A defining moment in Lowell's young adulthood was his conscientious objection to the draft for World War II. This decision represented a turn against tradition for Lowell, whose ancestors had fought for the United States since its founding. It also represented a personal shift in Lowell, who had attempted to enlist in the years before only to be turned away due to his eyesight. In his letter addressed to President Franklin Delano Roosevelt and written in 1943, he explains how this shift occurred, saying that after the attack on Pearl Harbor he thought his nation was in "immense peril" and was inspired to volunteer for the war efforts. At the time, he adds, he believed that any of the abominations the U.S. had perpetrated against other countries were justified due to the "nation's struggle for its life against diabolic adversaries." However, Lowell found himself disillusioned once the threats against the U.S. were thwarted and "almost apocalyptic" violence against Germany continued. "Let us be honest: we intend the permanent destruction of Germany and Japan," he wrote.
Specifically, Lowell addressed the bombing of Hamburg, which killed thousands of civilians. "This, in a world still nominally Christian, is news," Lowell says in his letter, his tone exasperated. "The Quaker Graveyard in Nantucket" expresses this cynicism about Christianity's state in the modern world. The religious symbols in the poem, like the Virgin, appear empty, especially compared to the vividness with which Lowell describes the corpse drawn up from the ocean in the first stanza. The murder of the whale has all the trappings of a religious ritual, but the sacrifice does not take; no redemption springs from it.
The death of the whale, taken literally, is like Lowell's idea of an unjust war; there may be a reason for it, but that reason does not justify the cruelty it causes. In his poem the Quaker's hunt of the whale exists beyond time, has happened and is still happening; the characters of the Quaker sailors and the characters from Moby-Dick and sailors from the current war slip dizzyingly into and over one another, barring one narrative thread from taking the lead. The cruel energy seems to lead the reader to the conclusion that there is no true urtext for this sort of violence, that it is something that fits into every era, repeating itself almost organically; the death of the whale leads to "corruption [overrunning] the world," not to the eventual salvation of those who perpetrate violence. The poem seems to reflect a deep suspicion on Lowell's part that violence is planted in man by God. The literary and Biblical references allude to how man's thirst for violence and dominance has brought him low, and how, despite the canonization of these cautionary tales, man has compounded his violence.
Lowell's protest of the war and his portrayal of the Quakers in his poem as foolish and violent reflect what moved him to convert to Catholicism; in part his conversion was a rebellion against his parents and his family's traditions, but it also stemmed from a sense of self-righteousness and insecurity in his faith. The Quakers believed that, given their belief in God and their commitment to his ideals, their actions would naturally be moved in a godly direction. Lowell was clearly swayed by the emphasis on action in the Roman Catholic faith, but again, the emptiness of the Christian symbolism in this poem reflects the quavering of his faith in response to his desire to see clearly. He cannot pretend to understand the expression on the Virgin's face when he finds it incomprehensible; likewise, he could not pretend to support a war fought for sheer dominance. In the poem, as in real life, he attempts to find a way to escape the violence. This action is self-contradictory, for according to this poem's logic there is no way out; the "blue-lung'd combers" continue their zombielike massacre because it is their purpose. But peace does appear in the poem, in Section VI, though it is inscrutable, beyond Sion and Bethlehem. By refusing to submit to the draft, Lowell embodies that peaceful, incomprehensible moment. He cannot be sure that his objection, like the symbol of the Virgin Mary in the poem, has any significance; he can only submit to what he feels is right.
