1

WALT WHITMAN

Whitman, a Voice of American Democracy / Whitman as a Poet

of Democracy / Poet of America

Walt Whitman is a great poet of democracy. Indeed, he may be the greatest. As Thoreau
said, Whitman “is apparently the greatest democrat the world has ever seen.” Specifically
speaking, he is perhaps the greatest poet of the culture of democracy. He writes the best
phrases and sentences about democracy. To describe democratic culture we may take into
account the following ideas:

First, democratic culture is the soil for the creation of new works of highly artistic poems
and moral writings, in particular.

Second, democratic culture is a distinctive stylization of life-that is, a particular set of

appearances, habits, rituals, dress, ceremonies, folk traditions, and historical memories.

Third, democratic culture is the soil for the emergence of great souls whose greatness
consists in themselves being like works of art in the spirit of a new aristocracy.

All these ideas are interconnected and appear in Whitman’s writings throughout his life.
But, in our judgment, Whitman’s democratic individuality is a greatly more powerful and
original idea than any of the other ideas of democratic culture that we have just
mentioned. Democracy for Whitman means the assertion of one’s individuality as well as
equality with others. In his view all men are equal and all professions are equally
honourable. Whitman had a deep faith in democracy because this political form of
government respects the individual. He thought that the genius of the United States is
best expressed in the common people, not in its executive branch or legislature, or in its
churches or law courts. He believed that it is the common folk who have a deathless
attachment to freedom. His attitudes can be traced to the Enlightenment of the
eighteenth century because he thought that the source of evil lay in oppressive social
institutions rather than in human nature. The function of literature is to break away from
the feudal past of man and artistically to urge the democratic present. Princes and nobles
hold no charm for Whitman; he sings of the average, common man. He follows Emerson in
applauding the doctrine of the “divine average” and of the greatness of the commonplace.
A leaf of grass, to Whitman, is as important as the heavenly motion of the stars. Whitman
loves America, its panoramic scenery and its processional view of diverse, democratically

Facebook Page MA / BS English University of Sargodha Pakistan

 2

inclined people. He loved, and reveled in, the United States as a physical entity, but he also
visualized it as a New World of the spirit. Whitman is a singer of the self as well as a
trumpeter of democracy because he believes that only in a free society can individuals
attain self-hood.

I speak the pass-word primeval, I give the sign of democracy,

By God! I will Accept nothing which all cannot have their counterpart of on the same
terms.

This is Whitman's expression of the idea of democracy taken from "Song of Myself." In
this all-encompassing interpretation Whitman says that the freedom offered by
democracy is for all not a chosen few. It included all people, not renouncing those of other
races, creeds, or social standings.

Whitman celebrates no individual person, nor does he celebrate himself. Though he often
says “I celebrate myself”, the self celebration throughout is celebration of himself as a
man and an American. The “I” in Whitman’s poetry is not only the individual, but collective
ego of humanity (universal). This “I” is an imaginative and sympathetic identification of
himself with every other individual (average American). This feeling of “oneness” strongly
asserts Whitman’s faith in democracy. In “Song of Myself” Whitman constructs a
democratic “I,” a voice which stands not only for himself but also for all average men. The
poet opines that he sings for himself, and, as he finds complete identity between himself
and others, in singing himself he is also singing for others. He is confident that his beliefs
and ideas are also the beliefs and ideas of others, and what belongs to him also belongs to
others. Every particle and every element of which he is made has also gone into the making
of others. In other words, the poet derives his ego-centric self confidence from the
pantheistic faith that the inner essence of all is one and indivisible:

I celebrate myself, and sing myself,

And what I assume you shall assume,

For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you.

Facebook Page MA / BS English University of Sargodha Pakistan

 3

Whitman has a sense of identity not only with man but with all leaving creatures.
Whitman’s sense of “oneness of all” makes his democracy universal and pantheistic. The
basic emotion in Whitman’s lyricism is a feeling of kinship between all creations, which is
evinced in the section 6 of the poem “Song of Myself”. Here, it is the simple spear of grass
that becomes the symbol of democracy. According to the poet the grass knows no
discrimination. It grows all places. It grows in broad zones and also in narrow zones. It
loves equality. It grow among black people as well among the white, Knauck, Tuckahoe,
Congressman, Chuff, etc. It gives them the same delight. It regards them all as equal.

