Final Whitman Project

The notation on this one should say "Whitman's speech goes where..." I goofed.

Now go and Release your Barbaric YAWP!!!!!

Final Thoughts:

What can i say, i mean what can i say? I don't really know. I wish i had had more time to go to virtual office hours but, unfortunately, they were during another class i had. Umm. Shit, Well i like the format of blogs.I think being able to say what you think in a less-academic environment was really beneficial to our learning process. I wish it had been more cohesive and more community based. Group work is tough i know, but the feedback i got from other students throughout the semester was awesome. When someone reads your blog it feels like you were offered the last slice of pizza at a birthday party: it feels fucking great.

Smaller class size. Wow, i know that aint happening. But i think with a class like this that is set up in a way to have a great community potential. A smaller class size would rock. Maybe even make it a seminar course. OOOOH, that would be slick.

I woulda liked maybe more time on other american poets (not frost though, seriously, frost is more played out than that Gotye song right meow) . Sandburg was cool, levine was cool, ginsberg is always cool. Its not that Whitman doesn't have a large enough body of work to look at, and its not that he is so simple that we plowed right through it but it is more of a matter of fatigue. His lines sprawl across the page and his lists are sometimes tautologically numbing. Still love the guy, but serious.

More twenty five dollar words. Here is one for free from me to you. Aposiopesis: When  a sentence is deliberately broken off in the middle and left unfished.

Thanks for the Great Semsters Hanley, have had some great classes with you. I graduate to morrow. See you all in h....

My Whitmanian Friends

Well my Whitmanian Friends, the semester is comign to a close. I will ost my final project up on this blog but after that it will no longer be a Whitman blog. I intend for it to become a "poetry" blog, since i read a lot of poetry. Would like it to be communal too, with comments and feedback. If you would like to say something, add something, disagree, be disgusted, amused, depraved, anything, here is the place.

I will eventual post the first analysis but probably only after the final project is posted here. Thanks for a great semester.

Lebowski, Sigur, McDunnough, Whitman

Well I can't get the images to sync up the way i want so fuck it!

       So what do Lebowski, Sigur, McDunnough and Whitman have in common? Well they all belong to narrative structures that are trying to figure out what American life is all about. Whitman is the creator of one of those narratives and the other three are the created.. 

So lets get into some sweet deets. I won't lie to you, it has been a while since i have seen these three movies, but i got an iron trap upstairs and i have seen them many a time.

Instead of boring you with an in depth analysis of each character or at least a analysis of what they represent i am gonna lump it together. If you have questions or want me to expand on a train of thought, comment. 

The Cohens choose stories that try to explain and shape america. In "Raising Arizona" we see a common lower class family trying to be a family. They get mixed up with the higher classes and hijinks happen. Raising Arizona is really a commentary on class, and social structure in america. It also explores the facets of wealth and life and how to live in the country with next to nothing. 

This same thing is explicated in "The Big Lebowski. The significance of money is played up, class warfare is played up, and different ideas of identity are played up. Lebowski is a symposium of the clashing of american values and ideas of the 20 years leading up to it. Vietnam, desert storm, nihilism, bad art, the eighties. It is a spewing forth of that esoteric culture that comes from the insanely rich and the insanely poor that inhabit the desert down by that shady oasis they call L.A.

No Country for Old Men is true to the book written by McCarthy. But even then, and this is why i add this, even then it is simply a study on how the world is changing. How America is no longer simple, and no longer pure, but instead has horrors in the night. Money, once again plays a large roll. Antone Sigur represents the ultimate unknowlable. The ultimate other. Foriegn, powerful, malicious, deadly and sadistic he has his own code of laws he sticks to. His morality is not ours. It is a movie (and book) of accepting that we cannot know everything. That things change and leave us behind.. 

So what does this have to do with Whitman?

Whitman tried to capture all of America, and so do the Cohens. 

Sure if you are a base degenerate you think about how Lebowski loafs and leans. Sure that's a point to make. Yet more poignant is that Lebowski navigates a land of delusional and shifting America. He tires to live his life his own way, a very American way, but the horrors of war have split his nation. He is Whitmanian in that sense (post civil war). Furthermore he collects aspects of America around him on his journey, The Rich, the abstract artist, the Vietnam vet, the bowling buddy, the fledgling dancing landlord, all these characters and caricatures of hope.

Raising Arizona is a play on the nuculer family. No Country is a haunting look at the dark under belly of corporate greed and violence.

All these things emobdy America, and thats what Whitman tried to do.

Im sorry, but i am done for today. No Editing. Sorry if it is sloppy. Good day, 

The Poetry, Yes

It has been a bit since my last post. I don't know why. There were things that needed blogging about certainly. Perhaps it was some sort of inexplicable funk that left me wordless and write-less as well.

This week our class will be discussing Sandburg and Rukeyser and, though part of the Sandburg group, i found myself wanting to delve deeper into Sandburg than perhaps we can in the allotted time. First and foremost i have always been a Sandburg fan. His poetry is concise, imagistic, beautiful, and real. He is a Whitmanian poet, there is no doubt. The alussions to Whitman and his symbolism are dotted throughout the poetic landscape of Sandburg. Yet that isn't really what i want to talk about. I'd rather talk about the differences. A one Professor Hanley had said that those differences may be more intriguing to look at than those similarities.

First Thoughts:

In 1855 edition of Leaves Of Grass we have the Preface in which Whitman explains to us why America must not only accept his poetry but understand that there is a new language of America, and there is the birth and coming impotence of the American bard. Whitman uses this preface to set the reader int he right mood to accept his poetry.

A line provides a small summary "I will not have in my writing any elegance or effect or origionality to hang in the way between me and the rest like curtains" (viii).

Whitman is as he is throughout the book, He seeks to pull the reader in and destroy the artifice of poetry that he feels creates a barrier between him and the reader. Nor does he believe his style, his "originality" will cause a barrier either. He believes precisely that he has created a style of poetry in which one can be brought in right up and understand him at a fundamental level.

The book then continues on with "Song of Myself" in which Whitman brings us to him and he shows us, like Virgil to Dante, America and himself. He has worries about being comprehensible throughout the poem and he tries to bring us closer and closer.

His project and Sandburg's are alike in that Whitman focuses on some aspects of Americans but the difference is that while Whitman is setting up a mythology of the American Bard who speaks about America, Sandburg is instead exploring, expanding, and explaining the mythology of The People.

17

"'The people is a myth, an abstraction.'
And what myth would you put in place
of the people?
And what abstraction would you exchange
for this one?
And when has creative man not toiled
deep in myth?

....

'Precisely who and what is the people?'
Is this far off from asking what is grass?
what is salt? what is the sea? what is
loam?"(30)

Here Sandburg recognizes that there are metaphysical perplexities involved with his and Whitman's projects. He furthermore directly aligns his project with Whitman's by showing and creating a metaphorical connection between their two primary questions. They are tackling a similar question, but where Whitman uses nature metaphorically to represent much of what he is trying to figure out Sandburg shows us that he will not hide the subject his is talking about in this way.

