Lyrics of Sunshine and Shadow: The Tragic Courtship and Marriage of Paul Laurence Dunbar and Alice Ruth Moore

Chapter 1: The Child Is Father of the Man

O N E The Child Is Father of the Man Hello, old friend, are you married? No, I’d just as soon be buried! Take your matrimony with you. It’s to me as thin as tisheu [sic] —Paul Laurence Dunbar, age 11 (1883) One day in 1883, eleven-year-old Paul Laurence Dunbar sat down to write yet another poem.1 Since the age of six, he had been “rhyming,” as he described his juvenile craft. His inspiration came from verses in his first-grade McGuffy Reader, especially those by the British Poet Laureate , William Wordsworth.2 Paul, who in his prime would be designated Poet Laureate of the Negro Race, did not publicize or save his early works.3 In secret, he scribbled them in his spelling book, showing them to no one. They were not even shared with the person who was, and would remain, most important in his life—his mother, Matilda Dunbar (c. 1845–1934), a former slave.4 But today’s poem was different. It would be shared, revised, and added to the growing pile of “stuff” by Dick, as his family called him. Also, Matilda now safeguarded these writings of her youngest son, keeping them in cardboard boxes. She had discovered that Paul was gifted when he was about seven years old. Since then, she had encouraged him in his projects and given him favorite-son treatment. Of her three children , Paul would go farthest. Matilda would see to it. This new poem about marriage was special, written for the recent engagement of Paul’s twenty-year-old half-brother, William Murphy (1864–1932). The poem is also prophetic and revealing. Tension hovers| 13 | over its seemingly humorous lines. Instead of conveying the love and happiness traditionally associated with an approaching wedding, the poem speaks of distrust, if not a disdain for marriage. A psychiatrist who studied Paul’s poetry believes the poet exposed himself in his work and laid “bare [his] emotional life.”5 It would seem then, that even at this early age, Paul knew the darker side of marriage. One of his many biographers contends the marriage rhyme merely expresses a typical young boy’s “disgust for romance.”6 Her statement should be augmented. Paul’s negative portrayal of love and marriage resulted in no small part from witnessing his parents’ union. At its best, that relationship was “as thin as tisheu.” Matilda and Joshua Dunbar (1823?–1885), both former slaves, had a stormy, violent union.7 Young Paul perhaps recorded in rhyme what he had internalized about intimacy from his primary role models. His poem confirms the theory that a person’s behavior is a consequence of social situations in which the individual lives, and that this person is profoundly influenced by such environments. Paul’s later turbulent relationship with Alice Ruth Moore would reflect much of what he learned about love and marriage at his parents’ hearth. More than familial factors contributed to Paul’s development and impacted his adult behavior. George Eliot in 1866 accurately assessed the intermingling of public policy and personal experience, writing: “There is no private life that has not been determined by a wider public life.”8 Paul was nurtured not only in a family in conflict, but also in the factionalism of his city and nation. His era was a time of paradoxes. Its glitz and glitter harbored the cultures of Social Darwinism, sexism, and racism . Alcoholism and tuberculosis flourished, as did various strains of social diseases. Class divisions became more pronounced as industrialism and the growth of big business put great wealth in the hands of few. Large numbers of southern and eastern European immigrants were perceived as threats to the Aryan predominance of the majority Euro-American population. These new immigrants often competed with the “new citizens”—recently freed African American slaves—for low-skilled wages and jobs. In such struggles, African Americans usually lost. If hired, they received less pay than other laborers. Paul’s father, Joshua Dunbar, was a perpetual member of this group of itinerant, hapless job seekers. This time period has been designated the nadir for African Americans because of the intense racism associated with skin color throughout The Child Is Father of the Man| 14 | America. Across the nation, people of color were viewed as lazy, improvident , childlike, irresponsible, chicken-stealing, crap-shooting, razor-toting , immoral, criminal beings. As...