Whitman emphasized individual virtue, which he believed would give rise to civic virtue. He
aimed at improving the masses by first improving the individual, thus becoming a true
spiritual democrat. His idea of social and political democracy—that all men are equal
before the law and have equal rights—is harmonized with his concept of spiritual
democracy—that people have immense possibilities and a measureless wealth of latent
power for spiritual attainment. In fact, he bore with the failings of political democracy
primarily because he had faith in spiritual democracy, in creating and cultivating individuals
who, through comradeship, would contribute to the ideal society. This view of man and
society is part of Whitman’s poetic programme.

Not only in his ides is Whitman democratic, but his poetic technique too reflects his
democratic impulse. It is significant that he rejects the conventional forms of poetry
which he left to be associated with its feudalistic and aristocratic past. His freedom with
poetic form reflects his advocacy of freedom for the human soul. The free flow of words,
the lines of uneven length, all express the sense of development inherent democracy.

In short, Whitman is undoubtedly the most authentic voice of the United States of
America. His art is one mode of the totality of American discourse; thus, in asserting a
new democratic identity through poetry, Whitman actively asserts a new democratic
identity for American politics and culture.

Discuss Walt Whitman Use of Symbols in ‘Song of Myself’

Whitman’s poetry is highly symbolical, because he believes that true art is

suggestive, and that requires great painstaking labor on the part of the readers to
understand and appreciate it. Moreover he wants to communicate to his readers his
own perception of (i) the essential ‘oneness’ or the ‘identity of all’ (ii) the spiritual

Facebook Page MA / BS English University of Sargodha Pakistan

 4

reality that exists at the back of the material world, and (iii) ‘the fluidity’ or
‘liquidity’ of what seems to be solid and concrete. Obviously, the poetry of such a
poet is bound to be extremely symbolic.

‘Song of Myself’ is perhaps one of the most remarkable poems of Whitman,

memorable for its powerful and significant use of symbols. The major symbols, used
here are ‘I’, ‘the grass’, ‘the journey’, ‘body’, ‘soul’, ‘plants’, ‘animals’, ‘heavenly bodies’,
etc. The ‘I’ or self is perhaps the single most important symbol in ‘Song of Myself’.
The ‘I’ does not stand for the poet alone. It symbolizes the modern American, the
modern man, or even Every man. It signifies a fusion of several characters, a
composite character, which exists at no place other than in the poem. It also
symbolizes the natural propensities in man and thus it stands for all. As the poet has
an overwhelming feeling of the ‘Oneness of all’, the ‘I’ may even symbolize a soldier
on the battlefield, or a comet rushing through the heavens. At other times the ‘I’
signifies the composite self on its quest of reality; it becomes the traveler exploring
the universe and thus it stands for all humanity undergoing the experience of the
universe.

In ‘Song of Myself’ Whitman has symbolically used ‘body’ for physical enjoyment
and ‘soul’ for spiritually. He sings both of the body and the soul because for him both
are equally pure and holy. The poet intends to enjoy the bliss of heaven by taking
care of his spirit. But he would also transfigure or purify the physical and the
sensuous and thus minimize the pain and suffering which is the lot of the human
beings on earth. Thus he has given a new meaning and significance to the physical and
the sensuous.

In section 6 Whitman uses ‘grass’ symbol which brings out the optimistic and hopeful
nature of the poet: ‘The smallest sprout shows there is really no death.’ He is so
optimistic that he believes that death is merely a transformation, and not an end of
life as is generally supposed.

In section 51 and 52 the journey symbolizes the process by which the soul achievers
it identity with the Divine. The poet calls his brothers and sisters (listeners) to come
with him on his mystical journey, to have a mystical trance, and gain insight and
wisdom like him.

Facebook Page MA / BS English University of Sargodha Pakistan

 5

To sum up, as a symbolist, Whitman wished to abolish distinctions between the

subjective and objective worlds and accepted the doctrine that universe may be
understood through the sensations and intuition of the poet.

Write on Whitman as a Poet of Democracy/Poet of America

with Reference to Song Myself?
‘Song of Myself’ represents Walt Whitman as a poet of America with strong democratic
impulses. He considers all the Americans equal irrespective of their caste, sex, color,
religion and status. Although the poem celebrates the ‘self’, that self has a great deal in
common with the American people. He was proud of being an American and believed modern
America to be the center of science and democracy.

Walt Whitman was keenly aware of the glaring defects of democracy as it was functioning
in America in his time. But at the same time he took an exalted view of his countrymen and
visualized a great democratic future for them. He foresaw a great and noble destiny for
America. He marked the sources of evil in tyranny or superstition rather than in human
nature, and out of the comparatively free environment of America, he expected the
emergence and growth of a proud, noble and ambitious race.

