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A black-on-white engraving of Whitman standing with his arm at his side
Steel engraving of Walt Whitman.

"Song of Myself" is a poem by Walt Whitman (1819–1892) that is included in his work Leaves of Grass. It has been credited as "representing the core of Whitman's poetic vision."[1] Revolutionizing American verse by fundamentally changing standard rhyme, metre, and form, while additionally openly introducing unprecedented sexual imagery, "Song of Myself" is Whitman's most well-known, and arguably most important piece.[1]

OUR STUFF edit

Walt Whitman's Song of Myself: A Mosaic of Interpretations --SU

Song of myself : a sourcebook and critical edition

Song of Myself: With a Complete Commentary--  Y

Walt Whitman's Song of Myself

Walt Whitman Quarterly edit

https://ir.uiowa.edu/wwqr/ --  Y

Meaning edit

https://www.jstor.org/stable/23241425 --  Y

Sympathy edit

https://www.jstor.org/stable/44018560 --  Y

Bateman's principle edit

Bateman's principle https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctv4v3226.9 --  Y

Reader edit

https://www.jstor.org/stable/41055442 --  Y

https://www.jstor.org/stable/27796989 --  Y

Whitman's Assumptions: "Song of Myself," in "Leaves of Grass," Walt Whitman --SU

The ecstatic epistemology of Song of Myself --SU

What he has assumed, we have assumed: Song of Myself as American poetry --SU

The Photograph and the Parenthesis: Walt Whitman, Walter Benjamin, and the Management of Time in “Song of Myself ” --SU

Colonial violence and poetic transcendence in Whitman’s “Song of Myself” --SU

more from: https://syracuse.summon.serialssolutions.com/search?q=Song+of+Myself#!/search?ho=t&l=en&q=Song%20of%20Myself

Background edit

Biblical Influence edit

Having been described as an imitation of Paul the Apostle's "thorn in the flesh" by David W. Hiscoe and being undoubtedly influenced by the Song of Solomon, "Song of Myself" is another one of Whitman's works influenced by the Bible. The unconventional nature of the poem is mirrored by how the Song of Solomon is considered to be one of the works least characteristic of the Scriptures. Whether or not Whitman made the conscious decision to use such an ambiguous and unique as a source for his poem is up for debate, but the effects of the choice are clear. Whitman created a work that echoes certain phrases of, uses similar stylistic techniques, and reveals some of the same thematic concerns as a Biblical work that also rejects some basic principles of 19th-century Christianity. "Song of Myself" reflected but also rejected ideas in the Scriptures, creating a contradiction that Whitman addresses in the poem,

Do I contradict myself?

Very well then I contradict myself,

(I am large, I contain multitudes.)

Rejection of some of traditional Biblical ideas was characteristic of Whitman as he himself created the notion of a "Great Construction of the New Bible". This consideration of creating a new Bible implies that Whitman did not agree with the original in all aspects.

Overview edit

Publication history edit

The poem was first published without sections[2] as the first of twelve untitled poems in the first (1855) edition of Leaves of Grass. The first edition was published by Whitman at his own expense.

In the second (1856) edition, Whitman used the title "Poem of Walt Whitman, an American," which was shortened to "Walt Whitman" for the third (1860) edition.[1]

The poem was divided into fifty-two numbered sections for the fourth (1867) edition and finally took on the title "Song of Myself" in the last edition (1891–2).[1] The number of sections is generally thought to mirror the number of weeks in the year.[3]

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Reception edit

Analysis edit

 
"Song of Myself" includes passages about the unsavory realities of the United States before the Civil War, including one about a multi-racial slave

Structure edit

The structure of "Song of Myself" was one that pioneered in free verse, beginning the legacy of poetry that would make Walt Whitman known as the father of free verse. The opening line of the poem is in traditional iambic pentameter, harkening back to the traditional, more formal openings of classic epics. It is after this line that Whitman breaks into free-flowing poetry that disregarded poetic conventions. By breaking free of the traditional metrics of poetry, Whitman allowed his poetry to shift in rhythm and change in response to different sections of the poem.[4]

