Walt Whitman (1819–92) was an American poet who pioneered a distinctive open poetic form and an overpowering voice that shaped 20th century-American poetry.
Whitman was born on Long Island, New York. His father was a farmer and carpenter. When Walter was four, his family moved to adjacent Brooklyn, then a small city. He embraced the city and the country equally. Whitman worked as a journalist in Brooklyn and often rambled around the streets of New York people-watching and searching for story ideas.
Whitman started writing poetry when America went into the Civil War. He self-published Leaves of Grass (1855) and arranged for it to be sold in different formats, at different prices, to reach as broad an audience as possible. His original form, subject, and overt sensuality received widespread disparagement in the conservative society of his day. Despite his best efforts, Whitman sold only ten copies of the first edition and gave away the rest. He sent out copies to several prominent writers and critics. Only a few answered him; Ralph Waldo Emerson responded positively and said, “I greet you at the beginning of a great career.”
For the rest of his life, Whitman expanded and revised the poems in Leaves of Grass. The verses that ultimately made him a literary celebrity were the poems he composed on the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, “Oh Captain My Captain” and “When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom’d.”
The nine editions of Leaves of Grass form a single all-encompassing epic poetic sequence. In it, Whitman embraced a range of sentiments—concerning optimism of America’s prospects to an increasing tragic tone about the Civil War.
More: Wikipedia • READ: Works by Walt Whitman
Seeing, hearing, feeling, are miracles, and each part and tag of me is a miracle.
—Walt Whitman
Topics: Miracles
A child said, “What is the grass?” fetching it to me with full hands; How could I answer the child? … I do not know what it is any more than he.
—Walt Whitman
I believe a leaf of grass is no less than the journey-work of the stars.
—Walt Whitman
Topics: Nature, Stars
Simplicity is the glory of expression.
—Walt Whitman
Topics: Time Management, One liners, Simplicity
As for me, I know nothing else but miracles, Whether I walk the streets of Manhattan, Or dart my sight over the roofs of houses toward the sky, Or wade with naked feet along the beach just in the edge of the water, Or stand under the trees in the woods, Or talk by day with any one I love, Or sleep in bed at night with any one I love, Or watch honey bees busy around the hive of a summer forenoon… Or the wonderfulness of the sundown, Or of stars shining so quiet and bright, Or the exquisite delicate thin curve of the new moon in spring… What stranger miracles are there?
—Walt Whitman
To the real artist in humanity, what are called bad manners are often the most picturesque and significant of all.
—Walt Whitman
Topics: Manners
Charity and personal force are the only investments worth anything.
—Walt Whitman
Topics: Character, Charity
Henceforth I ask not good fortune. I myself am good fortune.
—Walt Whitman
To me every hour of the light and dark is a miracle. Every cubic inch of space is a miracle.
—Walt Whitman
Topics: Miracles
And I will show that there is no imperfection in the present, and can be none in the future, and I will show that whatever happens to anybody it may be turn’d to beautiful results, and I will show that nothing can happen more beautiful than death, and I will thread a thread through my poems that time and events are compact, and that all the things of the universe are perfect miracles, each as profound as any.
—Walt Whitman
Judging from the main portions of the history of the world, so far, justice is always in jeopardy.
—Walt Whitman
Topics: Justice
Nothing endures but personal qualities.
—Walt Whitman
Topics: Character
I know nothing grander, better exercise, better digestion, more positive proof of the The Past triumphant result of faith in human kind, than a well-contested American national election.
—Walt Whitman
And whoever walks a furlong without sympathy walks to his own funeral drest in his shroud.
—Walt Whitman
Topics: Sympathy
Let your soul stand cool and composed before a million universes.
—Walt Whitman
Out of every fruition of success, no matter what, comes forth something to make a new effort necessary.
—Walt Whitman
It is only the novice in political economy who thinks it is the duty of government to make its citizens happy. Government has no such office. To protect the weak and the minority from the impositions of the strong and the majorityto prevent any one from positively working to render the people unhappy, to do the labor not of an officious inter-meddler in the affairs of men, but of a prudent watchman who prevents outragethese are rather the proper duties of a government. Under the specious pretext of effecting the happiness of the whole community, nearly all the wrongs and intrusions of government have been carried through. The legislature may, and should, when such things fall in its way, lend its potential weight to the cause of virtue and happinessbut to legislate in direct behalf of those objects is never available, and rarely effects any even temporary benefit.
—Walt Whitman
Have you learned lessons only of those who admired you, and were tender with you, and stood aside for you? Have you not learned great lessons from those who rejected you, and braced themselves against you, or disputed the passage with you?
—Walt Whitman
Topics: Learning
The future is no more uncertain than the present.
—Walt Whitman
Topics: Uncertainty, Doubt
A morning-glory at my window satisfies me more than the metaphysics of books.
—Walt Whitman
Topics: Flowers, Beauty
All faults may be forgiven of him who has perfect candor.
—Walt Whitman
Topics: Honesty
I am large; I contain multitudes.
—Walt Whitman
The art of art, the glory of expression and the sunshine of the light of letters is simplicity: nothing is better than simplicity.
—Walt Whitman
Topics: Letters, Simplicity
He most honors my style who learns under it to destroy the teacher.
—Walt Whitman
Topics: Style
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