Whitman’s ‘Song of Myself’ contains memorable panoramic pictures of American people and
American scenes. There are several sections in the poem in which catalogs of American
people and scenes occur. Section 8, for example, contains pictures of the heavy omnibus,
the clank of the shod horses, the excited crowd and the policeman working his passage to
the centre of the crowd, the fury of the roused mobs, etc. Besides, there are the clam-
diggers, the marriage of the trapper with a ‘Red girl’ having long eye-lashes, and the ‘runaway
slave’.

Section 15 contains an extraordinary long list of people of various occupations-the

carpenter, the pilot, the duck shooter, the deacons, the spinning girl, the mechanist, etc. In
Section 16, the poet presents himself as a comrade of Californians, of free north-
westerners, of craftsmen, of coalmen, and he identifies himself with persons of every trade
and rank.

Facebook Page MA / BS English University of Sargodha Pakistan

 6

In ‘Song of Myself’ Whitman speaks as a prophet because much of what he visualizes has
been achieved by the Americans. They have shown themselves worthy of the programmes of
action and onward march. The proud American whom Whitman celebrates in his poem has to
be strong. The modern American woman has to be an athlete, not a timid, submissive delicate
creature. He considers woman to be man’s equal, but woman has to be a potential producer
of heroes and bards.

In conclusion, we can say that the omnivorous lines of ‘Song of Myself’ convey Whitman’s
sense of the teeming American life. The movement of his verse echoes the sweeping
movement of the great currents of the living people of America.

Do you Consider Walt Whitman as a Modern Poet?

Walt Whitman as a Modern Poet

The American Civil War proved a turning point in her political and literary history. After
that, the American nation ushered in a new era of modern reconstruction. The American
literature during this period flourished in a fresh and free atmosphere. Some of the writers
broke away from the traditions of the past and emerged as modern writers. Walt Whitman
was one of them; he sang of the American nation and American people in his poetry. He
brought about some innovations in the poetic art and technique which characterize him as a
modern poet.

Democracy is a modernist tendency in literature and Whitman presented himself as a strong

advocate of American democracy. He tried to encompass the whole of America, the whole
gamut of his activities. He found his subjects among all sorts and conditions; his catalogues
symbolize the equalizing process of democracy.

Whitman did not follow the poetic conventions and traditions and techniques. The greatest
contribution made by Whitman to the growth of American poetry is his total change of
existing poetic form and his use of free verse. Since he wanted to deal with modern man
with a fresh outlook on life he realized that he required an original type of verse form. The
old types, he thought, were fit only for the old topics from myths, religions and feudal wars
and aristocracy. He wanted to write in a frank, crude and realistic manner.

Consistent with his love for democracy, he made use of the voice of the people, the richness
and beauty of colloquialisms and the colourfulness of the slang.

Facebook Page MA / BS English University of Sargodha Pakistan

 7

Whitman discarded the two traditional elements of poetic style-rhyme and metre. He
evolved a vital and vigorous metre and rhyme. His rhythm is the rhythm of prose verse. He
was the first American poet to make it a subject of metrical study.

The use of images and symbols by Whitman is also a modern element, as also his dramatic
elements in poetry. The ‘I’ and ‘You’ in his poems introduce the dramatic element. But
Whitman does not present his images and pictures before his readers in any logical order.
This is a also the steam-of-consciousness device as employed by Walt Whitman.

In terms of his poetic medium too, Whitman is modern. From the viewpoint of syntax we
find him as the poet of the phrase. Modern poets echo the syntax of Whitman.

Discuss How Whitman Has Used Imagery in His Poems

Whitman's use of Imagery in His Poems

Whitman’s poetry contains a profusion of images and it is truly perceived in almost any of
his poems. Imagery means the use of images or pictures in words to describe ideas or
situations. An image is something that can be perceived through one or more senses-sight,
hearing, smell, taste, and touch, the sense of motion or the sense of heat or cold. Imagery
is the pictorial quality of a literary work achieved through a collection of images. It evokes
a complex of emotional suggestions and communicates mood, tone and meaning.

Whitman employs different types of imagery in his poems- and they are galore-in order
to create the desired effect. All sorts of images crowd in his poems-images of the earth,
the sea and the sky, night and day, hills, mountains and rivers, nature and animals, images of
sex, energy and vitality. His long poems, like ‘When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom’d’ or
‘Crossing Brooklyn Ferry’, seem to be made up of a number of brief descriptions. At a glance
they seem chaotic as they flash past the eye in rapid succession. But in reality they have an
implicit pattern. In the poem ‘When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom’d’ we see an abundance
of images of the earth, the sky, the sea and all that, moving in quick succession.