Sandburg understands that he is creating a mythology of the people or at least collecting the mythology of the people and showing it to us in his art form. Whitman was trying to create an institution of American poetry. Whitman was creating the figure of the American bard. Sandburg cannot recreate Whitman's project but understands the fundamental similarities between what they are trying to accomplish. Sandburg is conflicted. How does one make space for oneself in the cannon when you come to the realization that you are trying to figure out the same problem as a predecessor ( Harold Bloom has some interesting essays on this topic)?

Well you do what Sandburg has done, you recognize that previous work, and though you may love it, you reject it.

Whitman had told us that he wouldn't let his poetry have assets that rest like a curtain between us and him. Yet near eighty years later Sandburg shows us that some of Whitman's metaphors may indeed get in the way of us and him. The question about the grass may as well be a question about the people. We are the 29th bather and we are the people, yes.   Yet instead of writing to create the new American bard as Whitman had done, Sandburg writes for the people, and to show the people.

These are some ideas that aren't fully formed yet. Only more reading of each poet could truly fortify them. But from what i have read this is one of those things that seems to speak to me. I am not saying that Whitman never wrote for the people, or about them, but his intentions were slightly different than Sandburgs when it came to the people.

I'm sure i will eat my words on some of this or edit it at a later date but we shall see.

Peter Doyle: The Intimate Friend

Peter Doyle

Peter Doyle was born in Limerick, Ireland sometime around 1845. He came to America around the age of eight. He fought on the side of the Confederacy before being discharged and moving to Washington D.C. He became a street car conductor and a close and intimate friend of Walt Whitman.

It seems that Pete was more than a friend, but instead a lover and the biography available through the Whitman archive speculates about this. It gives great detail of the fluctuating relationship between Pete and Walt and even ties in some of this to Walt's poetry. To be honest i have not read the entire biography yet but their correspondence with one another suggested a very passionate relationship.

Though they are seemingly opposite it is perhaps quite fitting that Whitman would like a man close to his opposite. Whitman tried to encompass all and in that attempt, grabbing a man cut from a different cloth does not seem so strange.

Project: Whitman's Speech

I suppose since i posted about it twice already i would like to more thoroughly investigate Whitman's sentiments on speech. I think i will do this by going through specimen days and his poetry. A poets relationship with speech or at least communication is paramount. Everyone is afraid they will be misunderstood or misread. In "Song of Myself" Walt has a few parts where he talks about speech and how it affects him.

What is the relation of communication and speech to a poem. How does Whitman try to close the gap between reader and author? Does Whitman invite us to try to go deeper?

On the surface some of these answers may seem easy and plain enough but it is more complex. Walt revising the Leaves as much as he did is important, perhaps focusing on segments that talk about speech or authors and readers through the revisions will also shed some light.

A Couple Of Old Friends - A Coleridge Bit

It always amazes me how much Whitman loved nature. He takes his time there to lean and loaf b y a pond and bird watches. It is hard for me to see him as a b'hoy of the Bowery as much as a the Whitman of nature. It's almost as if he had some sort of all encompassing hippy dippy love. Like 1969 was actually the culmination of a culturally rich ideally Whitmanian explosion. Except with drugs. Which i don't think Whitman would have dug. I think drugs are in the perfume category for him.

It is weird to think of what happened in America post Whitman and how much he may have influenced it. For instance how manhood was perceive in the beginning of the 20th century with the creation of all those boys clubs ect. Or Teddy Roosevelt calling for people to go out side. That nature prevented the "sissification" of men ( i have a source for this, let me check my papers and i will show you).

Surely some sort of twisted and corrupt Whitmanian stance led to that? ( i don't think Whitman would have approved the word "sissification" ).

I wonder how this man who said he could contain all always came out so sensibly in his own life for the love of nature. How could he really be a "rough" when he so loved nature and beauty? I am glad he didn't live to see the first world war. As much as the civil war broke his heart, which it did, i wonder how modernity WW1 would have affected him.

Whitman Treasure Hunt!

Here are some things i found that have echoes of Whitman!

1) Twilight Zone "I Sing the Body Electric"

This episode is about an electric grandmother that takes care of a family. It was written by Ray Bradbury some lines from the poem that are reflected in the episode are:

"The expression of a well made man appears not only in his face,"
"And in man or woman a clean strong firmfibred body is a beautiful as the most beautiful face."

The poem is about the strength of the body and in the episode the grandma is indestructible. This connection shows that Whitman can influence many different areas of art.

2) Archer episode seven season one "Skytanic"

Though it is a very small part, Mallory Archer mutters the lines "O' Captain, My Captain" to the captain of the sky blimp. Though this is a small and insignificate part (so much so that i couldn't find a clip) it shows how much Whitman's poetry is a part of the American consciousness. Yes it is one of the most quoted of Whitman's poems, but even that one line from it invokes Whitman. So we can see how American literary identity is shaped by Whitman.





3) Breaking Bad: Season 3 episode 12 " Half Measure

In the fortieth minute of this episode we get a very metafictional scenario. Walter White is watching Jeopardy with his son, and a question about Walt Whitman comes up. It is about his barbaric yawp, a line from song of myself we all know well. Without spoiling anything this reference foreshadows certain aspects of the episode to come and the remaining minutes of the episode. Also it could be seen as metaphorical for Walter White's character as he is the academic who is learning to release his own form of a barbaric yawp upon the world.
Breaking Bad also quotes Whitman again in an earlier episode (episode 6). So we can see that clearly the writers have Whitman on the brain.







So what does all of this tell us? That Walt Whitman is spread out among our culture like the roots of the grass. I can't wait to see what everyone else found because i am sure there is a plethora of Whitman inspired pop culture items. Furthermore it is hard to look at American poetry and not see something of Whitman there. He is essential to our culture as a poet and an artist so thoroughly American that we can see him amongst our daily lives. To quote a favorite poem of mine by Ginsburg "What thoughts i have of you tonight, Walt Whitman".

I'm Not Kidding Anymore

"Well it's 1969 okay/ All across the USA/ another year for me and you/ another year with nothing to do"- The Stooges

"I got a six-pack and nothing to do"-Black Flag

"The problem of leisure/ What to do for pleasure" - Gang of Four

Whitman is THE proto-punk. The first god damned one. I promise you this. We've seen it before. Dressing like a Bowery B'hoy, jaunty hat and a "i don't give two shits" hand on hip attitude. Not to mention he printed the first copies of Leaves of Grass by himself. Have you heard of a zine? Walt DIY'ed before DIY'ing was cool. The quotes above? Oh yeah....LOAFING. Three punk bands, and three bands full of loafers. Starting to get the picture?

How bout some text? Yes?

The poet "is the arbiter of the diverse and he is the key. He is the equalizer of his age and land" (v)

The poet. The punk. When capitalism was rampant in the age of Reagan we get this gem from Black Flag:

"This fucking city / Is run by pigs /They take the rights away /From all the kids /Understand/ We're fighting a war we can't win /They hate us-we hate them /We can't win-no way"

Black Flag is complaining about the status quo at one of the times that the status quo was strongest (except for now). Not to mention the big problems that were happening with the L.A.P.D. all throughout the eighties and ninties. Black Flag is equalizing the land. They are telling the youth of the troubles of their society and of unequality. Sure there is youthful zeal and sure this may be a stretch but....you can see it right?

