Ahhh amazing. I was wondering how long this one would take to pop up. I read Leaves of Grass for the first time in a seminar my senior year of college. Already ramping up for the transition to come (real world and all that) my insides vibrated to Whitman’s words. More even than what it is to be an American--though it is undoubtedly that as you capture so well in your essay--“Song of Myself” in particular is about what it means to be a person. I wanted to become the type of person Whitman told me to be. I would often find myself weeping as I listened to my professor (well loved, bespectacled, long-bearded, you know the type) reading the lines to us.
“Do I contradict myself?
Very well then I contradict myself,
(I am large, i contain multitudes)”
“I too am not a bit tamed, I too am untranslatable,
I sound my barbaric yawp over the roofs of the world.”
What a beautiful and well written piece about the poetry of Walt Whitman. Reminded me of my English teacher in high school. She also loved Walt Whitman! I completely forgot that the movie Dead Poet Society has a couple of his poems. Enjoyed this even more because of this.
Well said! I appreciate the nuance of this, drawing from Whitman's enthusiastic embrace of the paradox of our country, far from perfect, still a powerful idea. "Leaves of Grass is a foundational book because it not only shows our nation’s darkness, but also its rising sun." 💯
What a marvelous description of a formative experience. I love how you share the ways Whitman allowed you to form a more positive, less toxic identity as an American. As a lover of poetry and an American, this moved me in ways I was not expecting. Thank you for sharing this with me.
Ahhh amazing. I was wondering how long this one would take to pop up. I read Leaves of Grass for the first time in a seminar my senior year of college. Already ramping up for the transition to come (real world and all that) my insides vibrated to Whitman’s words. More even than what it is to be an American--though it is undoubtedly that as you capture so well in your essay--“Song of Myself” in particular is about what it means to be a person. I wanted to become the type of person Whitman told me to be. I would often find myself weeping as I listened to my professor (well loved, bespectacled, long-bearded, you know the type) reading the lines to us.
“Do I contradict myself?
Very well then I contradict myself,
(I am large, i contain multitudes)”
“I too am not a bit tamed, I too am untranslatable,
I sound my barbaric yawp over the roofs of the world.”
What a beautiful and well written piece about the poetry of Walt Whitman. Reminded me of my English teacher in high school. She also loved Walt Whitman! I completely forgot that the movie Dead Poet Society has a couple of his poems. Enjoyed this even more because of this.
Well said! I appreciate the nuance of this, drawing from Whitman's enthusiastic embrace of the paradox of our country, far from perfect, still a powerful idea. "Leaves of Grass is a foundational book because it not only shows our nation’s darkness, but also its rising sun." 💯
What a marvelous description of a formative experience. I love how you share the ways Whitman allowed you to form a more positive, less toxic identity as an American. As a lover of poetry and an American, this moved me in ways I was not expecting. Thank you for sharing this with me.
Leaves of Grass is a foundational work on that I can agree. It's on my desk as a fundamental go to.