tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34361027673683702862024-03-13T13:48:10.988-07:00wilt whatmana forum for discussion and dissensionsteelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09238863768122950749noreply@blogger.comBlogger22125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3436102767368370286.post-66430395121667193572012-05-17T10:57:00.002-07:002012-05-17T10:59:13.612-07:00Final Project - Youtube Project Revision (Song)http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zckNBa2fLYo&feature=youtube <br />
<br />
(copy/paste the link, the embed option is failing)<br />
<br />
My Final Project<br />
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The heirs of Whitman project made sense because so much of
Whitman’s poetry is configured as a dialogue with future generations. When he’s
effusing, asking us to find him under our boot-soles he is speaking to
contemporary and future residents of his spaces. Guthrie took up Walt's message
during a national communications shift from readership to more visual/auditory
forms. Walt and Guthrie both believed
their art should be social, democratic, and popular and Guthrie’s context
provided him a new mode to appropriate Walt’s message to make it truly popular.
<o:p></o:p></div>
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Walt said in a conversation with future generations: “you
justify me.” I feel the format I chose justifies Whitman in several ways. His message is
encoded in a pop format which is easily digestible yet contains words of wisdom.
It’s an egalitarian, democratic mode that has appeal beyond class lines.
Moreover, the form itself implies Walt’s message, specifically his panoramic
scope and insistence that there’s no thing too small that fails to possess a fair
measure of dignity and divinity, e.g. various fundamental
American pop tropes. Unusual for a pop song, these parts don’t repeat; rather,
they survey what’s available in a pop context, sampling among options just as
Whitman surveys scenes and occupations, lingering for a little while and then
moving on. This effort hopefully constitutes an authentic engagement with Whitman
and the American Tradition by appropriating existing instruments to serve the ends of each of them. <o:p></o:p></div>steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09238863768122950749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3436102767368370286.post-72137354434451329002012-03-29T07:15:00.001-07:002012-03-29T07:15:34.070-07:00Project DevelopmentI'm unsatisfied with my effort for the Youtube assignment and aim to revisit it in hope of producing a worthwhile project. My aim is to embody a selection of Whitman's verses in melody and form and to present it as a short, traditional song. This, I think, goes hand in hand with the democratic import of his project and will enable his words to move beyond the page and become actual "vibrations" that float through the air.steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09238863768122950749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3436102767368370286.post-91638626449398108742012-03-29T07:02:00.000-07:002012-03-29T07:02:22.134-07:00Tweet of the Week: Peter Doyle<br />
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Peter Doyle was a romantic companion of
Whitman for an extended period of their lives. They met in D.C. when
Walt was in his forties and Peter was in his early twenties at his
work of conducting a street car, in which Walt was the sole occupant.
This selection of a mate embodies Whitman's preference to move among
the “uneducated” as Doyle was a simple, ordinary man; also
embodied is Whitman's internal contradictions as Doyle, an Irish
immigrant, fought on the confederate side of the war whose function
was to dissolve the Union, the preservation of which Walt had been
pining. Doyle is thought to have some effect on the arrangement of
the Calamus poems which extol manly love. Doyle provided a biographer
of Walt insights into Walt's romance and sexuality by allowing him to
publish love letters from Walt to himself and by agreeing to an
interview for the biography. </div>steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09238863768122950749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3436102767368370286.post-60770433439724474142012-03-12T21:18:00.002-07:002012-03-12T21:18:55.214-07:00Specimen Days: My Passion For Ferries<br />
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Whitman equates commuting with poetry in this entry. He
thinks of his daily commute as a living poem, one teeming with a plurality of
captivating sights for him: schooners, crashing waves and “oceanic currents,”
the “tides of humanity” along with those of the water. Moreover, this stuff is actually the
subject of much of his poetry, and we are able to trace his subsequent poetic
renderings of this ordinary event to its incipient moments. This entry illustrates
Whitman’s tendency to find beauty in the common and mundane. </div>steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09238863768122950749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3436102767368370286.post-75387193302556489762012-03-12T21:00:00.001-07:002012-03-12T21:00:40.033-07:00Tweet of the Week: Martin Tupper, Proverbial Wisdom<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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Martin Tupper, an English didactic writer popular in America
due to copyright/ circulation circumstances and efforts to reconcile the two
countries, had many ideological differences with Walt Whitman, especially
regarding aristocracy/social orders and conservatism. However, Tupper’s <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Proverbial Philosophy</i>, a text which
Whitman owned, highlighted and may have even printed, employed the free verse
form. It was not referred to as poetry by the author and was instead called
“rhythmics.” Whitman appropriated this form, seeing it as the formal equivalent
of his democratic philosophy. Some of Tupper’s poetry in standard form may have
influenced Whitman, as Tupper’s “Are you a Great Reader?” is evocative of
Whitman’s “Have you practis’d so long to learn to read?” Tupper uses some very
Whitman-ian language, such as “I am untamed, a spirit free and fleet.” He
mentions a “dull, grazing ox” which Whitman inverts with “Oxen that rattle the
yoke and chain…what is it that you express in your eyes? It seems to me more
than all the print I have read in my life.” Apparently, Whitman’s lines
sometimes intersect with Tupper’s in a dialogue that criticizes their “poetic
commonplaces.” Early reviewers in England noticed and wrote about this
