2. George Sterling
The black vulture written by the great poet George sterling . Born in
Sag Harbor, Long Island, New York in 1869, George Sterling came from
an old and respected family descended from the Puritans. His father
wanted him to become a priest, so George at age 17 was sent to a
Catholic college in Maryland. Fortunately, his studies included poetry
-- and the priesthood's loss was literature's gain.
The father sent the wayward son to Oakland, California San
Francisco where the uncle -- Frank C. Havens -- was a leading real
estate and insurance agent in the area. Here Sterling obtained an
office job -- little more than a sinecure that allowed him to continue
reading and writing poetry.
3. Since he felt of little resurrection from where he brought
up, he saw that San Francisco is a place more opened to
many things and through the Bohemian club he was able
to express himself in very new way he liked. He had a
love of liberty and freedom, dislike for a master, and
would not be driven .
4. The Bohemian
While he was there in San Francisco , appears the bohemian
lifestyle , By 1872, when a group of journalists and artists who
gathered regularly for cultural pursuits in San Francisco were
casting about for a name, the term Bohemian became the main
choice, and the Bohemian Club was born.[9] Club members who
were established and successful, pillars of their community,
respectable family men, redefined their own form of bohemianism
to include people like them who were bons vivants, sportsmen,
and appreciators of the fine arts
5. George Sterling responded to this redefinition:
Any good mixer of convivial habits considers he
has a right to be called a Bohemian. But that is not
a valid claim. There are two elements, at least, that
are essential to Bohemianism. The first is devotion or
addiction to one or more of the Seven Arts; the
other is poverty. Other factors suggest themselves:
for instance, I like to think of my Bohemians as
young, as radical in their outlook on art and life; as
unconventional, and, though this is debatable, as
dwellers in a city large enough to have the
somewhat cruel atmosphere of all great cities.
6. Bohemian poets
They found inspiration in machines, speed, noise,
confusion, film, vaudeville, circus, jazz - everything
new and popular. They openly ridiculed the upper
class art establishment. They encouraged each
other to find new ways to portray the world around
them, to challenge all their traditional assumptions
about art, life and even perception itself.
7. In 1892, Sterling met the dominant literary figure on
the west coast, Ambrose Bierce which at Lake
Temescal and immediately fell under his spell. Bierce - to whom Sterling referred as "the Master" -- guided
the young poet in his writing as well as in his reading,
pointing to the classics as model and inspiration.
Bierce also published Sterling's first poems in his
"Prattle" column in the San Francisco Examiner
Sterling's poetry is both visionary and mystical and
harked back to what he had been taught by Bierce,
and, with its emphasis upon exotic romanticism and
rhythmical regularity, and his work covered a broad set
of themes and philosophies - from the romantic, in the
tradition of Shelley and Keats, to the morbid gloom of
Poe passing through the mystical and fantastic on the
way
9. As you know Sterling was influenced by the Romantic poets as
Shelly and Keats and how they use nature as a tool to express their
feelings and ideas , so in this poem, The Black Vulture is a naturepoem pure and simple , Sterling in this poem symbolizes death as a
vulture , he saw this bird in Santa Lucia mountains , he was inspired by
nature and birds , he also mention the Sierra Madre Mountains in
northern Santa Barbara County, California
“Where cold sierras gleam like scattered foam.”
Because he was also the king of Bohemian poets, and the concept
of their poetry is portray the world around them, he was able to portray
of the all-destroying power of Death in this poem
