Songs of Himself or Whitman, Sampled

"No one in this age of [expensive] flour and high rents can afford to be a nobody. Be somebody–biographically, poetically, or historically."– satirical editorial in The Brooklyn Eagle, October 11, 1855



Lately I've come across disturbing gaps in my education. Something will stop me short as I think, Wait, how do I not know this? Walt Whitman... Titan of American literature, Leaves of Grass, "body electric," repressed homosexuality, beard, that was nearly the sum of what I knew. So I got the Penguin Classics Collected Whitman and started on the first in my series of Why Don’t I Know This research missions.

Divine am I inside and out, and I make holy whatever I touch or am touch'd from,
the scent of these arm-pits aroma finer than prayer...
If I worship one thing more than another it shall be the spread of my own body, or any part of it.

** ** **
Blind loving wrestling touch, sheath'd hooded sharp-tooth'd touch! Did it make you ache so, leaving me? Parting track'd by arriving, perpetual payment of perpetual loan, Rich showering rain, and recompense richer afterward. Sprouts take and accumulate, stand by the curb prolific and vital, Landscapes projected masculine, full-sized and golden. ---Song of Myself, 1855

I do not like reading Whitman's poetry (prose, like Specimen Days, is much more agreeable). Considering the sweeping vistas and universalism he invokes I find the reading experience leaves me clammy and oddly claustrophobic. (I'm guessing that Whitman was a close talker. Pure conjecture...) He does however, conjure a mystical rawness, an uninhibited immediacy, blatancy even, that is astounding. Especially so when thought of as being published at a time when "Victorian" morality was in ascendance. (Emily Dickinson evidently wrote in a letter, "I have never read his book– but was told that he was disgraceful," which I find enormously funny.)

Professor Harold Bloom notes that it is paradoxical that Whitman "who proclaimed his love for all men, women, and children should be so solipsistic, narcissistic, and self delighting." I suppose it is partially just this that cemented my dislike of the poetry. The mono-maniacal quality fairly shouts out.

In Whitman and the Culture of American Celebrity, David Haven Blake places the self-styled "good grey poet" against the backdrop of America's developing intellectual identity and popular culture. A very good read. The 1850s was a time of lecture societies, and an expanding awareness of a specifically American intellectual identity. The search for a "native American" literary style, independent of European models, was a cultural imperative. Whitman felt he was the answer to that call. It was also the time of Barnum and the rise of consumer culture. Whitman offered himself, seemingly, as an entity (or commodity) that would effect happiness and harmony with the world.

Far more interesting to me than the poetry was Whitman's sheer audacity. He craved attention. He self-published Leaves of Grass then published reviews of his own work anonymously ("An American bard at last!"). Later he compiled various laudatory comments and reviews and included these as an addendum to later editions of the book. Throughout his life, it seems, Whitman was compelled to ceaselessly promote himself. "The public is a thick skinned beast," he confided to a friend,"and you have to keep whacking away it its hide to let it know you're there."

David Haven Blake's point, which was a new angle to me at least, was that celebrity in the mid-19th century could be seen as a true democratic phenomenon. Fame (and possible subsequent wealth) created and bestowed by the people– rather than by birth, class or inheritance–was, in a sense, sanctioned by popular vote. The celebrity was the embodiment of a culture sanctioned by the people, and an affirmation of the great American experiment.
images: “a 2/3 length with hat outdoor rustic”--This 1877 photograph was Whitman's favorite and caused much to-do with acolytes and early scholars who argued about this butterfly. Whitman tried to foster the idea that the creature was real and had somehow alighted upon his finger... in the midst of a photo studio. In 1995, someone found the butterfly in a cache of Whitmaniana that had gone missing from the Library of Congress in 1942. If you look carefully at the mottled patterning of the paper wing, however, it does NOT match that of the wing in the portrait... Further mystery?

Addendum: The WW cultishness was bizarre. The New York Times ran nearly continuous bulletins of his health topped by absurd headlines:
"Walt Whitman Still Alive" January 4, 1892
"Whitman Helpless" January 6
"Walt Whitman Eats and Drinks" January 14