connection.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<!--EndFragment-->steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09238863768122950749noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3436102767368370286.post-61213778463857953242012-03-12T20:20:00.001-07:002012-03-12T21:26:11.164-07:00Whitman and Mass Culture<br />
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A quotations of Whitman was cited in a section of Oprah Winfrey’s <i>O</i> magazine in 2004 whose intention was to enhance their audience’s sense of self worth in connection with their bodies. The quote is “If anything is sacred, the human body is sacred.” Whitman is an especially useful writer to invoke for this purpose, as he always finds <i>the other</i> beautiful and connects them to himself/ his own sense of self worth.</div>
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Another popular culture reference to Whitman occurred in an episode of <i>Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman</i> entitled “The Body Electric.” Whitman is dramatized in this episode, as he travels to Colorado Springs where he is welcomed as a poet but it’s understood that he “prefers the company of men.” Dr. Quinn worries that her adopted son, who has been employed to interview Whitman alone for the town’s newspaper, will find himself in a sexual quagmire. Her fears are eventually dissipated, but Whitman apparently disturbed by her intolerance. This adaptation is useful because it helps us conceptualize contemporary perspectives on Whitman and his gay sexuality.</div>
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Van Morrison has a track called “Rave On, John Donne” in which he cites Whitman among other writers: Donne, Yeats, Omar Khayam, and Kahlil Gibran. He urges them to “rave on” through “industrial, atomic, nuclear” periods and visualizes Whitman “nose down in the wet grass,” and as someone who “fills the senses on nature’s bright green shady path.” This corroborates the popular conception of Whitman as a nature poet and demonstrates that respect for nature is something that extends across generational lines and remains consistently relevant, contrasted against the technological/machine industry of our and previous times against which these writers must “rave.” </div>steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09238863768122950749noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3436102767368370286.post-71466843835680250412012-03-06T12:32:00.000-08:002012-03-06T12:32:48.248-08:00Contemporary Views on Whitman<br />
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This entry focuses on three critical and contemporary
perspectives of Whitman and help to illustrate Whitman’s perception among his
contemporaries. </div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;"><a href="http://www.whitmanarchive.org/criticism/reviews/leaves1855/anc.00014.html"><span style="color: windowtext; font-size: 14pt;">[Whitman,
Walt]. "An English and an American Poet." </span><i><span style="color: windowtext; font-size: 14pt; text-decoration: none;">American Phrenological Journal</span></i><span style="color: windowtext; font-size: 14pt;"> 22.4
(October 1855): 90-1.</span></a></span></div>
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For the reviewer, great poets embody a national identity by
their poetry, and that it’s informed by the actions of his or her country from
the past, and the conglomeration of uniquely country-specific experiences.
Interestingly, he thinks of Whitman’s identity and poetics in terms of a long,
sprawling list, and he is adapting Whitman’s prose/poetry style to suit the
expansive subject. In a way, he is suggesting that Whitman himself is too large
to encompass normal prose, and he adjusts his form fittingly. He sees Whitman
as a break from tradition, from the practice of ornamentation and “ready-made
models,” whose writing eschews these in order to focus on “the very meanings of
the works of nature and compete with them.” He ascribes to Walt, as a “new
poet,” the ability to pack within his poem a pervasive, eternal, “fearless,”
and provocative element that if heeded, allows the reader to “tread the half
invisible road where the poet is standing fearlessly before.” If what Walt says
is true, poetry has a “subtler range” than large actions and events as
exemplified in Homer and Shakespeare.</div>
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The same review mentions Tennyson and that in spite of all
his “ennui and aristocracy,” he is still a real poet. Yet, the contrast between
the two poets is startling. The reviewer intimates that the moment of
publication of LoG signifies a break from tradition, and he feels on the cusp
of a liminal space. He, however, is not certain whether history will judge
Whitman’s “haughty” efforts as the “most lamentable of failures or the most
glorious of triumphs.”</div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;"><a href="http://www.whitmanarchive.org/criticism/reviews/leaves1855/anc.00016.html"><span style="color: #103079; font-size: 14pt;">[Griswold,
Rufus W.]. "[Review of </span><i><u style="text-underline: #103079;"><span style="color: #103079; font-size: 14pt; text-decoration: none;">Leaves of Grass</span></u></i><span style="color: #103079; font-size: 14pt;">
(1855)]." </span><i><u style="text-underline: #103079;"><span style="color: #103079; font-size: 14pt; text-decoration: none;">The Criterion</span></u></i><span style="color: #103079; font-size: 14pt;"> 1 (10
November 1855): 24.</span></a></span></div>
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Rufus Griswold unleashes a bitter diatribe against Whitman
and his poetics. He states that LoG adheres to the principles of
“metempsychosis,” which is apt for him since he declares that only a man could
have written it if he were in possession of the soul of a donkey. Griswold
declares that there is no “wit” in the poem, so he probably conceives of poetry
in the Augustan manner, as a highly wrought, traditionally/classically-inspired
form that utilizes rhetorical devices to illuminate some human
concept/essential truth. This highly-wrought form, in combination with the
Latin inscription with which ends the review, suggests he doesn’t think poetry
should be for the common people. He claims that these dissidents are finding a
way into the Academy and “leaving a foul odor.” There is no place for new
forms; revising or updating them is “licentious.”</div>
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Much of the language for the reviewer uses is excessively
passionate: vile, shameful, abhor, abuse, etc. A lot of the things we neutrally
or positively associate with Whitman cause problems for Griswold: his “vagrant
wildness”; “beastly sensuality.” This initial problem is strange considering
how frequently questing/vagrancy has appeared as a trope for classic/traditional
poetry. To the other charge, Whitman would not think beastly pejorative, as he
