lo                                 Kenneth A. Lohf

Masters is no longer the iconoclast or idealist he was during
his Chicago days, but the quiet and thoughtful poet in his
seventies that he had hoped he would be. 1 he earliest manu¬
script in the collection, a five-line holograph poem in ink, "An
Etching," signed by Masters and dated October 24, 1910, bears
an afliinity with the best of his later work as he writes of "this
gray sphinx called life."

In this year of the World's Fair, another manuscript appears
particularly interesting. Masters had visited the Belgian Restau¬
rant at the World's Fair in 1940, perhaps ordered an aperitif,
carried away the wine list in his hand, sat down alongside one
of the fountains, and scribbled his free-verse reflections on the
passing scene on the back of it, as follows:

Sitting out at night by a fountain

I looked at falling water, and circling birds

Until I was half-paralyzed for words

With which to lift the load large as a mountain

From off my heart; . . .

Throughout his life Masters reminded one of a typical mid-
Western farmer with his ruddy cheeks, gold-rimmed spectacles,
broad shoulders, frank and independent expression, and vigorous
demeanor, but he was always known by his friends as being
mild-mannered and essentially friendly. Although his fame will
certainly rest on Spoon River Anthology, nearly all of his work
was born out of his faith in the American vision of liberty. The
collection also contains a short holograph manuscript, dated
August 10, 1942, concerning a play by Kimball Flaccus which
had undoubtedly been sent to Masters for a reading. His com¬
ments on the work might well apply to his own lifetime of writ¬
ing: "For he has America in his heart as a theme, and that will
feed his inspiration for Hfe; for America is the great fact of these
centuries. Now listen to the fiddlers, and to the mountains as they
thunder over this great land."