Walt Whitman is unique American - Essay Example

The most fundamental thing about poetry is that the content and the articulation of language in a poem reflect among other things the perception of the poets and his or her relation to the environment. It is the mandate of any form of art to contribute positively to the social, political and even intellectual domains of the society. The poet’s work is also a significant representation of the poet personality. Walt Whitman is an American poet who lived and shone at the time when American nationalism and patriotism was at stakes in each and every American. It is a time when the Americans who loved their country had to come out strongly and defend the nation’s reputation. The poet, for this reason, used poems to reflect his nationalism and patriotism. This paper is aimed at deeply analyzing Walt’s poems and bringing out important aspects about the poet. The paper is guided by the thesis that Walt Whitman is uniquely American, and this is strongly demonstrated in his poem. This insight will be developed through critically analyzing the aspect of Americanism as seen in three of his most popular poems. The two most critical structures observed in Walt’s poetry are list and anecdote. List as a poetic structure allows the poet to present a large number of entities and items without making many claims as to their worth; this is can be viewed as a clearly democratic presentation of material. Through this structure, the poet has an easy time going about cataloging America, a raw material nation for poetry. On the other hand, anecdotes are a means through which the poet demonstrate what kind of sympathetic perceptions he wishes his poetry to be. When he has to present an aspect of life second-hand, he does it so well that it becomes real for him in such a way that he seems to have experienced the aspect of life himself. Intense connection between people is the focus of Walt’s poetry. Walt categorically avoids traditional styles such as rhyme in his poems. This is also an attempt to show that his poems are actually American poetry, fresh and new, with no connection to other countries’ styles of poetry. From the poem O Captain My Captain, which is a poetic work of 1865, Whitman demonstrates his American personality. The poem is an elegy that literary creates a need for analysis. The poets mourn his father, the captain of a ship that is almost docking. In the poem, the poet explains that the captain of the ship, who is also his father was steering the ship towards the shore. The poet can hear the bells from the harbor, but moving to where the captain’s body lies, he observes that the captain is dead and cold. Having lived between 1819 and 1892, Walt Whitman experienced the pains of civil war in America. Being extremely patriotic, he was reportedly a great supporter of the American president Abraham Lincoln. The poem can be interpreted to represent the assassination of President Lincoln (Kaplan, 33). The death of the president, which was hoped to be the main person to lead the country away from the pains of the war is something to mourn about. The poem structure is relatively simple making it easy for the meaning to come out clearly. The yearn for a happy day for Walt Whitman, as indicated in the poems beginning on a happy note “our fearful trip is done” shows that he is a real American, wishing the best for his country and its people. The lamentation related to the death of the leader who has been successful in steering the country out of the war. The song structure used in this poem makes it memorable and increases the tone effect of the poem. From the poem, A Song of Myself, Walt Whitman creates a poem or a song about himself. He is keen to represent his life as someone who has lived a life of struggle but also as one who loves his environment. This poem is a great insight into what the poet makes of his life, an aspect of himself that has not come out clearly often from himself or other artists. His Americanism is seen in the poem as he tries to explain how much he loves the world and nature. His portrayal of America is a beautiful environment worth loving and adoring. He explains that everything to him looks good. It is also worth noting that he encourages, through this poem the positive attitude towards life that is important to American. He explains that even the things that appear from a surface view as bad have some considerable contribution tow some larger common good. According to him, “nature has patterns that fit together like a well-built house” (Miller, 24). Although this poem reflects personal life to a larger extent, relating it the previous and future works of Walt Whitman portrays an Americanism that Whitman is claimed to have. He loved his country as an American withal the diversity and nature. He believes in the country and its resources from the people to the environment. He is also keen to note that even with the problems that the country had at this time, he could be sure to have a something good coming out of the situation, in the long run. The poem, therefore, gives a uniquely American image of Walt Whitman as do other poems that this great American poet is the hand behind. Lastly, if we focus on the poem A Riddle Song, Walt Whitman uses imagery for a new purpose. Although not common in his other poems, imagery is used in the poem to represent the difference between good and evil. It represents the fight between life and death and has been used widely to represent the real American dream of having to save the country from evil and having to embrace life over death. Walt Whitman uses this poem to shed light further on his person and life. He uses it to show his humility of self and background and uses this notion to challenge the rest of the Americans to uphold humility and support what is good for the society. America, according to Walt in his poems is greater than one person. The use of rhyme, on the other hand, contributes to the tone of the poem. The uniqueness of the poet, in this case, is his ability to represent America and its needs for unity, concern, and love for the country. Poetry has been viewed as a tool for the transformation of a society. The contribution that poems make to the community development does not arise only from the wordings but also to a greater extent from the presentation that the poet makes of him or herself. This presentation is the basic determinant of the perception that the people will have and hence the reason they will or will not embrace the content of the poem. Walt Whitman achieves much in his poems. More so, he successfully brings out himself in a uniquely American way (Zweig, 48). The three poems used in this essay adequately support the thesis that Walt Whitman is uniquely American, and this is strongly demonstrated in his poem. Works Cited Kaplan, Justin. Walt Whitman: A Life. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1980 Miller, James E., Jr., ed. Walt Whitman’s “Song of Myself”: Origin, Growth, Meaning. New York: Dodd, Mead and Co., 1964. Zweig, Paul. Walt Whitman: The Making of the Poet. New York: Basic Books, 1984. Read More