each of the examples and discuss how the same image can be used to create different meanings. Pay particular attention to tone and structuring technique.

2. In the third section, the initials IS appear to describe “the whited monster.” The whited monster probably is Moby Dick, the sperm whale, while IS may be less certain. The first printings of the poem read, “Of is, the swashing castle.” Some say the edit introduced a typo into the text, while others believe that IS references Iesus Salvator, Latin for “Jesus the Savior.” If IS signifies Jesus Christ, then Lowell invites the reader to associate Moby Dick with the Son of God. What implications would that understanding have for the rest of the poem?

3. The sixth section of “Graveyard” breaks sharply from the New England scene to describe the Carmelite Monastery of Walsingham, in Norfolk, England, which was a popular shrine to Mary before being destroyed in 1538. How does this section relate to the rest of the poem? What does Lowell accomplish by including it? Feel free to conduct additional research on the monastery, Catholicism, or Lowell to include in your response.