Whitman’s images are multi-faceted; they function on more than one level. In all cases, he
used images to carry the reader from the world of sensory perception to the world of

Facebook Page MA / BS English University of Sargodha Pakistan

 8

thought in which he achieves some perspective. From the sensory he moves to the
metaphysical level. The images are, of course, continually becoming symbols whose meanings
fluctuate. The bird in ‘When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom’d’ is grief-stricken by the
death of Lincoln, but it pours songs whose themes tally with the thoughts of the poet. The
star symbolizes eternity. It is seen to be brightly glowing in the western sky, signifying the
immorality of Lincoln’s memory and also the eternity of the soul.

Images of vitality and energy are scattered through the works of Whitman. Whitman’s
sensibility and response to the visible world are expressed clearly through his images. He
seems to be specially fascinated by the essential dynamics of life, by the objects that
suggest energy and vitality. His sexual images or erotic images indicate his quest for vitality.

Grass is a recurring image in Whitman’s poetry. It represents democracy, individuality and

kinship with all.

The image of the trinity suggests the unity in the universe. All objects of the heaven and
the earth are conceived of as having formed a unity.

Whitman’s images are lively, vivid and impressive.

Walt Whitman as a Poet of Nature

Nature is central to Whitman's thought and writing in two aspects: as the material world
of objects and phenomena (natura naturata) or as the force—usually personified as
feminine—that pervades and controls that material world (natura naturans). In Whitman's
pre-Civil War poetry the naturata aspect of nature tends to predominate, as he focuses on
specific natural objects. In such later works as Democratic Vistas (1871) or his last major
poem, "Passage to India" (1871), the naturans aspect predominates and nature becomes
largely an abstraction.
Like most of his contemporaries, including Emerson in his book Nature (1836), Whitman
does not try to distinguish between the two aspects, simply declaring in the lines moved to
the final version of "Song of Myself": "I permit to speak at every hazard / Nature without
check with original energy" (section 1). For him as for William Cullen Bryant in the opening
lines of "Thanatopsis," nature as naturans speaks through "her visible forms" (naturata).
Thus John Burroughs, describing his first encounter with Leaves of Grass in 1861, when he
read it in the woods as a naturalist, wrote that he found the book unique in producing the

Facebook Page MA / BS English University of Sargodha Pakistan

 9

same impression on his moral consciousness as "actual Nature did in her material forms and
shows" (10). Like Ralph Waldo Emerson, Whitman sees natural facts as inherently symbolic
of spiritual facts, thus differing from Nathaniel Hawthorne, who depicts the symbolism
of naturata as ambiguous, and from Herman Melville, who finds the symbolism
of naturata not only ambiguous but often deceptive.
Whitman's poetic use of natural objects differs from that of his contemporaries such as
William Wordsworth, Bryant, or Emerson chiefly by his inclusiveness. He rejects the
prettified nature he finds in conventional poetry; in Specimen Days he describes that view
of nature as artificial, repressing, and "constipating." Natural objects listed in his
catalogues range from the "quintillions of spheres" that fill the universe to "brown ants,"
"mossy scabs," "poke-weed," and "beetles rolling balls of dung" ("Song of Myself," sections
33, 5, 24). Furthermore, like Emerson in the opening paragraphs of Nature, Whitman
includes as natural objects products of human industry, such as the ships, foundries, and
buildings of Manhattan in "Crossing Brooklyn Ferry." In the opening lines of "The Song of
the Broad-Axe," that artifact is portrayed as though it were a natural object. And
although like other romantic poets Whitman is strongly drawn to the unspoiled natural
world, he is equally drawn to life in the city, which he is the first American poet to
celebrate. Thus, after depicting the varied attractions of the countryside in the opening
lines of "Give Me the Splendid Silent Sun," he rejects them for the excitement of the
city, ending the poem with the line "Manhattan faces and eyes forever for me."
The natural object most frequently and conspicuously employed by Whitman is the sea. In
"Out of the Cradle Endlessly Rocking," "When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom'd," and
several of the shorter poems in the "Sea-Drift" section of Leaves of Grass, the sea is
personified as an old mother or nurse and associated with death. In "Reconciliation"
Whitman has this personification of the sea in mind when he writes that "the hands of the
sisters Death and Night incessantly softly wash again, and ever again, this soil'd world."
The air—used most frequently with the adjective "open"—generally symbolizes either
freedom and happiness or the universality of Whitman's message. The sun figures
prominently in Leaves of Grass—far more than the moon. Whitman makes frequent use of
stars, listing them in "A Clear Midnight" as among his favorite themes, along with night,
death, and sleep. The evening star, Venus, is a central and powerful symbol in "Lilacs."
Grass is a frequent symbol, most conspicuously in section 6 of "Song of Myself," as are
leaves, which are often not merely parts of a plant but also parts of a book, as in "I Saw in
Louisiana a Live-Oak Growing." The imagery of growing plants, with the use of words like
"blossom" or "bloom," is used in such poems as "Song of Myself," "Song of the Universal,"
and "Passage to India" to symbolize the progress of the universe towards perfection.