seeks to learn from the animals. He thinks Whitman, and the type of person that
he represents, ill for “having no secrets, no disguises,” employing the
Renaissance courtier aesthetic that poetry should disguise our urges; Whitman’s
indulgences “rot the healthy core of social virtues.” For Grisworld, Whitman’s
speech should be suppressed as it is tantamount to crime, which increases when
the “exposure of their vileness is attended with too great indelicacy.” </div>
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In this essay, Griswold obsesses on single points, instead
of seeing the big picture. He is disgusted with an unconventional method of
living, and so much so, that he attacks that way of life, and we are supposed
to take that over anything by way of actual criticism. In fact, not one word of
LoG is even mentioned in this ostensible review. The review ends with: <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Peccatum illud horribile, inter Christianos
nos nominandum</i>”; that horrible crime not to be named among the Christians.
I believe this is a reference to sodomy, and a probable basis to his dislike of
Whitman. </div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;"><a href="http://www.whitmanarchive.org/criticism/reviews/leaves1855/anc.00181.html"><span style="color: #103079; font-size: 14pt;">[Anonymous].
"[Review of </span><i><u style="text-underline: #103079;"><span style="color: #103079; font-size: 14pt; text-decoration: none;">Leaves of Grass</span></u></i><span style="color: #103079; font-size: 14pt;">
(1855)]." </span><i><u style="text-underline: #103079;"><span style="color: #103079; font-size: 14pt; text-decoration: none;">The Merchant's Magazine and
Commercial Review</span></u></i><span style="color: #103079; font-size: 14pt;"> 34 (May 1856): 654.</span></a><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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The reviewer is unaware of how to proceed in his article;
there isn’t even an author’s name attached to LoG. Structurally, the reviewer doesn’t quite know where to
start, as the poem doesn’t contain any formal meter, but instead is an
amalgamation of “common-place remarks, aphorisms, and opinions.” This new
method of composition develops the author’s “undisciplined power” and seems to
convey emotional resonance, as the reviewer is confounded by and impressed with
the “perfect pictures” of the prose-poems. The review is short because the reviewer
does not yet possess sufficient poetic vocabulary to comment upon the work. He
is confounded by the “kaleidoscopic, grotesque” shifting of images and changes,
and informs us that possibly the author only can explain what these mean, as it
is indeed a “curiosity of literature.” He ends by stating that the author, who
he presumes is the fellow depicted on the frontispiece, is a “remarkable blade”
among the leaves of grass. </div>
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He describes the book as “singular”—a term which I’ve noted
several times so far in brief perusals of other reviews. This iteration
confirms our suspicion of Whitman’s radical departure from poetic norms of his
time.</div>
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<br /></div>steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09238863768122950749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3436102767368370286.post-16956626209458672022012-03-01T10:04:00.004-08:002012-03-01T10:04:54.859-08:00Specimen Days-A Discovery of Old Age<br />
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
This entry is about patience. It
reminds me of one of Whitman's maxims about seeing the poetry in
neglected objects. He wonders where “the best is always
cumulative.” Certain things (art, people, places), he notes, won't
always at first appear special, but through time their brilliance is
revealed. It may take years, but this is the way the “best” has
been revealed to Whitman, either through “stealth” or a “sudden
bursting forth.” He decries people who only want things “for the
nonce.”</div>steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09238863768122950749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3436102767368370286.post-58479106136571035472012-03-01T09:49:00.001-08:002012-03-01T09:49:40.874-08:00Frances Wright<br />
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Frances Wright was Scotland-born, and
eventual U.S. Citizen, and noted for her involvement in feminist and
abolitionist issues. Regarding slavery she has said, of the purported
humanity of Virginian slave holders, that it is “better to break
the chains than to gild them”; of gender, she has said that “the
mind has no sex but what habit and education give it.” She is well
known for her Independence Day speech, which is considered by some to
have been the “first major public address by a woman” in the
United States. She influenced many important people, such as “Thomas
Jefferson, Mary Shelley, and Walt Whitman. Walt used to frequent
anti-slavery halls, met her, and in retrospect called her “one of
the best (characters) in history.” Walt loved to listen to her
weekly talk of broad reforms in New York. He calls her “one of the
sweetest of sweet memories,” and was “enthralled” by her “very
appearance.” He also said she was “never satisfied unless she was
doing good.” We see the influence in Whitman's work of civil
reform, of slaves and women as equal to all and constitutive of a
great American whole. Frances Wright's tombstone reads “I have
wedded the cause of human improvement, staked on it my fortune, my
reputation and my life.”</div>steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09238863768122950749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3436102767368370286.post-62119397589375676292012-02-29T22:36:00.003-08:002012-03-01T09:16:57.193-08:00Song For Occupations<br />
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Song for Occupations (1855)</div>
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Evident in this section is an extension of the dialogic
mode/relationship between reader/writer. They are still established as equals. He
eroticizes distance and touch, and longs for levels of contact. He shuns
“cylinders”— evocative of a manmade object, cold, dividing. I think the
frequent ellipses used are suggestive of his democratic method, and are sort of
equivalent to the conjunction “and.” They don’t subordinate sections of the
sentence; they instead give equal weight to separate parts (I think we’ve
discussed this…). This sprawling
form perhaps suggests authentic description. </div>
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He offers paradoxes (“usual terms…never the usual terms”)
and rhetorical questions in a probable effort to obtain some cosmic truth.