But here is Walt showing us his even more punk like aspects:
"If the time becomes slothful and heavy he knows how to arouse it...he can make every word he speaks draw blood. Whatever stagnates in the flat of custom or obedience or legislation he never stagnates."(v)

Hell ya! Punks make their words draw blood, especially in times slothful. When change is the least, when things have become comfortable and terrifyingly so. Here are two examples of punk bands make their words draw blood.

"what they did,past or present/got us in this situation/predicament/no where to run/everybody's building bombs/no more housewives;/"days of our lives",/television,disneyland,/basketball or stars and stripes/their chairman's on his death bed/our president's popularity is down/an epileptic called a colonel/presses a button/and its all knocked down"-Circle Jerks

At this point and time (1982) the cold war had been going on for almost thirty years. Our Government had gotten out of certain crises but Reagen only helped propel the Cold War until he "won". Basically, this little band was stirring it up, being political, and showing the youth was was going on in the country. Booyah.

I know by know you are pissed as shit at me thinking "what does the Misfits wanting my skull have to do with Walt Whitman?!?" well it does. Walt was lauded as a crude and vulgar poet by some reviewers and he had done things no poet had done. He experimented with the new verse. He had the guitar riffs crunch and barbaric that where the words from his voice. He changed the shape of poetry and made new ways of making poetry available to furture generations. Likeso with punk. The amount of amateur but glorious guitars, brutal riffs and care-free attitude allowed many young bands to "sound [their] barbaric yawp over the roofs of the world" (not to mention many of the musicians in these bands were self taught).

These punk kids tried to change the world. Their attitude was one of not backing down, not giving in to conformity. Walt didn't either. He revised his Leaves sure, but he never gave in, never took out the profane because of peoples anger. He was himself through the poetry, loving, changing and not afraid of his own ideas. This makes me think of a line from a Refused song:

"It could be dangerous/ Art as a real threat"

The bottom line of this is that Walt was revolutionary and we need to understand that to understand his poetry. Contemporary times have jaded us from seeing just how crazy of a game Walt was playing, one as crazy as these punks. Walt tells us in his poem he harbors a slave. Walt tells us that "he most honors my style who learns under it to destroy the teacher"(40). Walt was for America herself, even for the President, but also against establishments that would prevent humans from being alive, being human.

Despite his intent, which is a thing unknowable, he had somewhat of a pervasive poetry. The poetry of a rebel, a loafer, a rebel loafer, who dared to dream that we could all be humans together.

I wont lie to you, i am not done with this, i will bring about Punk into Whitman every god damned chance i can because i think the movement of Punk and the poetry of Whitman are combined in a way so thoroughly American that i can hardly stand it. Maybe it is the aspect of America that so brings together these things. Or maybe it was Walt who indeed started it all. We will see. Maybe i will change the song i am singing, but if i do, i still wont back down.

Reviewing the Reviewers

Does Walt Look Like He Cares What They Say?

Okay, understanding that the last two posts were epic in length i intend to try and keep this one short(er). I read five reviews in total, two bad, two good, and one that seemed to be on the fence. It was just as beneficial to see how Whitman received negative comments as good. A full view of the spectrum of reviews allows us the scope to understand Whitman as the circle of critics viewed him.

Starting with bad, here are some lines that really stuck out.

"As to the volume itself, we have only to remark, that it strongly fortifies the doctrines of the Metempsychosists, for it is impossible to imagine how any man's fancy could have conceived such a mass of stupid filth, unless he were possessed of the soul of a sentimental donkey that had died of disappointed love. This poet (?) without wit, but with a certain vagrant wildness, just serves to show the energy which natural imbecility is occasionally capable of under strong excitement" -Rufus Griswold

""We have glanced through this book with disgust and astonishment;—astonishment that anyone can be found who would dare to print such a farrago of rubbish,—lucubrations more like the ravings of a drunkard, or one half crazy, than anything which a man in his senses could think it fit to offer to the consideration of his fellow men. Where these bald, confused, disjointed, caricatures of blank verse have any meaning, it is generally indecent; several times execrably profane." - Henry Bagshawe

Wow. Right? Wow. Scathing really. Scathing. Over the top certainly, however understandable given the knowledge of Victorian sensibilities.

Griswold is extremely reactionary and extremely subjective. Despite the logical fallacies he commits (such as attacking Whitman directly) he actually does not quote any of what he finds displeasing about "Leaves". We know, in fields literary, that when you don't quote, yo shit don't float. His knee jerk reactionary stance that only expounds how vile he thought the poetry was betrays a sense of not having read past maybe the first few pages of "Song of Myself". Yet his abhorrence helps us understand a fact that made Walt so revolutionary. Walt was the first Punk. Walt was Pete Townshend smashing his guitar on stage. Walt was "The Lizard King" so high on acid he couldn't finish a concert. Walt was Zappa (I said it!) telling us to not eat the yellow snow. The poetry was raw and egdgey, and that is exactly why it elicited the response it did.

Bagshawe at least comments on things he doesn't like about the poetry itself. He points towards Walt's blank verse. That's at least something objective yes? But once again he merely talks about how profane the poetry is, and attacks Whitman. And, strangely, nay even suspiciously, he doesn't quote Walt either. Now i understand that, if profanity is the issue, why quote? Well at least censor whats offensive or quote parts that were disliked yet not profane. The reality of these negative reviews is that they are so upset about what they found offensive in the poetry they most likely forgot to correctly analyze it. That's a problem. Some of the best works of art have been profane and profound so, even though we may recoil in horror, to be good critics we must remain at least a bit objective. That is the problem shown by these two of Walt's contemporaries.

So here is the quote of the on-the-fence review.

"A curious title; but the book itself is a hundred times more curious. It is like no other book that ever was written, and therefore, the language usually employed in notices of new publications is unavailable in describing it."-Anonymous

The rest of the review is similar. On the fence, merely stating certain facts about the book and saying that, though strange, the book can provide pleasure to people who are " fond of new and peculiar things". This person has read the book, and thus is capable of reviewing it. Though the review is very ambiguous it is, no the less decent, merely stating that the book is new and strange. This gives people who would read it the idea that, if they are strict traditionalists, they may not care for it, and if they like things new and different, they will find pleasure in it.

Now for the positive reviews.

"In glancing rapidly over the "Leaves of Grass" you are puzzled whether to set the author down as a madman or an opium eater; when you have studied them you recognize a poet of extraordinary vigor, nay even beauty of thought, beneath the most fantastic possible garments of diction. If Hamlet had gone mad, in Ophelia's way, as well as in his own, and in addition to his own vein of madness, he might, when transported to our own age and country, have talked thus." -Anonymous, Our Book Table

This is a review from someone who understands a bit more about Whitman and perhaps America. While they praise Whitman they acknowledge that he is doing something never done before. Whitman is challanging the current conception of poetry in 1855. Though they equate him with Shakespeare (or rather a character of Shakespeare's) the understand Whitman's "roots" or at least the influences that effect him. They call him "Walt Whitman the b'hoy poet". As in bowery b'hoy. As in they know something about Whitman. This intimacy with the culture current in America is perhaps what keeps away the knee jerk reaction to some of the more profane parts of Walt's poetry.

