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Walt WhitmanA modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
It is a cliché of American literary studies: Whitman changed American poetry as few other poets in nearly 400 years have. Whitman was a pioneer in pushing poetic forms into radically individual forms. No poetry before Whitman quite resembled the poetic lines he crafted, and the poetic forms of few American poets since Whitman do not reflect either the embrace of his liberating sense of formal freedom or the rejection of his innovative poetic lines.
“As I Walk” reflects Whitman’s restless career-long experiment with how a poem looks, how a poem scans, how a poem sounds. For instance, the poem freely mixes elevated diction appropriate to conventional poetry of serious intent (the “thou” construction in Line 4; the exotic vocabulary—“eclat” (Line 7), “Libertad” (Line 19), “lumine” (Line 20); the parenthetical layering of critical arguments; the word “erewhile” (Line 3) or the apostrophe word “finish’d” (Line 2) with the street vocabulary of his contemporary America, the world of ships and factories, foremen and inventions.
In addition, Whitman consistently resists sculpting lines of tight and predictable length. He could do it—his earliest poetry published before Leaves of Grass reveals his ear for percussive rhythms and predictable rhymes.
By Walt Whitman
A Glimpse
A Glimpse
Walt Whitman
America
America
Walt Whitman
A Noiseless Patient Spider
A Noiseless Patient Spider
Walt Whitman
Are you the new person drawn toward me?
Are you the new person drawn toward me?
Walt Whitman
Crossing Brooklyn Ferry
Crossing Brooklyn Ferry
Walt Whitman
For You O Democracy
For You O Democracy
Walt Whitman
Hours Continuing Long
Hours Continuing Long
Walt Whitman
I Hear America Singing
I Hear America Singing
Walt Whitman
I Sing the Body Electric
I Sing the Body Electric
Walt Whitman
I Sit and Look Out
I Sit and Look Out
Walt Whitman
Leaves of Grass
Leaves of Grass
Walt Whitman
O Captain! My Captain!
O Captain! My Captain!
Walt Whitman
Song of Myself
Song of Myself
Walt Whitman
Vigil Strange I Kept on the Field One Night
Vigil Strange I Kept on the Field One Night
Walt Whitman
When I Heard the Learn'd Astronomer
When I Heard the Learn'd Astronomer
Walt Whitman
When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom'd
When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom'd
Walt Whitman