Also, he repeats grammatical forms (“If you…”; “Is it you…”), positing the
similarities and nearness he shares with the reader. The ordinary is rendered
“remarkable, eternal”; it is also absolute, and definitive. </div>
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The poem is partly concerned with immutable connections
between reader and writer, but this is extended to all persons. In a country
grappling with racial/ political divisions, unity of self and other is a
frequent concern, and probably requisite for an authentic democracy the likes
of which Whitman espouses. </div>
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There is a civil rights emphasis on granting subjectivity to
foreigners and women. </div>
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So many small, different scenes and aspects of life are
presented, perhaps to show the variety and beauty of our possible existences that,
at an initial glance, seem mundane. Whitman says to not think less of yourself
if you are not a scholar, or to feel unwise if you have no education/training, but
ushers in these images to give them poetic space and beauty; to let people know
their lives are the stuff of poetry. </div>
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1856 brings a new title: Poem of The Daily Work of The
Workmen and Workwomen of These States. This suggests more specificity and resonance; it includes the
female's in general hitherto-excluded voice) Ellipses have been replaced with commas and
dashes. Cleaner, neater typographical presentation is presented (Walt makes use
of indentations.). The text is possibly
more readable, and certainly less sprawling. </div>
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He alters some of the language, but doesn't change meaning greatly. Interestingly, he adds this self-reflexive moment to
the list of jobs and job-utensils: </div>
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t<span style="color: #1b2128; font-family: Arial; font-size: 13pt;">he compositor's stick and rule,
type-setting, making up the forms, all the work of newspaper counters,
folders, carriers, news-men<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br />
<br />
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
1860 brought another revised title to
this section: “Chants Democratic (3).” Perhaps Whitman, in doing
this process of manuscript revision, cultivated an appreciation for
and linked working with a democratic ideal. Whitman, the loafer, also
sees the necessity of all the parts functioning to produce a coherent
system; I believe this is the reason for his enumerations. </div>
<br />
<br />
<br />
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
In 1871, Whitman retitled the poem
“Carol of Occupations.” He explains the title, extending and
plainly stating his theme: “In the labor of engines and trades, and
the labor of fields, I find the developments, and find the eternal
meanings.”It ends without that strange object-veneration part (it
has been pushed back and modulated), and instead we see something
closer to a restating of his thesis, the divinity of the working men.
We also see him employ semi-colons here. This poem is situated in
about the middle of LoG. Carol is an evocative word for the title
because it often has a religious resonance, and Whitman is singing
here of the divinity of the common man.
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
In 1881, the title “A Song for
Occupations” was restored. It is a slightly more condensed version,
and ends in the manner of previous editions (excluding '71). I also
did not notice any semi-colons. Instead of “come closer,” it
starts with “A song for occupations!” Perhaps this is done for
thematic organization, as he initially states his intention and then
develops and extends it. Pushing closer and longing for contact, as
it initially began, suggests a poem that will continue to be
concerned with that.