The second Review:

"Walt Whitman, the world needed a "Native American" of thorough, out and out breed—enamored of women not ladies, men not gentlemen; something beside a mere Catholic-hating Know-Nothing; it needed a man who dared speak out his strong, honest thoughts, in the face of pusillanimous, toadeying, republican aristocracy; dictionary-men, hypocrites, cliques and creeds; it needed a large-hearted, untainted,self-reliant, fearless son of the Stars and Stripes, who disdains to sell his birthright for a mess of pottage"-Fanny Fern

I love Fanny Fern. No Joke yo. She hits the nail on the head of how people should have felt about Walt's poetry. He embraces everything and sets everything equal. Though she is very excited by "Leaves" she still reads Walt well, in our terms. She understands the reasoning Walt was apparently trying to get and she poets to him as a thoroughly American poet. She may even purpose my thieving bastardization of a statement from "The Dark Knight"

"Walt Whitman is the poet America needs, but not the one it deserves"

Walt had a vision of an America i wish i could be a part of, a vision of an America that Fanny agrees with and it is that vision that the negative reviewers were afraid of. Progressive and accepting. Refusing the old outdated modes of aristocracy and judgement.

GO WALT GO!

Sorry this wasn't short.

Under the Shadow of Whitman's America

(Ginsberg, a Whitmanian poet to be sure, as Uncle Sam: He too understood something about America "I've seen the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving hysterical naked")

Whitman's America is not our America, or maybe, maybe she is ours too. Whitman has in "A Song For Occupations" these lines, that perhaps show us what he believes of his America:

The President is up there in the White House for you....it is not you who are here for him
The Secretaries act in their bureaus for you....not you here for them
The Congress convenes every December for you,
Laws, courts, the forming of states, the charters of cities, the going and coming of commerce and mails are all for you.(48)

In short, i cannot, and do not believe in Whitman's America, and that makes me sad. I can no longer believe that the President is up there in the White House for me, or that any mechanism of our confounded bureaucracy meets for my benefit.

Before i get on a soap box too much i have to say that, i think, in some ways, Whitman stopped believing in his America too. Three entries from Specimen Days show light onto Whitman's thoughts on politics. First is the Inauguration Ball. In this entry Whitman compares the opposite scenes of the setting for the Ball and the wounded brought in from the second Bull Run. He gives us only a brief look at the ball, talking about pretty women and perfumes, but goes into detail on the sights and smells and sounds of those wounded in battle. This brief passage certainly shows us that Whitman is an ardent observer and has ease at description. But there is not much opinion in this section. However the juxtaposition of the images of leisure with the gruesome realities of war give enough of a statement. Whitman's connection that there is so much for surgeon and nurse to do that while they are busy helping people that some mother's sons pass away unintended, give us a thought of liesure with disgust. How can people be waltzing and drinking while men are dying and screaming, marred by a war for thier respective countries? Perhaps this is a first look at Whitman's realizing of the truth about America.

Second comes the entry "President Hayes's Speeches" . It is actually a line from about the middle of this passage that gets me thinking about how Whitman may feel:

"I hear [the speeches] criticised as wanting in dignity, but to me they are just what they should be, considering all the circumstances, who they come from, and who they are address'd to. Underneath, his objects are to compact and fraternize the States, encourage their materialistic and industrial development, soothe and expand their self-poise, and tie all and each with resistless double ties not only of inter-trade barter, but human comradeship."

Whitman also states that the speeches are "on easy topics not too deep" and that some would call the speeches "ephemeral". So it comes to me that, if they are very surface level speeches that some would say lack dignity and the ability to last what is the point? Why would Walt think they were exactly what they should be? What is the import of thier style and substance. Clearly Walt wants these speeches to connect America again. to soothe an America that had just gone through a civil war. But thinking that these, perhaps superficial, speeches are what America needs? It seems to me that that is not the same Whitman who seemed to have unlimited faith in people, in the American people. Certainly the Civil War would have changed anyone's ideas, but there is an echo of a loss of faith in the average American. It also seems that Whitman doesn't care much for Hayes, but with his emotion toward Lincoln well known, it is no wonder he would not care for Hayes.

For me the last nail in the coffin is one of the last entries of Specimen Days: "Nature and Democracy - Morality". Walt talks about how Democracy needs nature, or as Marcus Aurelius put it, the morality of nature. Walt states that he "conceive[s] of no flourishing and heroic elements of Democracy in the United States, or of Democracy maintaining itself at all, without the Nature-element forming a main part". Though this is very abstract it seems to me that Walt is calling for Democracy to maintain elements of nature that are beautiful and elegant. Peace, compassion and perhaps humanity. Nature can be violent and brutal but Walt's nature, as expressed through much of his poetry, is always one of beauty, always a nature of the loafer and leaner, the grass connects us all; connects every person. Walt does not see that Democracy will be successful unless it understands these concepts, and embraces them, and he is right.

Most of me wants to delete this post and start over. But this is an informal space to make these posts right? We can understand that Whitman knows of all the ugly aspects of America as well as the good. But he also seemed to know the difference in what was good about America and what wasn't. He did not drastically change the lines from "A Song for Occupations" which goes to show how much faith Whitman had in this land, even after the loss of Lincoln, even after the Civil War. These lines show faith in politicians before "politician" became a bad word. It shows faith that we as a country were building towards something.

I can only hope that one day i can see America as it was through Whitman's eyes. With hope and understanding.

P.S.

If your wondering why i am disillusioned here are some links: Our 1st Amendment rights down the drain, Legislation relying on the denial of basic human rights, and Homeland Security spying on peaceful protesters. But you are probably not wondering. Whitman tried to change this country with his poetry, and, as we will see, he did make change in places. But this needs to happen more often. We, as students of the word, are not powerless.
It is our solemn duty to ensure that the future of this country will not be brutal, unfair, and destructive of her people. We should turn our skills of analysis upon those who govern us, and our skills of rhetoric and compassion to battle their brutalities. A quote of Edward Said inspires me constantly. When people ask me what my B.A. in English Lit will be worth i think of this. When people underestimate the importance of what we do i think of this. And when i wonder what is neccesary for us to change this world we live in i think of this:

"Very well: if what i have been saying has any validity, then the politics of interpretation demands a dialectical response from a critical consciousness worthy of its name. Instead of noninterference and specialization, there must be interference, a crossing of borders and obstacles, a determined attempt to generalize exactly at those points where generalizations seem impossible to make. One of the first interferences to be ventured, then, is a crossing from literature, which is supposed to be subjective and powerless, into those realms, now covered by journalism and the production of information, that employ representation but are supposed to be objective and powerful." -Edward Said

Occupations en Regalia

Whitman/Zappa


Whitman and Zappa? Whitman AND Zappa. But why? Wasn't the point to see how there were changes in "A Song For Occupations"? Well sure, and believe you me we will get to that because, well, that's the whole point. Revisions. Zappa, like Whitman, was a master of revision. Both spent their lives revising. Poetry and Music are alive with these two masters of their craft, and who could deny them that?

