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.