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
In the final edition, the title is
preserved, and it appears earlier in LoG. The ending is revised and
follows the 1881 edition, not the 1871. The last couple of editions
are sprawling in size, much like his intial prose; our poem is just
one song among the many songs, as in his frequent lists and his
iterations that one thing is as good as any other, and just as worthy
of your time. We can also think of this as having an America-type expanse; thinking of its humble beginnings to the sprawling, effulgent poem that eventually surrounded "A Song for Occupation" and how it might mirror population expanse, diversity, and resilience beyond the war. </div>
<br />
<br />
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09238863768122950749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3436102767368370286.post-18473384157421050262012-02-23T08:54:00.001-08:002012-02-23T08:54:02.544-08:00Bowery b'hoy<br />
This is a term used to denote a subset of the working class in Lower Manhattan (1840s-60s?) . The term is modeled after the Irish pronunciation of "boy." B'hoys dressed in an elaborate style (e.g. stovepipe hat, trousers tucked into boots, gaudy neckcloth) and employed swagger and slang, of which Whitman was enamored, and it had some influence in the composition of "Song of Myself." They attended the same theatre, and their influence on his writing demonstrates his hybrid artistic technique of mixing the high and low.<br />
<div>
<br class="Apple-interchange-newline" /></div>steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09238863768122950749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3436102767368370286.post-40568604320286697082012-02-21T12:09:00.003-08:002012-02-21T12:09:54.042-08:00Thoughts on Whitman's process of revisionA striking difference from the initial 1855 composition, "Song of Myself" has been recast as "Walt Whitman." Looking at the different editions, the most widespread of Whitman's emendations seem to be typographical/organizational in nature, and demonstrate his interest/experience in that subject and printing. By the 1867 version nearly all of the words carrying the same form as "packed " and "helped" have been modified to "packt" and "help'd." Throughout the poem this is evident. The ellipsis of the 1855 version have been replaced by the 1860 version with dashes and commas. In the 1867 version, many of the commas (especially in lists) and exclamation points have become semi-colons. These changes, in addition to the exclusion of occasional extraneous passages, allow the poem to breathe a bit more since they can cut down on overall line length. He also, in the 1867 version, omits certain things: passages about particularly himself ("I am the poet;" "I step up"; "I eat and drink" ; "I receive you") ; racially-specific language ("darkey"; passages about the "savage") ; and overtly eroticized language ( "thruster holding me tight" ; "the climax of my love-grip"). I think Whitman made these changes because of their ability to obscure the general message and the overall import of the poem. Often passages of conflict, especially the prisoners of war section, have been reduced or excised, suggesting the influence of the war on his writing. Some redundancies in place names have been eliminated. Fat and excess have generally been trimmed. However, the reason for many of the changes eluded me, and I will probably return to add something substantive to this post. It's tough for me to say how all the revisions alter the constitutional and thematic import of the poem as I think their effect on the poem has been generally minor.steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09238863768122950749noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3436102767368370286.post-84634818259951121552012-02-14T12:16:00.000-08:002012-02-14T12:16:02.041-08:00Walt Whitman and Ariel Pink<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<iframe allowfullscreen='allowfullscreen' webkitallowfullscreen='webkitallowfullscreen' mozallowfullscreen='mozallowfullscreen' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/lO7KCl0nAFo?feature=player_embedded' frameborder='0'></iframe></div>
<br />steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09238863768122950749noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3436102767368370286.post-25954714646990391842012-02-14T08:02:00.001-08:002012-02-14T08:06:46.373-08:00Specimen Days: Abraham Lincoln<br />
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
In this entry, Whitman considers his
close proximity to president Lincoln, someone by whom he was
apparently fascinated. He describes the route by which he sometimes
catches glimpses of he and his wife during their daily sojourns. His
precise detail of certain points and sensitive representation of
Lincoln's character imply a minor obsession. This entry is
interesting because Whitman meditates on greatness instead of common,
rustic images. However, Lincoln's greatness is enhanced to Whitman
because of the simplicity of he and his wife's bearing: he respects
Lincoln's reluctance to engage in the perfume of haughty
civilization, instead resembling the “commonest man” in attire,
and, during their occasional evening pleasure-strolls, notes the
simple “equipage” of their barouche. He forgives Lincoln for an
ostensible extravagance, noting that the extensive cavalry that
attend upon him is “against his personal wish.”<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgJmU2gwECa8h4zaLJDFoXdustFPIQ4yCKYeUCeHnCdW0bS_CY_8cP1aynFofKfsCiVHSBuLzFBsnqsa0cI-68sk9v6LWL0S1Z0s_VE1vuKWX9wQwDUTnKg2cZTmO-1M4tckxeRNlmBKJWr/s1600/abe-lincoln-abraham-lincoln-43846780233.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgJmU2gwECa8h4zaLJDFoXdustFPIQ4yCKYeUCeHnCdW0bS_CY_8cP1aynFofKfsCiVHSBuLzFBsnqsa0cI-68sk9v6LWL0S1Z0s_VE1vuKWX9wQwDUTnKg2cZTmO-1M4tckxeRNlmBKJWr/s320/abe-lincoln-abraham-lincoln-43846780233.jpg" width="239" /></a></div>
<br /></div>steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09238863768122950749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3436102767368370286.post-83326678953291728782012-02-09T10:42:00.001-08:002012-02-09T10:45:27.545-08:00Specimen Days: A Sun-Bath -- Nakedness<br />
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
This entry is a tract on the purity of
nakedness and solitude in nature. Whitman attacks our “manners,”<i>
</i> inverting the conventional idea
of clothes-nudity, claiming that clothes make us indecent, and he elevates the potential of nudity in nature as a means of self-renewal
(he is free of “prostration, pain.”). It is also a religious,
transcendental experience for Whitman, as heaven “filters nutriment
and peace” to him. He engages in a typical trope of his as he
imagines himself merging with nature.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Instead
of seeing himself as a communal figure, he emphasizes seclusion
within nature in this entry, and invites his readers to the same
thing, attributing his daily excursions into Nature to his enhanced
health (and knowledge of “purity, art, faith,” etc.). He loves
the touch of water against his whole body (“never before did I get
so close to Nature.”).The language he employs is more poetic than
in other entries, as he is experiencing a swelling of emotion.