Zappa revised many of his songs and played many repeating themes and melodies throughout his career. Likewise Whitman was constantly revising Leaves Of Grass which became a massive collection in the 1891 edition. But we were asked to narrow our searches of revision down to "A Song for Occupations" and so i narrow my search down to one of my favorite Zappa tunes as well:"Peaches En Regalia". There are only three editions of "Peaches" that were released on non-posthumous, non-bootleg albums, and those three are what i will explore, along with the six editions of "Occupations". Bare with me. This works out, trust me. It will be fun.

1855-56 Edition and Hot Rats

A hundred and fourteen years after the release of Leaves of Grass came Frank Zappa's album Hot Rats. While featuring such alluring song titles such as "Willie the Pimp" and "Son of Mr. Green Genes" this album was mostly instrumental except for the near excruciating, buckets of gravel, screeching Captain Beefheart. But it is here that we get our first rendition of "Peaches". Likewise for Walt we get our first rendition of "Occupations" in 1855. For a frame of reference you can listen to "Peaches En Regalia" here, while you read. Now, while you are hopefully listening, is the analysis of Walt's changes to "Occupation"

From 1855-1856 we see a large change in "Occupations". Firstly the name is changed to "Poem of the Daily Work of the Workmen and Workwomen of These States". Mouthful. It is also bumped from second place, as it was right after "Song of Myself" in 1855, to a fourth place spot. There are many grammatical changes as well as additions or deletions. To narrow our search let's look at the (roughly) eighth stanza and the twenty first. These stanzas, for those following along, start with "If you are a workman of workwoman..." and "Old institutions....these arts libraries legends" respectively (pages 45 and 48 in the 1855).

First in stanza eight he changes high to nigh in the line "If you are a workman or workwoman, i stand as high as the highest that works in the same shop". High to Nigh. Standing as high as the highest in the same shop could be a pretty arrogant standing. Bosses, Owners, all could be cruel. This line paints a picture of superiority of the poet over the worker. So understandably Walt changed it. Nigh means close so now the poet is standing as close as the closest. He is relating to the workers instead of alienating them. This changes makes sense thematically for the poem. Further down in the stanza a line reads "If you remember your foolish and outlawed deeds, do you think i cannot remember my foolish and outlawed deeds?". Yet in 1856 Walt amends this by adding "plenty of them?" at the end of the line. Walt is just as foolish, just as much an outlaw as our worker, our reader, and thus he speaks from a point of understanding. The line prior gives us a similar intimation however one could ask themselves how foolish or how outlaw a "poet" could be. Thus the addition is one that seeks to bring the poet closer to the worker.

In the second stanza commented on we see a line change from "Will we rate our prudence and business so high?....i have no objection," to "Will we rate our cash and business high? I have no objection,". Few changes here of note. First "prudence" to "cash". The ability to be reasonable with resources and ones affairs changes to a word meaning ready money. Prudence is seemingly a valuable merit that Walt would rate high. Cash is almost derogatory. Also with the following line stating "but a child born of a woman and a man i rate beyond all rate" it shows us that, though America's economy, its business, is all well and fine to Walt, it is people he cares about. It is the workman, not the work that is valued. Also the removal of ellipses shows us that Walt is not objecting to American values, as the ellipses might suggest, but instead is showing us he doesn't care much at all about the subject one way or another. To him it is the children and men and women who are important.

Did you listen to "Peaches En Regalia"? Good! Smooth sounds, a very melodious undercurrent of piano, softer drums, and guitars and horns coming in for effect. A very neat and concise package. But the name, humorous right? "Peaches in Regalia". Royal peaches. Peaches wearing crowns and holding scepters. I know that last sentence is mired in double entendre and perhaps that is what is meant by Zappa's name for his song, but think about it. This studio version is so clean cut, so precise, does it match its name? Perhaps not. We shall see what happens.



1860-1872 Edition and the Filmore East

Okay, so now you know introductory things so here is the Filmore East Edition of "Peaches". Listen and read. Whitman looks different no? Hrmm. Anyhow he did make some very distinct changes to our beloved "Occupations" changing the title to the third segment of "Chants Democratic" in 1860 and "Carol of Occupations" in 1872. There are quite a few changes in both of the texts. including additions and deletions. Our stanzas have a few of these changes. For instance the line " If you are a workman or workwoman, I stand as nigh as the nighest that works in the same shop," changes to " If you stand at work in a shop, I stand as nigh as the nighest in the same shop," (1856-1860). It stays this way for the rest of the editions. This new line is more encompassing, and reaches out to more workers despite of where they work or who they may be. Also it shortens the line and becomes less of a labor to read. It is not flashy, and is more concise. He deletes the "?" from the "...foolish and outlaw deeds? plenty of them." in 1860 and then deletes the "plenty of them" all together in 1872. The first deletion, of the question mark, shows he does not question his own deeds but is aware of all of his foolish and outlaw deeds. The deletion of "plenty of them" is the poet showing maturity; he does not wish to remember, or state perhaps, that he had performed many foolish and outlaw deeds. The poet is coming now from a higher place (1872 is also an edition where we see "ed" change to " 'd"). The last line of this stanza "If you see a good deal remarkable in me, I see just as much in you."(1855) to " If you see a good deal remarkable in me, I see just as much, perhaps more, in you."(1856-1860) gets deleted entirely in 1872. The 1855 version is nice, but almost placating. It's as if the poet is saying "if you think i am so wonderful i think you are!" which almost talks down to the worker. The addition of "perhaps more" is just adding arrogance to the mix and so, the 1872 deletion, i affirm, makes the whole of the stanza better.
The changes in the 1972 version show us a more refined poet. The arrogance is toned down and the scope broadened. Although some would say the addition of the " 'd" is, in itself, arrogantly stating the importance of these lines as poetry, the argument could also be made that the poet was trying to be less radical, and daresay, conform more to standards.

Filmore East has a totally different feel doesn't it? The song, similar right? But not. More raw. Yes it's live. But doesn't account for everything. The pace, a bit slower, more lingering, more jammy. Ansley Dunbar's falsetto is just a nice addition to the guitar. The piano turns to an organ, and the guitar is given more freedom and is a bit crunchier. All in all this rendition is more playful, more fun, and it shows how Zappa was getting comfortable with making his music, not just music. He has more power and wants the band around him to make his song as playful as the title. Awesome, yes?


1881-2 -1891-2 to the Tinsel Town Rebellion of 1981.

Here we are at last, the 80's and 90's. Here listen to this edition of "Peaches in Regalia". Wait, what? Oh my sweet lord. Zappa changed the name to "Peaches III". He changed the name, just like Walt had changed the name of his "Occupations". A peculiar, but interesting twist to our analysis no?

