Walt Whitman

Walt Whitman wrote poetry in the 1800s in America. He broke the standard mold of 19th century American poets and created a new type of poetry. Traditionally for that era, rhyming and metric verses dominated American poems (Connors). Walt Whitman believed that type of writing was "copious dribble" and did not represent the country well (Connors). Whitman wrote in free verse, with sexuality, and tried to represent the whole country with his poems (Oliver.) In Leaves of Grass Whitman introduced Americans to free verse. Although he did not invent it, he improved the style to represent "American spirit: free, individual, and democratic" (Oliver). Whitman used a "free flowing style" that was first shunned by critics and not embraced by Americans like it would later be (Oliver).

Walt Whitman's poetry was full of "sexual love and exaltation of the human body" that startled and shocked many people (Oliver). Ralph Waldo Emerson even intervened and asked Whitman to remove or edit some of his poems that were very graphic involving sexual actions and references in his "Enfans d'Adam" poems (Oliver). Whitman did not agree and kept the poems the way they originally were. Walt Whitman's "Calamus" poems involved descriptions of homosexual love and Whitman eventually edited that set of poems to be more "family friendly" (Oliver). Whitman also edited "Children of Adam" after Emerson and many critics argued that expressing the desires, torments, and needs of homosexuals could be expressed in a less graphic and offensive way (Connors).

In "Song of Myself" Walt Whitman wrote about the whole country, every man and women, regardless of race. The "I" in the poem was written to represent a collective, all Americans united together (Connors)."I celebrate myself, and sing myself" represents the country coming together and uniting after the Civil War (Connors). In the preface to Leaves of Grass Whitman makes it clear that he rights for everyone, not to a specific race, "for America is the race of races" and blacks are represented equally in Whitman's poetry. Emerson was a fan of Whitman and embraced him as a "quintessential American poet" who embraced the "diversity of race and attitude" (Connors). Walt Whitman served in the Civil War as a field nurse and tended to the wounded (Connors). Seeing first hand the violence of the Civil War influenced Whitman's later writings which included and represented every aspect and everyone of the war; black or white, Union or Confederate (Connors). He graphically wrote about the war in Drum Taps and because of that many publishers rejected it (Connors). Walt Whitman was not appreciated while he was alive, for it was not until later that the true genius of his poetry was realized and embraced in America. Few people had read Whitman's Leaves of Grass and knew who Whitman was personally since most people who read it burned the "vulgar filth" and did not want anything to do with it (Connors). When Whitman's boss in Washington, James Harlan, found out he was the author of the "scandalous and indecent work" Whitman was fired from the Bureau of Indian Affairs in the Department of the Interior (Connors).



Connors, Judith. "Whitman, Walt." In Bloom, Harold, ed. Walt Whitman, Bloom's BioCritiques. Philadelphia: Chelsea House Publishing, 2002. Bloom's Literary Reference Online. Facts On File, Inc. Web. 19 Mar. 2012.

Oliver, Charles M. "Whitman, Walt." Critical Companion to Walt Whitman: A Literary Reference to His Life and Work, Critical Companion. New York: Facts On File, Inc., 2005. Bloom's Literary Reference Online. Facts On File, Inc. Web. 19 Mar. 2012.