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09238863768122950749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3436102767368370286.post-12680259884208949502012-02-09T10:06:00.000-08:002012-02-09T10:06:01.059-08:00Whitman and His Peers<br />
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
“The Village Blacksmith”</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Content/Thematic concerns: We see, as
in Whitman, the sympathetic depiction of the working man as a fit
subject for poetry. “He owes not any man” evokes Wilt's
sensibilities of freedom. The subject of the poem also experiences
the divine, as he possibly experiences a transcendental moment at
church.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Formal characteristics: the form of
this poem is in a regular prosody (with slight variations) form, the
ballad, with alternating lines of iambic tetrameter and trimeter.
This is repeated 3 times per stanza and the rhyme scheme is abcbdb.
Obviously this poem is more highly-wrought and metrically regular
than what we've read from Whitman. However, many of Whitman's
concerns have been historically subjects deployed in the ballad form.
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Oakes-Smith (<i>An Incident</i>); The
natural theme evokes Whitman; the speaker of the poem is content to
grant the eagle alone its sublime views of nature, preferring instead
to remain aground with the rest of humanity and wingless creatures.
This poem is much more pedantic than Whitman, and the argument of the
poem is not as easily divined as in Whitman's work, especially in
lines 3-5. Another highly-wrought poem, a Shakespearean sonnet.
Stylistically, this is foreign to the prosody/form of Whitman.
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Lynch (<i>An Imitation</i>); This poem
is in iambic trimeter, and evokes the English Romantic poets: precise
meter; poet as visionary experiencing something sublime (the
sublimity of nature for example; large mountains, a tempest), a
dream-vision; appropriating myth, irrational, emotive. Unlike
Whitman, this poem has a linear narrative sequence, and contains much
more action. There is something of a refrain of “Excelsior,” yet
in lines of Whitman we've read so far, the refrains are generally
thematic and less explicit. The end of the poem alludes to a
synthesis of you-and-i, a recurring trope in Whitman. </div>steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09238863768122950749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3436102767368370286.post-40005637593581771202012-02-09T09:13:00.001-08:002012-02-09T09:13:29.284-08:00Tweet of the Week. Re: Barnum<br />
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
P.T. Barnum and Walt Whitman are two
distinct markers of American popular culture, and hardly similar:
Whitman believes in essential human passions, the transcendental
capabilities of humanity, the divine, the low as sublime, the
possibility of a truly democratic republic, the power of nature, the
transformative potential of the common, and human as wanderer; and
Barnum is interested in tricking people, gaining capital from them,
the extraordinary, and is indifferent to nature. He has studied human
instinct toward capitalist ends; Whitman to ennoble the common man.
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Interestingly though, their paths
intersect: Barnum's autobiography (descibed as “sociopathic”)
was published the same year as <i>Leaves of Grass</i>; when Whitman
claimed to have exchanged glances with Lincoln in a deeply inspiring
moment for him, it occurred within a busy crowd in front of Barnum's
American Museum. Whitman describes the building in “Song of the
Exposition” from <i>Leaves of Grass</i>:</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: #301115;"><span style="font-family: Georgia;"><span style="font-size: small;"><i>"In
large calm halls, a stately Museum shall teach you the infinite
lessons of minerals,</i></span></span></span><br /><span style="color: #301115;"><span style="font-family: Georgia;"><span style="font-size: small;"><i>In
another, woods, plants, vegetation shall be illustrated -- in another
animals, animal life and development."</i></span></span></span>
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Whitman also interviewed Barnum in 1846
for the <i>Brooklyn Daily Eagle</i>. For additional information,
consult theses sources:
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<a href="http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/whitman/map/8.html">http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/whitman/map/8.html</a>
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<a href="http://www.laphamsquarterly.org/reconsiderations/hatching-monsters.php?page=all">http://www.laphamsquarterly.org/reconsiderations/hatching-monsters.php?page=all</a>
</div>steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09238863768122950749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3436102767368370286.post-12168980422952291602012-02-07T12:27:00.000-08:002012-02-07T12:30:10.243-08:00Motif Discussion<br />
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
In this entry I'll be writing about the
motif of democratic vision as it appears in “Song of Myself.”
This is a broad motif, so I'll be selecting specific examples (since
so many images in the poem work toward this effect, and enumerating
all of them would be unnecessary) that illustrate the broader motif.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;">“<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';">I
CELEBRATE myself, and sing myself, </span></span><br />
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';">And
what I assume you shall assume, </span></span><br />
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';">For
every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you.</span></span>
“ ;</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
“<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';">I
loafe and invite my soul...Nature without check with original
energy.”</span></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
These initial
remarks serve to usher in his vision; the poem will be concerned with
the self as it contributes to the other, and to the community, small
and large (national identity). The trope of democratic vision is
exemplified in the inaugural remarks, as the first utterance in the
poem of his repeated insistence that I=you. Whitman sets out to
dissolve this apparent duality, proposing a unified voice of America,
calling for the cessation of division.