Except, where Walt had changed his poem's name many times, he, in these two versions, finally changes it back to "A Song For Occupations". And it is, sadly in these editions that our stanza has the least amount of change. Most of the change comes before hand, with the deletion of some stanzas to make ours, instead of the eighth, the fifth. There are minor grammatical adjustments but it does come to bear that the whole first stanza of "Come closer to me, push closer my lovers" is deleted. This is strange. Why would Whitman not want this in his poem anymore? Why would he not want them to come close to him and "take the best [he] possess[es]" and give "the best [they] possess"? I can only imagine that it is because he has said it before and better "For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you" (to note "Song of Myself" is also returned its title from it's first incarnation in these editions ). Surely the grammatical changes are worth note, they change the entire cadence of the poem and even meaning, but they are numerous and they flip flop; what was changed in one was returned to in an another. Whitman has settled and found, perhaps, the best that these poems could be, and settled with them.

Likewise, no other "Peaches en Regalia" editions surpass the Tinsel Town Rebellion version created in 1981. Other versions were released later but they were all recorded prior to '81 and some released posthumously. This "Peaches" is so different to say the least. A faster pace at some parts. Added synthesizers. The xylophone takes lead. Weird operatic voices, and Zappa's calling out of Italians in the end. Zappa definitely doesn't play guitar in this one. This is a product of the 80's certainly, but also a product of how far Zappa could push the envelope of music. "Peaches" finally lives up to it's name with bizarre sounds and strange interludes of weird music. That's why Zappa stopped it here. No more recorded "Peaches" it became what it was supposed to, much like Whitman's last edition of Leaves (though if Whitman had lived to today, he would have revised until today). "Peaches en Regalia" had it's final incarnation as "Peaches III" and Zappa left it alone, knowing that he had accomplished what he wanted with the freedom he had gained by becoming a master in his field, much like Whitman.

Final Note

Whitman created a living poetry and Zappa changed the face of modern music. Two geniuses realized that their work was never done, their intent never fully realized, and so they sang the same songs they had been singing in different ways until the echoes came back in ways they wanted. They knew that what is beautiful changes, what is ironic changes, and time changes all. Whitman's "A Song for Occupations" had been a "Carol" and a "Chant" but it was always something sung. Likewise, as ridiculous as this sounds, Zappa's "Peaches en Regalia" was always "Peaches" of some sort. Always abstract, always strange and beautiful, succulent and deceiving. They both were artists, and they both revised their art because they needed to perfect it every time for the age it was in.

Revisions and Speech

When people i have known have said that sometimes authors just put words on a page without thinking about it I point them to Walt Whitman. Like Professor Hanley at SFSU has pointed out, Whitman's leaves of grass wasn't so much of a final edition, but instead was a constant work in progress with new editions coming out nearly annually. There is not a single word in Leaves of Grass that Whitman didn't intend to belong there. It's true as hell!!! Look at the revisions in the blue book. Look at them! Witness someone who, despite speaking words that cut to the core of me, revised those words constantly to find the perfect meaning.

"Speech is the twin of my vision....it is unequal to measure itself" (pg.19 1855)

Speech for Whitman was always unequal to his vision, and thus his revisions. Who could blame him? I'm not saying that the 1855 version of Leaves of Grass isn't beautiful and literary by itself, but i am understanding that Whitman revised his work to try to make it closer to his intent, to his vision.

For me, page 19 of the 1855 version of Leaves speaks to me. I have already written about it multiple times but when a certain part of a poem speaks to you, you have to respond. I will look at the revisions of this page, or rather this section of the poem.

Walt turns understand to contain in the line " Walt you understand enough....why don't you let it out then?"

Walt also changes it into italics. But first we must discuss the word change. Contain versus understand. Contain supposes that Walt had been filled with understanding, he had been filled with experience. Understand implies that Whitman may not have experienced the parts of life that speech contains, but instead realizes them conceptually. So we can see how contain takes a different position in the poem.

Another large change is the addition of "O Speech" in the line "Do you not know, O Speech, how the buds beneath you are folded". The issue with this is that, in the 1855 version, this part was not directly talking to speech, or rather, the act of speech. But with the updated version we understand more thoroughly that Whitman is specifically talking about the inadequacy of speech. By adding "O speech" we understand that Whitman is directing all of his verse upon the topic of speech.

There are more changes that occur even within his page. There are too many changes for us to track them down on just one blog post. But the reality of it is this. That Whitman was always looking to make his intent more concise. Whitman does not even condone a single word in Leaves of Grass without his complete acceptance of that word belonging in the poem. Perhaps Whitman's poetry is one of the texts that we, as literary critics, can pull out the most authorial intent from.

The Slangs of New York

Although I have posted here a picture of what seems to be a very affluent San Francisco hipster, would you believe that it is a Bowery B'hoy from a antebellum New York City. This group of people from Manhattan's lower east side inspired this image with the way they dressed. However the Bowery b'hoys and g'hals were also responsible for slang and a cultural atmosphere that made the Bowery a place of cultural revolution. Though many gangs were a part of the Bowery, and many of the b'hoys were street thugs, they helped shape a part of the colloquial American speech.

The flop-houses, cheap theaters, and dance halls made the Bowery a place where the working man could go to have a good time. Of course, wherever there is culture there is bound to be slang, and it was this slang that caught Walt Whitman's eye. We even still use some of this speech today. Every time you say "so long", or "chum", call someone your "pal", or say that the party was a "blow-out" you have to thank the bowery b'hoys and g'hals. Whitman, a clear lover of language, was a fan of the language of the Bowery. Whitman even used parts of their slang in his poetry.

Although I can't see Whitman agreeing with the thuggish elements of the Bowery i can see that he might be interested in them and thier language. A language of the working class man, of the dancehalls, flophouses, and theaters is the language fo the people. Although the high academic institutions of America always hold a sway on what language is proper or literary, it is always the people who come up with the new additions to language. Language is a sign of the times and even certain periods are demarkated by words. If i say "groovy" an image of the late sixties and early seventies comes to mind. "Radical" and "dude" remind us of the eighties. So we can see how powerful the language of the people, and how even some of this slang still sticks around with us today!

I can imagine Walt Whitman seeing this new slang, new words, words of the people, and i can imagine him saying "Why the hell not!" Whitman was all about the language of the people, the lull of the voices he loved, and as an autodidact, how could he not love the new slang coming from the lower east side.

But speaking of the atmosphere that was made by the Bowery? How about a little place called CBGB's? How about The Talking Heads, or The Ramones?


Though the Bowery was a spot of ill repute, much like San Francisco's Tenderloin, sometimes it's these places of low rents and residents that stay up all night that allow this kind of art to flourish. New styles, new art, new slang, all form in these cultural epicenters and that is perhaps what Whitman saw, and why he enjoyed the slang of the Bowery.

So, that picture of that hipster with the tall hat, weird pants and red shirt wasn't too far off. Surely there may have been more violence and less av-ante-garde snobbery, but the spirit may be the same. New people, trying new things, trying to live their life in new ways, and creating a microcosm of culture that may be immortalized through language.