Facebook Page MA / BS English University of Sargodha Pakistan

 10

Although Whitman occasionally mentions animals of the American wilderness such as

alligators, bears, elk, moose, panthers, rattlesnakes, and wolves—most of which he had
never encountered—his best known reference to animals is the generalized one at the
beginning of section 32 of "Song of Myself," where he seems to idealize the natural
behavior of animals as contrasting sharply with the guilt feelings and frustrations found in
artificial lives of human beings. Later, however, toward the end of "Passage to India," the
behavior of animals, now referred to as "mere brutes," is something to be eschewed and
transcended.
Whitman depicts birds conventionally in poems like "To the Man-of-War-Bird" or "The
Dalliance of the Eagles," but his boldest and most distinctive use of them is as speaking
characters in two of his greatest poems, "Out of the Cradle" and "Lilacs." The songs given
to the mockingbird in the former and to the hermit thrush in the latter are used with
great effectiveness to express naked, heartfelt emotional responses to death: loss,
sorrow, and grief in one case; triumphant acceptance in the other.
Whitman's description of the hermit thrush depends heavily on information given to him
by his friend Burroughs, since Whitman is admittedly no naturalist; he even asserts
in Specimen Days that one enjoys the natural world more if one is not too precise or
scientific about it. Rather, he sees the function of natural objects and phenomena as
revealing the characteristics of natura naturans—that is, nature as a reified or
personified abstraction. The closest he comes to defining this abstraction is in "Song of
the Banner at Daybreak," where he can do little except to state that it is something
separate from the natural objects and phenomena it pervades, much as Wordsworth
refers in "Tintern Abbey" to a "presence," "something," "motion," and "spirit."
Historically, conceptions of nature as naturans have varied widely, and among Whitman's
contemporaries nature as an abstraction is depicted in contradictory ways. For
Wordsworth, nature is a benevolent goddess; for Alfred, Lord Tennyson in his "In
Memoriam," nature is a cruel force, "red in tooth and claw." Emerson in Nature generally
shares Wordsworth's view, but in his later essay, "Fate," he refers to nature as "the
tyrannous circumstance" (Emerson 949).
For Whitman, nature as naturans has six predominant characteristics: process, purpose,
sexuality, unity, divinity, and beneficence. He never sets forth this conception of nature
explicitly or systematically, any more than did Emerson, Thoreau, and other
transcendentalists, most of whom would generally agree with all of these characterizations
of nature except sexuality. This last was for Whitman's contemporaries often the most
conspicuous—and to many the most objectionable—aspect of his poetry.

Facebook Page MA / BS English University of Sargodha Pakistan

 11

Process simply means that the universe is not static, as it was often perceived in
eighteenth-century thought, but is continually in flux, changing, growing, evolving.
Furthermore, it is evolving in a purposive way towards a future perfection, a teleological
view that Whitman sets forth succinctly in "Roaming in Thought (After reading Hegel)"
and echoes in the section of Specimen Days headed "Carlyle from American Points of
View." Whitman's outlook in this respect is consonant with the widely held nineteenth-
century belief in progress, the belief reflected in the thinking of Georg Wilhelm Friedrich
Hegel, Charles Darwin, and Karl Marx. But Whitman's depiction of progress is unique in
identifying the force behind progress as sexual, an identification he made explicit in 1867
by adding the words "always sex" at the end of the Hegelian line 45 in "Song of Myself"
(section 3).
For Whitman personally, sex was a force that often seemed to baffle him, overwhelm him,
and leave him with guilty pleasure. But it may also have contributed to his empathy with
the wounded young soldiers, and likewise his willingness to comfort them at times by
kissing them, that made him such an assiduous and effective visitor to the Civil War army
hospitals. This empathy is symbolized in the bold final gesture in "Reconciliation" and is
stated most succinctly in "Song of Myself" (section 33): "I am the man, I suffer'd, I was
there." In viewing sex as an essential component of nature, Whitman saw it as fulfilling
two positive purposes: creating new life as the product of the attraction between men and
women, and creating the organic unity of society as the product of a more inclusive
attraction—for which he used the phrenological term "adhesiveness"—among all members
of society, as set forth, for example, in "The Base of All Metaphysics," "I Hear It was
Charged against Me," and Democratic Vistas.
The unity of nature is a central Emersonian belief that Whitman fully shares. Although he
asserts this belief in such poems as "On the Beach at Night Alone," "Kosmos," or "Starting
from Paumanok" (especially sections 6, 7, and 12), more often it is an unstated assumption.
Whitman takes for granted an underlying unity, in which the individual components of his
catalogues merge and blend, much like the diverse components of a successful photo
montage, to create a single, unified impression.
Divinity as a fifth characteristic of nature as naturans is evidenced by Whitman's
frequent use of the adjective "divine." Although he at times addresses God as a
transcendent being, as in "Passage to India" (section 8) or "Prayer of Columbus," he also
depicts God as immanent. In this latter sense the distinction between God and nature is
not always clear, with the result that Whitman has sometimes been labeled a pantheist.
Some support for this label may be found in Whitman's most theological poem, "Chanting
the Square Deific," which depicts God as having four aspects—Jehovah, Christ, Satan, and