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
His democratic
vision of a unified voice for America can be contrasted against the
antiquated Augustan ideal that metered poetry is the highest form of
art/writing; yet to Walt, certain conventions of poetry, namely a
stiff , academic prosody/meter, may have an alienating effect,
especially if the meter is more complicated than a ballad. He
adjusts, democratizes his poetic form for his vision and audience.
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;">“<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';">I
am the poet of the woman the same as the man, </span></span><br />
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';">And
I say it is as great to be a woman as to be a man, </span></span><br />
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';">And
I say there is nothing greater than the mother of men.</span></span>
“</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Also, to Walt,
bard is equal to slave; no longer does the poet enjoy the most
elevated status of a society, but the same status as everyone else.
Throughout “Song of Myself,” he offers sympathetic perspectives
on marginalized voices, that contextually are experiencing democracy
withheld. He harbors slaves at the risk of sedition, yearns for their
inclusion into the American democratic tradition. In fact, Walt often
mentions slaves consecutively with women, often transposing woman to
“mother.” He is fascinated by their reproductive potential, their
“fit(ness) for conception.” He dislikes “neuters and geldings.”
They are, as mothers, responsible for the diversity Whitman
cherishes, responsible for the birth of democracy. For Whitman, what
is better than being the mother to all men? He understands the need
for greater female inclusion in our American scheme, to which the
29<sup>th</sup> bather parable alludes.
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';">"The
pure contralto sings in the organ loft</span></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';">The
carpenter dresses his plank, the tongue of his foreplane<br />whistles
its wild ascending lisp... </span></span>
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';">And
these tend inward to me, and I tend outward to them,<br />And
such as it is to be of these more or less I am,<br />And of these
one and all I weave the song of myself."</span></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
Wilt also
democratizes the American experiences with his lists of jobs and
scenes. He lends these rich portraits of American life a democratic
voice; since each scene is as important and necessary as any other
and the next, they are all given equal space. These iterations always
confirm his democratic ideology.
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
This democratic
motif, pervasive throughout the poem, suggests a Romantic influence.
Romantic interests are evident in exalting low to high (although,
for Whitman, everything is high), dialects, and love of nature. He
employs these to sustain and enhance his vision of a greater America.
Walt's democratic vision leads to, I think, fallacious relativism (if
everyone is right, how can we improve? Especially morally.) but is
also contextually necessary as Whitman employs it poetically to enact
his vision of a truly democratic America.
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;">“<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';">I
depart as air, I shake my white locks at the runaway sun...</span></span>
</div>
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';">Failing
to fetch me at first keep encouraged,<br />Missing me one place
search another,<br />I stop somewhere waiting for you.”</span></span><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEimrRGsp1lwey6Rzuw3S9nFNxf1XtBFguqnuUa07b03C23ra3NzOlKurhiL0MkePa_Z-LTJ-VL4CdVQhzEvM_a5x4Ezh4fbJ1pa1ftLSRcqQ3ZeGNnGvnz52dR8kZWMno7Qxw5VJqv-DUkA/s1600/old_hippie_very_old_hippies_1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEimrRGsp1lwey6Rzuw3S9nFNxf1XtBFguqnuUa07b03C23ra3NzOlKurhiL0MkePa_Z-LTJ-VL4CdVQhzEvM_a5x4Ezh4fbJ1pa1ftLSRcqQ3ZeGNnGvnz52dR8kZWMno7Qxw5VJqv-DUkA/s320/old_hippie_very_old_hippies_1.jpg" width="213" /></a></div>
<br />
The poem ends
with Whitman dissolving into and becoming nature, suggesting a
greater import for equality than previously imagined; men are equal
to not only each other, but also to nature. The poem ends
cryptically, on what feels like an unfinished tone (suggesting
another departure from the Augustans, who believed poetry should be
highly wrought): work remains that must be fulfilled in additional,
subsequent steps by the reader, and involve adjustments and revisions
of a national consciousness, away from division and unnecessary
dispute. This is the ultimate democratic move; what we use the poem
for is as equal as Walt's efforts creating it. The creator engages
his audience with a task equal to his.<br />
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';">(Other
occurrences of thematically linked excerpts: </span></span>
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;">“<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';">I
will not have a single person slighted or left away, </span></span><br />
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';">The
kept-woman, sponger, thief, are hereby invited, </span></span><br />
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';">The
heavy-lipp'd slave is invited, the venerealee is invited; </span></span><br />
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';">There
shall be no difference between them and the rest;”</span></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;">“<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';">Through
me many long dumb voices,<br />Voices of the interminable
generations of prisoners and slave;”</span></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;">“
<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';">I
am the hounded slave, I wince at the bite of the dogs;”</span></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;">“<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';">The
friendly and flowing savage, who is he?...</span></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';">Wherever
he goes men and women accept and desire him;” </span></span>
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;">“<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';">I
hear bravuras of birds, bustle of growing wheat, gossip of flames, </span></span>
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';">clack
of sticks cooking my meals</span></span> …
