Walt Whitman, Known as the Poet of Democracy - Book Report/Review Example

AMERICAN IDENTITY IN WALT WHITMAN'S "SONG OF MYSELF" Walt Whitman, known as the 'Poet of Democracy,' [Loving, 1999; p. XI] is considered to be America's archetypical and epic poet. 'Song of Myself,' in which the poet celebrates himself and "his own nature as a representative of all humankind in its endless variety" [Loving, 1999; p. XI] is also a premeditated celebration of the experience of being an American, in the latter half of nineteenth century. [Whitman, 1888; p. 311] The changing titles of the poem-no title in the first edition of Leaves of Grass in 1855, to "A Poem of Walt Whitman, an American" in 1856, to simply "Walt Whitman" in 1860 edition and finally "Song of Myself" in 1881-signify the growth of the meaning of the poem, contributing to his construction of the archetypical American identity. Writing at a time when America and its philosophers like Emerson and Thoreau were trying to eradicate the lingering influences of Europe, Whitman radically defined and constructed a national identity for America, which he construed was inextricable from the nation's central premise of self-governance and equality. [Schramm, 2005] Yet the diverse and conflicting philosophies and attitudes presented in the poem is often perplexing to a reader, who endeavours to understand the kind of American identity that Whitman constructs for the new civilization of America. The present research is an attempt to understand the archetypical American identity presented by Whitman in his mid-nineteenth century poem, Song of Myself. Whitman's Song of Myself, which contains the "essence of nearly all his poems," published in 1855 edition of Leaves of Grass [Chase, 1995; p. 58], is also the most difficult to understand given the multitude of aspects it presents. In choosing the grounds for the poem, and its extended collection Leaves of Grass, Whitman deliberately abandoned the conventional themes and the stock ornamentation for poetry known till date, to choose the "broadest average of humanity and its identities in the [then] ripening Nineteenth Century, and especially in each of their countless examples and practical occupations in the United States" [Whitman, 1888; p. 299] at the time. While this vitally explains the difficulty in identifying a very unique or singular American identity, it provides the crux for understanding the multifaceted appeal, the many sides of the constantly evolving American identity. Song of Myself begins with the poet's self-proclaimed celebration of himself, and extends to celebrate Nature, an environment that is essentially American in its quality and character, bringing together images and devices from every cultural arena [Reynolds, 2000; p.26]. Un-assuming as he is in celebration of himself, he calls up the readers to assume the same: "And what I assume you shall assume." [Whitman; 1990; l. 2] In his opening lines, Whitman makes it succinctly clear that his use of "I," "me," and "you," is democratic and universal and that the "myself" he is singing about in the poem could be for every American. [Schramm, 2005] As the poem historicizes "the poet's movement from loafing individual to active spirit," it presents a "catalogue of persons and things," [Mason, 1987; p. 187] with which he identifies as an American. It is through this identification that Whitman gains his confidence to construct a new identity and order for the American society. And to his contemporary readers, he instructs "You shall listen to all sides, and filter them from yourself." [Whitman; 1900; l. 30] Given that the American identity forged by Whitman in Song of Myself is very much based on the historical realities of the time, and is distinctly different from the contemporary American identity, any effort to understand the kind of American identity that he constructs in the poem would need to explore the historical context of the poem. As Reynolds remarks, while theoretically American democracy had abolished all kinds of social barriers, by the 1850s it was "painfully clear that such barriers were on the verge of separating the nation." [Reynolds, 2000; p.10] Whitman, who was distressed by disunity and fragmentation of American society, through his profound and absolute democratic vision, attempted to offer his poetry as a gesture of healing and togetherness. [Reynolds, 2000; p.26] Whitman's poetic self - the thoroughly democratic "I" in the poem, constructs an American identity that affirms absolute equality: "A southerner soon as northerner/ At home on the hills of Vermont or in the woods of Maine or the Texan ranch." [Whitman; 1900; l. 327-333] His vision of the American nationality, "One of the Great Nation, the nation of many nations, the smallest the same, and the largest the same" [Whitman, 1900; l. 326] is significantly inclusive, as his sympathetic identification extends to Native Americans, recently-arrived Europeans and the African American, including the fugitive slaves. [Reynolds, 2000; p. 10 ] In constructing his concept of the multifaceted American identity, Whitman looks at the individual lives whirring around him, " the broadest average of