Facebook Page MA / BS English University of Sargodha Pakistan

 12

Santa Spirita—the last of which includes not only the first three but everything else in
the universe. Likewise, in "As They Draw to a Close," nature is described as "encompassing
God."
Finally, Whitman sees nature as beneficent, a sharp contrast to the malevolent nature
depicted by such contemporaries as Henry Adams in his Education and John Stuart Mill in
his essay "Nature," or the morally indifferent nature of Herbert Spencer and the Social
Darwinists. Whitman expresses this view of nature most explicitly in "A Song for
Occupations" (section 3) and most succinctly in "Song of the Universal," where he speaks
of "Nature's amelioration blessing all" (section 4).
This purposive, unified, divine, and beneficent nature plays a central role in "Passage to
India," where Whitman sees the unification of the Eastern and Western halves of
humanity as simultaneously bringing about the unity of humankind, nature, and God in a
"trinitas divine" (section 5). In Democratic Vistas, written just a few years earlier,
the naturans aspect of nature again plays a major role, this time as a model for
democracy—referred to as nature's younger brother—and also for literature, which must
always be tested against "the true idea of Nature, long absent" (Whitman 984).
Since Whitman was not a systematic thinker, his assertions about nature as naturans are
inevitably characterized by a vagueness and inconsistency that frustrate those who want
to reduce his thought to a static and logically coherent philosophy. Fittingly, in his final
extended treatment of nature, in Specimen Days, Whitman returns to its naturata aspect
and again reflects the joy, peace, and happiness he found in his solitary immersion at
Timber Creek in the comforting maternity of the natural world.

Whitman’s mysticism and transcendentalism in “Song of

Myself”

Mysticism is not really a coherent philosophy of life, but more a temper of mind. A mystic
vision is intuitive; a mystic feels the presence of divine reality behind and within the ordinary
world of sense and perception. He feels that God and the supreme soul animating all things
are identical. He believes that all things in the visible world are but forms and manifestations
of the one Divine life.

The self-proclaimed “American Bard” Walt Whitman is undoubtedly a mystic and

transcendental poet. He shocked his contemporaries by his embrace of the sensual; “Song

Facebook Page MA / BS English University of Sargodha Pakistan

 13

of Myself” has been regarded as a prolonged expression of an experience that is essentially

mystical. The beautiful sampling of Whitman’s poetry from “Song of Myself” offers a
glimpse into the spiritual side of his most radical themes–love for country, love for others
and love for self. Whitman seeks to tear down the belief the spiritual resides only in the
religious and embraces the idea that nothing is more divine than humankind, nothing greater
than individual soul. There is a great deal of sexual elements in Whitman’s poetry; sexual
connotations are inseparable from the mystical experience.

In “Song of Myself” Whitman’s overjoyed revelation of union of his body with his soul has
been depicted in his mystic expression. Held in the trance-like grip of the soul from beard
to feet, the poet has a feeling of fraternity and oneness with God and his fellowmen:

“And I know the hand of God is the promise of my own

And I know that the spirit of God is the brother of my own

And that all – of the creation of love.”

As a mystic Whitman believed that there is no difference between Creator and the Creation.
His “self” is a universal self. He sees people of both sexes, all ages, many different walks
of life; even animals are included. The poet along with the divine spirit not only loves them
all; he is also a part of them.