Well in the words of the Bowery, so long.


Sites Cited:

http://www.boweryboogie.com/2010/11/bowery-slang/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bowery
http://ahistoryofnewyork.com/tag/bowery-bhoys/

Specimen Days: Feburary Days

Well Walt certainly liked to loaf didn't he? And certainly the month of February should be the month of loafing. The bizarre mix of days that beckon you outdoors to enjoy the sun at its right temperatures, or keep you inside with the rain rapping its cold fingers upon your windows. Either way it is a month of beauty and transition and Whitman's entry shows us that this is so.

The power of his poetry comes from his loafing. Like the yellow sun to superman, the more loafing Whitman does, the more powerful his verse becomes. He is the king narrator of nature's splendor and not outdone by even Emerson or Thoreau. Leaves of Grass, the title itself even, is rife with metaphor and symbolism. Whether it be the plurality of the grass as it relates to humanity or the pages of the book representing the glory of Whitman's nature, it is charged with meaning. However perhaps a cigar is just a cigar and the title is simply to illustrated what inspired Whitman. We know he loafs and leans and observes spears of summer grass but in this specimen days we see how much he actually takes in nature and its beauty.

The hay from the barn has a perfume about it, the tendencies of humanity inspired by nature are vigorous and sweet, and Whitmans strength grows.

Whitman is a verse minded, peace loving Antaeus. He would invite you to wrestle, but only so that you could tug at his feet and beard. You often don't see many people appreciate nature the way Whitman does. He enjoys the weather regardless and even brings to his mind a letter by Robert Burns. We see Whitman even state that "I, too, like the rest, feel these modern tendencies (from all the prevailing intellections, literature and poems,) to turn everything to pathos, ennui, morbidity, dissatisfaction, death" but he does not allow this to stop him from enjoying what is around him and turning it into happiness.

The perfumes that crowd the houses and rooms may not be the odors that cover up the truth of nature but perhaps the intellectuality that keeps one from nature by using sight and ratiocination instead of touch, taste, smell, and feeling.

I think everyone probably needs to break out there inner Whitman now and again. When the summer comes iI know that Tamalpias will be calling my name.

Barnum's American Museum & Whitman

Barnum's American Museum was a spectacle full of all the odds and ends and oddities that could be found by Barnum. He stocked his museum with everything from mermaids to siamese twins to bearded ladies to a rifle range ect. ect. Many americans went to this museum and some sources boast even 15,000 visitors a day. With a large group of American's piling in every day, and the museums location in NYC what could be more American?

However Barnum's museum was full of oddities and fake artifacts and was just a spectacle in itself. Whitman certainly understands spectacle but as a poet who tries to get to the deeper aspect of life and constantly is in a struggle with what "truth" may be, i can't see this museum appealing to him. We do know however that, at the same time as Barnum's museum was going on there was another museum of Egyptian artifacts that did appeal to Whitman. Dr. Henry Abbot's collection of artifacts was frequented by Whitman. In fact Whitman's name appears on the ledger to sign in to the museum.

I can see how both would appeal to him. Barnum's museum appealing to to the masses and being a lively spectacle if mostly a fictitious one, and Abbot's as a real showing of Egyptian artifacts. Whitman would appreciate both i believe for the different aspects of culture they display.

Sources:

Wikipedia. Barnum's American Museum. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barnum%27s_American_Museum. Accessed 2/8/2012

Maurita. "Egypt on Broadway" New York Historical Society. http://blog.nyhistory.org/egypt-on-broadway/. Accessed 2/8/2012

Specimen Days: Abraham Lincoln

It is interesting to see the connection to the president that is felt by Whitman. He takes cursory glances and makes monuments out of them. Whitman seems to be dripping with admiration for the man. Yet he mentions many times during this entry about how plain Lincoln is in dress and action. Whitman associates Lincoln with the common man and this is perhaps a reason his admiration is so deep. To state that one needs a master of portrait painting from the Renaissance to paint an accurate picture of Lincoln shows great reverence indeed.

This shows us how reverent people were to Whitman. I suppose Lincoln is special because he was the president but because Whitman is relating him to the common man so often it seems that this is the aspect most appreciated by Whitman. Whitman was a poet of the people, and Lincoln had the value of the president for the people. Whitman praises the common people of the world in "Song of Myself". Likewise if such a great figure as Lincoln can seem to be, or represent, the common man then we can see why Whitman had such adoration for him.

This is Just to Say

Words and Walt Whitman have a strange relationship in "Song Of Myself". I will list a few instances in which words or speech come up. Yet I know that there is certainly more in the poem. The quotes that will be shown are more directly about speech.

"The sound of the belched words of my voice . . . . words loosed to the eddies of the wind,"(1)

"I have heard what the talkers were talking . . . . the talk of the beginning and the end,
But I do not talk of the beginning or the end." (2)

"Not words, not music or rhyme I want . . . . not custom or lecture, not even the best,
Only the lull I like, the hum of your valved voice." (3)

"What living and buried speech is always vibrating here . . . . what howls restrained by decorum,"(6)

"Endless unfolding of words of ages!
And mine a word of the modern . . . . a word en masse.
A word of the faith that never balks,
One time as good as another time . . . . here or henceforward it is all the same to me.
A word of reality . . . . materialism first and last imbueing."(16)

"My voice goes after what my eyes cannot reach,
With the twirl of my tongue I encompass worlds and volumes of worlds."(19)

"Speech is the twin of my vision . . . . it is unequal to measure itself."(19)

"My final merit I refuse you . . . . I refuse putting from me the best I am.
Encompass worlds but never try to encompass me,
I crowd your noisiest talk by looking toward you." (19)

"Man or woman! I might tell how I like you, but cannot,
And might tell what it is in me and what it is in you, but cannot,
And might tell the pinings I have . . . . the pulse of my nights and days.
Behold I do not give lectures or a little charity,
What I give I give out of myself."(32)

"My words are words of a questioning, and to indicate reality;"(35)

"I too am not a bit tamed . . . . I too am untranslatable,
I sound my barbaric yawp over the roofs of the world."(43)

Apologies for the long list of quotes. The four I will talk about will be the ones in bold.

Whitman has a lot to say about speech. Set up by Whitman are two modes of speech set in a hierarchy. The narrator's "belched words of [his voice]" and "barbaric yawp" take a priority in the hierarchy of language for the narrator. "I too am untranslatable" is what the narrator tells us right before sounding the yawp. But how is it possible that he be untranslatable? We are reading these words, we are understanding them, right? Yet this is not the same as translation. That is why the narrator sounds his yawp. Because that sound, the yawp, is one without form.
The burden of concise words and symbols is what the narrator is trying to get away from. Our words have direct definitions attached to them and that is precisely the problem.