His views on poetry and life reflected a respect and desire for natural, organic growth. The predetermination and limitation of form, therefore the traditional structure of poetry, was inorganic and thus destructive to the art of poetry. In 1855, Whitman claimed that all perfect poems reveal "...free growth...as unerringly and loosely as lilacs or roses on a bush, and take shapes as compact as the shapes of chestnuts and oranges and melons and pears, and shed the perfume impalpable to form." The organic structure of the poem additionally reflected the content of the poetry. "Song of Myself" delves deep into an exploration of life and nature and the inherent unity between the two, and the free form of Whitman's poetry here makes the portrayal of relatively abstract topics effective and beautiful.[5]

Meter/Rhythm edit

Whitman's meter in "Song of Myself" is not only crucial to the structure of the poem, but also to the interpretation of its content. The unique rhythm allows for the reader to perceive an alternation between various abstract terms throughout the poem. Rhythmic changes occur between sections concerning spirit and sections concerning matter, sections concerning virtue and sections concerning vice, and sections concerning the individual and sections concerning the masses (among others). This alternation of rhythm additionally has foundation in another similar pattern. This more fundamental alternation of rhythm results from the expansion and contraction of the persona's [of the poetry] consciousness. Throughout the poem, the consciousness repeatedly merges with the phenomenal world and returns to the tangible, its journeys punctuated by sections discussing the psychic gains of such expansion. This effectively creates an experience that is able to show the evolution of the persona's understanding and their development of an integrated personality. Through the sharing of this experience, Whitman shows the necessity of the reader's involvement in such an evolution, reflecting his belief that all humans are inherently connected.[6] This belief is a core facet of Whitman's ideology: transcendentalism.

Uses in other media edit

Canadian doctor and long-time Whitman friend Richard Maurice Bucke analyzed the poem in his influential and widely read 1898 book Cosmic Consciousness, as part of his investigation of the development of man's mystic relation to the infinite.

Simon Wilder delivers this poem to Monty Kessler in With Honors. Walt Whitman's work features prominently throughout the film, and Simon Wilder is often referred to as Walt Whitman's ghost.

The poem figures in the plot of the 2008 young adult novel Paper Towns by John Green.[7]

A documentary project, Whitman Alabama, featured residents of Alabama reading Whitman verses on camera.[8][9]

The poem is central to the plot of the play I and You by Lauren Gunderson.[10]

"Song of Myself" was a major inspiration for the symphonic metal album Imaginaerum (2011) by Nightwish, as well as the fantasy film based on that album.

OUR STUFF edit

See also edit

References edit

  1. ^ a b c Greenspan, Ezra, ed. Walt Whitman’s "Song of Myself": A Sourcebook and Critical Edition. New York: Routledge, 2005. Print.
  2. ^ Loving, Jerome. Walt Whitman: The Song of Himself. California: University of California Press, 1999. Print.
  3. ^ Graves, P. "Whitman's "Song of Myself"" (PDF). englishwithmrsgraves.weebly.com. Retrieved 27 April 2015.
  4. ^ "Section 1". IWP WhitmanWeb. Retrieved 2020-10-14.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
  5. ^ Hill, Jane (1949). The structure of Whitman's Song of myself (Thesis). University of Louisville. doi:10.18297/etd/1967.
  6. ^ Egan, Ken (1987-04-01). "Periodic Structure in "Song of Myself"". Walt Whitman Quarterly Review. 4 (4): 1–8. doi:10.13008/2153-3695.1147. ISSN 0737-0679.
  7. ^ Christine Poolos (15 December 2014). John Green. The Rosen Publishing Group, Inc. p. 41. ISBN 978-1-4777-7904-0.
  8. ^ Whitman Alabama
  9. ^ "Reciting Walt Whitman at a Drug Court in Alabama" in The New Yorker
  10. ^ Lauren Gunderson (20 December 2018). I and You. Bloomsbury Publishing. p. 67. ISBN 978-1-350-10510-2.

External links edit

 
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