In “Song of Myself”, mystical experience is symbolically conveyed through a piece of

sensuous experience. Being a mystic poet of his own kind, Whitman gives equal importance
to body and soul; he becomes the spokesman of the “forbidden voices” of ‘sexes and lusts
indecent.’ He loves his body and is sensitive to another’s touch. Both the lady and the
prostitute enjoy equal position in his poetry, for the inner reality, the soul has been created
by the same God. Whitman declares: “If anything is sacred, the human body is
sacred.” Thus he takes equal delight both in good and bad, noble or ignoble.

Whitman does not reject the material world. He seeks the spiritual through the material.
He does not subscribe to the belief that objects illusive. There is no tendency on the part

Facebook Page MA / BS English University of Sargodha Pakistan

 14

of the soul to leave this world for God. Whitman does not belittle the achievements of
science and materialism.

“Hurrah for positive science!

Long live exact demonstration.”

Whitman praises not merely life, but absolute worth of every particular and individual
person. Thus, his comic consciousness is the result of the expansion of the ego. The word “I”
assumes an enlarged universal connotation bringing the smallest and the greatest things of
the universe within its compass.

James E. Miller considers Whitman’s Song of Myself as “inverted mystical experience”.

While the traditional mystic attempts to annihilate himself and mortify his senses in
preparation for his union with the divine; Whitman magnifies the self and glorifies the
senses in his progress towards the union with the absolute. Although Whitman is influenced
by Emerson and oriental mysticism, yet there is a difference between Whitman’s mysticism
and the mysticism of Orient. Oriental mystic believes that communication between soul and
God is possible only through the mortification or conquest of the senses and the physical
appetites. On the other hand Whitman believes that spiritual experiences are possible
without sacrificing the physical appetites.

Whitman seldom lost touch with the physical reality even in the mist of his mystical
experience. Physical phenomena for him were symbols of spiritual reality. He believed
that “the unseen is proved by seen”; thus he makes use of highly sensuous and concrete
imagery to convey his perception of divine reality. He finds a purpose behind any natural
objects- grass, sea, birds, flowers animals etc.

Whitman is a mystic as much as he is a poet of democracy and science, but a “mystic without
a creed.” Song of Myself portrays Whitman's poetic birth and the mystical journey; the
poet feels the exhilaration of being no longer bound by the ties of space and time: he
is "afoot with" his "vision." He feels able, indeed, to range back and forth over all time, and

Facebook Page MA / BS English University of Sargodha Pakistan

 15

to soar like a meteor out into space. His entity is unique: he can assume the "gigantic beauty
of a stallion" and can turn himself into a departing air or annihilate himself into a dirt.

The poet does not deny but dismisses his "contradictions," asserting, "I am large, I
contain multitudes." In the beginning the poet vows to "permit to speak at every hazard,
/ Nature without check with original energy." Leaving "Creeds and schools in abeyance" ,
he goes "to the bank by the wood” and becomes “ undisguised and naked" similarly, at the
end, he describes himself as "not a bit tamed," as "untranslatable," as one who sounds
his "barbaric yawp over the roofs of the world." His journey over and done, he prepares
for departure, bequeathing himself "to the dirt to grow from the grass" he loves, and tells
the reader: "If you want me again look for me under your boot-soles." At the end, the
poet admonishes his readers to "keep encouraged" and continue their search for him,
promising: "I stop somewhere waiting for you."

Summary and Analysis of "One's-Self I Sing"

Summary

The poem directly addresses the successive themes in Whitman's poems. The speaker
begins by claiming that the poem is an ode to "One's-Self" - an individual. He then
immediately expands the scope of the poem by applying it to individuals "en-masse,"
emphasizing the democratic nature of the work. According to this poem, Whitman's ensuing
poetry will encompass both the individual and the collective, democratic mass, drawing many
parallels between them. The speaker further asserts that he "sings" (or, as a poet, writes)
about the body, about both men and women, about life and passion. The poem concludes with
the idea of The Modern Man, an ideal of American society that Whitman hopes to attain
through his poetry.

Analysis

"One's-Self I Sing" is the first poem in Inscriptions, which is the first book of Whitman's
Leaves of Grass. The poem sets the tone for the rest of the volume because Whitman
introduces the themes that he, the poet, will "sing" about. The poem delves into themes of

Facebook Page MA / BS English University of Sargodha Pakistan

 16

the self, the all-encompassing "I," sexuality, democracy, the human body, and what it means
to live in the modern world. Though this poem is short, it alludes to the broad scope of ideas
that Whitman will explore in the rest of the poems in Inscriptions and Leaves of Grass.

Whitman speaks to a general idea of self, a commonality between his personal identity—the
Walt Whitman he so often casts as the protagonist in his poems—and the Democratic self,
which is the collective identity that everyone shares. Whitman explains that the self is a
shared experience between the poet and the reader. As members of a democratic society,
all selves are intertwined—but conversely, each of these intertwined "selves" still retains
his or her individuality.