The narrators "speech is the twin of [his] vision....it is unequal to measure itself". Speech is born of the same origin as his vision but because of this it is unable to accurately measure itself. Speech is unable to differentiate itself from the vision. Speech cannot show the vision because the vision is in the speech. The narrator rejects speech because, since it cannot differentiate from the vision, it is inadequate. His "final merit" is that of refusing speech. The narrator states that speech may "encompass worlds but never try to encompass [him]". Speech may show his vision but it cannot show the narrator himself. Speech cannot show all that is our narrator or his vison.

So What? Well these two modes of speech show us something that Whitman struggles with throughout the whole of "Song of Myself". He cannot, and is aware of it, make his words express what he is actually writing about. Many times throughout the poem he makes statements about all that he encompasses ("I skirt the sierras....my palms cover continents."(23)). This is because Whitman, or the narrator, is coming to terms about showing all that is his vision of the beauty of life. He attempts to be everywhere with his long lists and his all encompassing experiences tinged with a hint of omnipotence. It is because there is something ineffable about the idea Whitman strives to express. His love for words that do not belong to the mind but are "barbaric" or "belched" shows this ineffability. When Whitman does venture into the realm of higher words, words wrought by the brain, he recognizes their contradictory and often failing nature. Whitman's narrator can "crowd your noisiest talk by looking toward you". Whitman's language of the body is more powerful than words. Understanding that, we can look at the poem and search out its most visceral moments about the body and see their importance.

In short, don't read this poem with a lens of cold objectivity. Whitman meant for these words to be felt by your body, felt in your heart, felt subjectively. To deny that is deny the song Whitman is singing.

Specimen Days: Plays and Operas Too

We can see how thoroughly in love with the arts Whitman was. His recounting of all the old plays he had seen as well as there performers is amazing. He remembers the plays that he saw as a child as well as the operas he enjoyed as an adult. Our poet is a lover of the arts and this shows as does his culture in his knowledge of theater. He would even read Shakespeare's plays the day before he went to go see them.

"Song of Myself" is a celebration of living surely, but also a celebration of art. As i mentioned in an earlier post Whitman defies and refuses speech but chooses poetry to share his world with us. That is because art has a power over language that simple speech does not. This power is derived from the rearranging of symbols and the balances between story/discourse being shifted. A metaphor is a strong device. But as we can see in some metaphysical poems ( such as John Donne's "The Flea" and arguably parts of "Song of Myself") those metaphors become more powerful and changed in a way that a metaphor, presented in regular speech, does not.

That is why theater is so powerful. It shows an aspect of the world in a heightened state that elicits a special connection. We recognize the artifice, but that artifice is a mirror that helps us view ourselves and humanity more clearly. Whitman's early love of theater and later love of opera just goes to show us how much our poet was embedded in the arts. It even makes me think of some parts of "Song of Myself" as theatrical.

Whitman and the Wilmot Proviso

Whitman is clearly against the Wilmot Proviso. We can see in sections of "Song of Myself" how this must be true. When the narrator in the poem takes in the runaway slave and feeds, cloths and bathes him, we get a clear view of Whitman's stance on slavery. The Proviso would have made any territory acquired in the Mexican War slave free.
The Proviso was introduced on august 8th 1846. Whitman who essentially is a poet of compassion for all people and things must have stood for the Proviso because of the cruel nature of slavery.

Sources Referenced: U.S. History.org http://www.ushistory.org/us/30a.asp accessed on 1-31-12

To Page 19

Page nineteen seems to be, by far, my favorite. It seems that the narrator in this passage is talking to an intellectual skeptic. The narrators defiance of this skeptic, speech, are what make these words so powerful. We can see that Whitman is setting up a dialogue between himself and speech. "Speech is the twin of my vision....it is unequal to measure itself" and "It says sarcastically, Walt, you understand enough....why don't you let it out then?" In a strange fashion Whitman is arguing with himself about the nature of language to encompass his vision. Walt comes to the conclusion that speech cannot encompass his vision at all. My three favorite lines from this page are his refusal of speech.

"My final merit I refuse you....I refuse putting from me the best that I am.

Encompass worlds but never try to encompass me,
I crowd your noisiest talk by looking toward you."

Walt refuses trying to use speech in order to express himself. Speech would somehow put the best that Walt is away from himself. Speech would make Walt lose something of himself. Walt tells speech that it can encompass worlds but that it should never encompass him. Speech could never encompass Walt because he is beyond speech. Walt's world of words is poetry, not speech. His world is one that is tactile and visceral; a world of his senses. Walt's vision is paramount over his speech. He can crowd out the noisiest talk by simply looking at speech. He can stifle the skeptic or the academic or the lecturer or politician by simply turning his vision towards them. No amount of speech could ever encompass or overtake Walt or his vision.

These lines are very powerful indeed and it says something about the nature of poetry and how different poetry is from prose. That Walt's vision can take the form of poetry but refuses prose as unequal is a strong concept in understanding the difference between the two.

Houses and Rooms are full of Electronic Perfumes

I wonder what Whitman would have thought of our age and, if he were alive, his beginning to "Song of Myself" would have not been more like Ginsberg's "Howl". Though we are living in an age where technology is only getting faster and allowing us access to an infinite trough of information i ask: to what purpose? It seems that we are often held down by this overwhelming access.

A friend of mine said to me that he thought Facebook could be used as a mobilizing tool in which to raise awareness politically. It is no surprise that Acts like NDAA and SOPA/PIPA have been mostly under a media blackout. This same friend posts about these things on his Facebook account stories from AP, Reuters, and other online sources. I have had other people tell me they were thinking of blocking him, feeling that he was spamming their home pages. This is sad because a lot of these stories that he is posting is information that will affect every U.S. citizen. His attempt at using this tool is only met with contempt because, lets face it, most of us just wanna know how X's vacation went in cabo, or see pictures of peoples cats. With this in mind a part of Whitman's "Song of Myself" strikes me:

"Houses and rooms are full of perfumes....the shelves are crowded with perfumes/ I breathe the fragrance myself, and know it and like it, / The distillation would intoxicate me also, but i shall not let it."

This is a calling of abandoning that room. Do not let the things that mask truth intoxicate you. The distillations of perfumes are used to mask truth, and real beauty lies in the truth; for Whitman nature is truth. This could be a metaphor for what I wish to convey. That the internet is stocked to the brim with these "perfumes", these things that keep us distracted from the truth of the situations at hand. Though we can love our "Farmville", "Facebook" or "Youtube" we shouldn't let them distract us. The internet is the greatest tool for information ever created. It is the greatest tool for gathering and learning and organizing ever to exist and perhaps we should start using it that way.

Many people are using it for these types of purposes already. Yet imagine if most of us did. I'm not innocent in checking my Facebook or going on Reddit just to look at funny things, but i am starting to realize that there is potential in these devices for great usefulness. It matters not whether we like these things, in fact everyone needs enjoyment, but we should refuse to use them in a manner that clouds our minds.

I am extremely glad to have had a class that is forcing me to start this blog. I have often thought about it. Thought about the possibilities. Even if no one is reading it, it is out there and available. Not that what i have to say is even that important, but maybe it can inspire someone. I think the rest of the posts here on out will all be almost exclusively Whitman, but it's telling how just a few lines of his poem can speak so much to me in our time.