Jeffers at Occidental College

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Jeffers At Occidental College

"O that our souls could scale a height like this,
A mighty mountain swept o'er by the bleak
Keen winds of heaven; and, standing on that peak
Above the blinding clouds of prejudice,
Would we could see all truly as it is;
The calm eternal truth would keep us meek."

-Jeffers, "A Hill-Top View" 1904, One of his first poems, printed in Oxy's student newspaper

Above: Jeffers on an outing with friend, distinguished
alum Robert Cleland '07

Robinson Jeffers entered Occidental College in 1903 at the age of 16 for his Junior year and graduated the following year. At Oxy he was involved extensively in writing activities. He was an editor of the school newspaper, he joined the Stevenson literary society (a very popular social activity at the time) and he wrote numerous poems for the Occidental school paper.

The years that Jeffers spent at Occidental College were an important stage in his development as a poet. He published many early poems in the school newspaper, then called The Aurora, which later changed it's name to The Occidental the subsequent year. In 1955 Jeffers wrote a letter about his literary experiences a Oxy to a group of Occidental students that were founding a now defunct arts and literary magazine called Focus at the college:

"When I first went to Occidental College...there was a literary magazine...called the "Aurora," and I remember thinking it odd that Occidental- the west, the setting sun- should be represented by a magazine called Aurora, the dawn. At least it gave us a wide range, the whole daylight sky.
I was continually writing verses in those days. Nobody, not even I myself, thought they were good verses; but Aurora's editor accepted many of them and it gave me pleasure to see my rhymes in print. They did rhyme, if that is any value, and were usually metrical, but why was I so eager to publish what hardly anyone would read and no one would remember? I suppose the desire for publication is a normal part of the instinct for writing...the writer sits at home, and the mere fact of being printed provides his verses with a kind of audience...So, having his vanity partially satisfied, he can go ahead and try better work."

Above: Jeffers with literary club	Above: Jeffers in an Oxy theater production		Left: A playbill for a theater performance listing Jeffers as writer and actor
Jeffers was also heavily involved in theater at Occidental College, and he was an avid outdoorsman and hiker as well. These two pursuits become cornerstones of his future. He became the country's foremost poet of the natural world; and his interest in theater culminated later in life when he wrote the popular adaptation of Euripides' Medea, which made two critically acclaimed appearances on Broadway.

Page last edited on 07/08/2008.
Reviewed by Dale Stieber on 6/1/2006

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