humanity and its identities," - the "trippers and askers" who surround him, who he says "are not the Me myself." [Whitman, 1900; l. 58-66] As Whitley remarks, "[F]or Whitman to create a unified vision of America within this notion of the self, that vision must consist of discrete individuals, which accounts for the lists of people in Song of Myself. [Whitley, 2001; p.2 ] Tracing the average American life around him, and identifying with those other selves, Whitman proclaims how the average individual lives constituted the "very circumference of American democracy." [Schramm, 2005] His vision crosses not just the racial or spatial boundaries; it even crosses sexual barriers to experience the American self: "I am the poet of the woman the same as the man," [Whitman, 1900; l. 419] Whitman claims. Central to his representation of women is the idea of new American identity based on democratic and egalitarian principles. Whitman depicts women, particularly in their maternal role, "there is nothing greater than the mother of men" [Whitman, 1900; l. 421]; and women who adore "most the homeliest of all men [Whitman, 1900; l. 197]. While these women serve as the key to the realisation of his utopian social vision for America, perhaps more striking than the fervent glorification of the maternal, homely women, is his revolutionary portrayal of women as highly individualised, self-reliant figures. Even as he celebrates the inclusiveness of American nationality, Whitman's epic poem presents strikingly individualistic identity of himself, embodying the personal ideals of a civilization. Whitman confesses his overriding desire to exploit his personality as a representative of a typical contemporary American: "This was a feeling or ambition to articulate and faithfully express in literary or poetic form, and uncompromisingly, my own physical, emotional, moral, intellectual and aesthetic Personality, in the midst of, and tallying, the momentous facts of its immediate days, and of current America - and to exploit that Personality, identified with place and date, in a far more candid and comprehensive sense than any hitherto poem or book." [Whitman, 1888; 298] In the poem, Whitman typically depicts himself as a bachelor before the American society, "Walt Whitman, a kosmos, of Manhattan the son/ Turbulent, fleshy, sensual, eating, drinking and breeding/" [Whitman, 1900; l. 491-492] His image of 'himself' identifies in many ways with the typical working-class American - typically a butcher or a blacksmith or other worker - who exudes the vitality and defiance as well as the ruggedness and extravagance of the 'Bowery Boy,' as some of his reviewers called him. [Reynolds, 2000; p. 27] He had noted his fascination "for the splendid and rugged characters forming among these states, in the cities, the firemen of Mannahatta, and the target excursionist, and Bowery Boy." [Cited Reynolds, 2000; p. 27] When Whitman wrote Song of Myself, the native American individuality, the distinctive and ideal type of Western character consistent with the operative political and even moneymaking features of United States' humanity, he says, had not yet appeared, though it was certain to come. [Whitman, 1888; 308] Nonetheless he believed the democratic averages of America of his times were perfectly placed: "And will never be any more perfection than there is now." [Whitman, 1900; l. 34] He thought American individuality, based on the unalterable elements of "courageous and lofty manhood," to be a "great lesson in Nature, a counterpoise to the levelling tendencies of Democracy." [Whitman, 1888; 308] While Whitman proclaims absolute democracy and welcomes the doctrines of equality and fraternity, he detests its "first instincts" to produce "stragglers" and "reduce everything to a dead level.' His vision of a great aggregate Nation, he says was "altogether through the forming of multitudes of fully developed and enclosing individuals." [Whitman, 1888; 298] As Reynolds observes, "his dawning insight was based a belief that each and every democratic self was vast and contradictory, as variegated as the nation itself." [Reynolds, 2000; p. 50] Whitman's ideology of democracy served as a premise to bring Americans out of their practice of discrimination and hierarchy, to create a great Nation characterised by his vision of "unity through diversity." [Mason, 1987; p. 187] His idea of the democratic American-self acknowledges the individual personal force of man; it was central to American individuality, as it is central to any humanity. 