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';">It
shakes mad-sweet pangs through my belly and breast.” </span></span>
</div>steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09238863768122950749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3436102767368370286.post-73094553086340008282012-01-31T12:35:00.001-08:002012-01-31T12:36:16.371-08:00The Wilmot Proviso<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
The Wilmot Proviso, initiated in 1846 by Congressman David
Wilmot, called for the end of slavery in states acquired from Mexico during and
subsequent to the Mexico-American war. Whitman supported the proviso, though it
eventually failed in the Senate, and is now historically regarded as one of the
events leading to the Civil War. This proviso reflected enhanced division
between the North and South regarding slavery. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I have mixed thoughts about Whitman and racism from “Song of
Myself.” I can’t seem to decipher his position on it. For the time, it probably
seemed provocative and possibly seditious for him to harbor a runway slave,
yet, when he lists among the jobs and activities of persons in Canto 16, he
mentions “the quadroon girl is sold at the auction-stand” as just one activity among others without explicitly denouncing it. If his interest is social
reform, he should probably say something by way of resistance. I think this
is an example of Whitman’s encoded inconsistencies, his contradictions that led
him to famously exclaim: “Do I contradict myself? Very well then, I contradict
myself (I am large, I contain multitudes.).” </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Maybe, but to me Whitman is the ultimate relativist, and
cannot provide a moral compass by which we may guide our actions. He is as “wicked” as “righteous;” he
simply belongs to every position to which one can ascribe. He loves nature, but
has no qualms with killing animals for sport. He is a loafer, but also a
capitalist. For what other reason might one work hard and compile one’s poems?
They are no longer “thoughts,” but thereby become commodities. </div>
<br />steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09238863768122950749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3436102767368370286.post-56923437902486609212012-01-31T11:53:00.000-08:002012-01-31T11:53:28.331-08:00Specimen Days: Grow—Health—Work<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<div class="MsoNormal">
This diary entry of Whitman is fascinating because, speaking of himself as a
young boy, we witness many of the traits that will develop into his subsequent
identity.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It anticipates his
penchant for travel and the outdoors. Perhaps, the constant movement of his
formative years bred this comfort, providing the initial experiences for what
he would eventually term in “Song of Myself,” “his place late at night in the
crow’s nest.” For comfort, he would eventually look both “on” and “outside of
pavement or land.” </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
His “omnivorous” reading habit, cultivated from youth, also
proved useful, in that it gave him the requisite tools to articulate his
philosophy. Even though his thought and prescriptions are based in the
experiential, visceral, and communal, (and decidedly populist/non-intellectual)
he would not be able to articulate as eloquently without a history of study. He,
in time, respects this learning, but subordinates it to essentially human,
visceral, touch-specific experiences: “Have you felt so proud to get at the
meaning of poems? Stop this day and night with me, and you shall possess the
origins of all poems…”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Whitman also worked odd jobs (compositor, teacher in various
counties) at a young age, which may have contributed to his later attitude of
respect toward the working individual, and his perception of himself as
embedded within the working community. In “Song of Myself” he declares, after
listing a series of jobs, “and of these one and all I weave the song of
myself.” </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Collectively, this diary entry underscores and possibly
provides the source for dynamic, essential aspects of Whitman’s character. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<!--EndFragment-->steelehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09238863768122950749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3436102767368370286.post-11133744080809228802012-01-31T10:43:00.000-08:002012-01-31T10:47:25.151-08:00<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Part 17 of “Song of Myself ,“ and elements of the
surrounding cantos, exemplify, I think, Whitman’s approach to life, his
worldview. Whitman sees himself defined by community and vice-versa. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Whitman sees the world or aspects thereof as composed of
binaries that sometimes seem to somehow unify, or have potential to unify. They are distinct yet unified. He sees
himself carrying on an intellectual tradition just by recording “his thoughts,”
since they are all the thoughts that every man has ever thought; and moreover,
they belong to you as much as to him, since they are your thoughts as much as
his. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The apparent contradictions of binaries never give Walt
anxiety; rather, they give him comfort as the constitutive fabric of his
conceptual cosmos. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Sort of how a quilt is composed of different patches, but each
pieces has an essential quality of quilt-ness simply by dint of its inclusion, which
reminds one of one’s status as an American-as divergent parts contributing to a
national identity-, since Walt is an American to the utmost degree. After enumerating a lengthy grouping of persons/workers
and descriptions of their positions, he integrates himself among this
vocational list; he is all jobs, or at least “more or less” has components of
them, and they --Walt, the jobs, and the people who perform them-- tend toward
each other. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Communally, in Whitman’s perspective, we are granted meaning
by granting meaning: our part in the/as the whole justifies not only ourselves,
but also the community at large. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“…in all people I see myself, none more and not a barley-corn
less.” </div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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