'The great pride of man in himself,' he thought was indispensable to an American. [Whitman, 1888; 298] Yet the proud of average American mystifies him: "Sure as the most certain sure, plumb in the uprights, well entretied, braced in the beams/ Stout as a horse, affectionate, haughty, electrical/ I and this mystery, here we stand." [Whitman, 1900; l. 41-43] According to him, the nineteenth century American myths -- democracy and modern science -- even as they seemed to endanger or eliminate the personal force of man, in reality, the 'useful and real' new influences were 'on the whole preparing the way for grander individuals than ever' [Whitman, 1888; 308]: "Hurrah for positive science! long live exact demonstration!" he exclaims [Whitman, 1900; l. 480]. In integrating the attitudes of the common people - "the commonest, cheapest, nearest, easiest" [Whitman, 1900; l. 250] being the poet himself - Whitman turns to the apparently private of all selves -sexual urge - which he believed was most genuine and natural. Though his verse "Urge, and urge, and urge/Always the procreant urge of the world" [Whitman, 1900; l. 36-37] had launched him in the centre of a controversy at a time when any talk of sexual desire was seen as profane in literature, he saw the procreant urge of the world as the basis of all civilization. He believed that the "corruptions and inhumanity of the love plot" in popular American literature of time contributed to what he regarded as America's alarming moral decline. [Reynolds, 2000; p. 29] In his opinion, it was imperative to achieve a "shifted attitude from superior men and women toward the thought and fact of sexuality, as an element in character, personality, the emotions, and a theme in literature". [Whitman, 1888; 308] For him the body and its urges were inseparable from the soul and its emotions. "I am the poet of the Body/ And I am the poet of the Soul;" [Whitman, 1900; l. 415-416] his idea of new American identity considered body as sacred as the soul. He insisted on the acceptance and celebration of human sexual nature in all its manifestations and complexity. [Miller Jr; 1990; p. 130] Sex for him was means of self-awareness and a means of achieving a new identity - "Is this then a touch Quivering me to a new identity." [Whitman, 1900; l. 616] His sexual identity extends beyond the human drama, to experience and achieve harmony with the fundamental generative forces of nature, "the life force that subterraneously unites all into one creative whole," [Miller Jr; 1990; p. 131] adding to his cosmic experience. In constructing a New World order, a new identity for his vision of the absolutely democratic America, Whitman uses his idea of religion, based not on the selfless Christian duty to God and priesthood, but on Emersonian transcendentalism or the Oriental mysticism which assumes divinity in one self, "And I know that the hand of God is the promise of my own/And I know that the spirit of God is the brother of my own" [Whitman, 1900; l. 84-85] While W.D. O'Connor claims that Whitman's religious mysticism in the poem makes it a sort of an 'American Bible,' [Cited Miller Jr; 1990; p. 136] Miller states that he created a "unique mysticism, designed for America - a "democratic" mysticism available to every person on equal terms, embracing both body and soul, science and myth, life and death, active and passive, material and spiritual." [Miller Jr; 1990; p. 131] According to Levine, Whitman presents a "new religion," an all-inclusive, self-reliant one, guided by what he calls "an inner-directed law" [Levine, 1987; p.158]. His mysticism assumes a central role in the meaning of his poem, providing the base for his vision of a new American identity based on self-governance and equality. "The proof of the poet is that his country absorbs him as affectionately as he absorbed it," Whitman wrote in his 1855 preface to Song of Myself [Cited Reynolds, 2000; p.10]. To what extent America has absorbed the poet's vision of democracy, his religion and his concept of American individuality is a debatable issue, however the growing acceptance of his poem and the apparent interest in it as an 'American Bible' are proof that the Whitman's notion of American identity has not lost its relevance, despite the socio-political, economic and cultural changes in America since his time. Works Cited 1. Chase, Richard V. Walt Whitman Reconsidered London: Victor Gollancz Ltd, 1955 2. Levine, Herbert J. "Song of Myself' as Whitman's American Bible." Modern Language Quarterly 48 (June 1987): 145-161. 3. Loving, Jerome Walt Whitman: The Song of Himself Berkeley: University of California Press, 1999 4. Mason, John B. "Walt Whitman's Catalogue: Rhetorical Means of Two Journeys" in 'Song of Myself'" In On Whitman: The Best from American Literature Ed. Edwin H. Cady & Louis J. Budd Durham: Duke University Press, 1987 5. Miller Jr., James E. Walt Whitman Update Edition University of Chicago Boston: Twaye Publishers, 1990. 6. Reynolds, David S. Ed. A Historical Guide to Walt Whitman New York/Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000 7. Schramm, Geoffrey Saunders. "Whitman's Lifelong Endeavor: Leaves of Grass at 150" Humanities, Volume 26/Number 4, July/August 2005, Available at: http://www.neh.gov/news/humanities/2005-07/whitman.html Accessed 3/1/07 8. Whitley, Edward "A long missing part of itself: bringing Lucille Clifton's generations into American Literature" MELUS, Summer, 2001 Available at: http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m2278/is_2_26/ai_80852617/pg_1 Accessed 3/1/07 9. Whitman, Walt "A Backward Glance O'er Travel'd Roads" 1888 in The Portable Walt Whitman Ed. Mark Van Doren New York: The Viking Press, 1977 10. Whitman, Walt "Leaves of Grass" 1990 Available at: http://www.bartleby.com/142/14.html Accessed 3/1/07 Read More