The human body is also a common theme in Whitman's poetry. Here, it forms the crucial link
that connects each individual self to the communal Democratic self. At the same time, the
body is inextricably tied to Whitman's image of the soul. He believes that without the
physical body, there is no soul. This is because the human body is the vessel through which
the soul interacts with and experiences the world. Therefore, in Whitman's poetry, the
human body is sacred and every individual human is divine.

Whitman goes on to introduce the theme of gender, specifying that he treats men and
women equally in his poems. "The Female equally with the Male I sing," he declares. Whitman
considers the woman equal to the man because his view of gender is tied to his definition of
the soul. To Whitman, women are just as sacred as men because despite their physical
differences, they are all human (and souls are free from gender). In later poems, particularly
in "I Sing the Body Electric," Whitman delves deeper into his ideas about gender.

Summary and Analysis of "O Captain! My Captain!"

Summary

The poem is an elegy to the speaker's recently deceased Captain, at once celebrating the
safe and successful return of their ship and mourning the loss of its great leader. In the

Facebook Page MA / BS English University of Sargodha Pakistan

 17

first stanza, the speaker expresses his relief that the ship has reached its home port at
last and describes hearing people cheering. Despite the celebrations on land and the
successful voyage, the speaker reveals that his Captain's dead body is lying on the deck. In
the second stanza, the speaker implores the Captain to "rise up and hear the bells,"
wishing the dead man could witness the elation. Everyone adored the captain, and the
speaker admits that his death feels like a horrible dream. In the final stanza, the speaker
juxtaposes his feelings of mourning and pride.

Analysis

Whitman wrote this poem shortly after President Abraham Lincoln was assassinated. It is
an extended metaphor intended to memorialize Lincoln's life and work. The Captain
represents the assassinated president; the ship represents the war-weathered nation
following the Civil War; the "prize won" represents the salvaged union. The speaker, torn
between relief and despair, captures America's confusion at the end of the Civil War. It
was a time of many conflicting sentiments, and Whitman immortalizes this sense of
uncertainty in "O Captain! My Captain!"

Whitman's poetry places a lot of emphasis on the individual. This particular poem explores
a variation on that theme: the self vs. the other. The speaker struggles with balancing his
personal feelings of loss with the celebratory mood resulting from the successful voyage.
While the Civil War claimed many lives, it led to the reunification of the Union, so many
Americans felt similarly divided. In Whitman's poem, the speaker believes that he should
be part of the "other" group, celebrating the return to safety. However, his inner
thoughts set him apart from the crowd as he tries to reconcile his emotional reaction to
the Captain's death.

"O Captain! My Captain!" is the only Walt Whitman poem that has a regular meter and
rhyme scheme. Often hailed as "the father of free verse," Whitman tended to write his
poems without following any kind of ordered poetic form. However, "O Captain! My
Captain!" is organized into three eight-line stanzas, each with an AABBCDED rhyme
scheme. Each stanza closes with the words "fallen cold and dead," and the first four lines
of each stanza are longer than the last four lines. Because this poem is an elegy to the
dead, the more traditional format adds to its solemnity. Additionally, the regular meter is

Facebook Page MA / BS English University of Sargodha Pakistan

 18

reminiscent of a soldier marching across the battlefield, which is fitting for a poem that
commemorates the end of the Civil War.

Summary and Analysis of "To a Stranger"

Summary:

The speaker uses this poem as a silent address to a stranger passing by him on the street.
He expresses the belief that he and this stranger (whose gender remains undefined) know
each other from another life. The speaker reminds the stranger of all the experiences
they shared together and how close they once were. They grew up together; they ate and
slept together. Their emotional intimacy matched their physical closeness. In the present,
however, the two are strangers, and their former closeness is now just a hint of a memory.

They pass by one another without a word, but the speaker describes a silent exchange
between them. Each one notices the other's body, bodies that were close in a past life but
are now physically distant. The speaker ends by stating that he cannot directly address
the stranger in this life. Instead, he must think of the stranger in solitude, hoping to meet
again one day so that the memory of their relationship does not fade entirely. The speaker
takes on the responsibility of keeping their spiritual connection alive.

Analysis:

Whitman wrote this poem in his typical free-verse style. It consists of one ten-line stanza.
Whitman also uses his signature list structure to invoke the connection between the
speaker and the stranger: "you give me the pleasure of your eyes, face, flesh, as we pass,
you take of my beard, breast, hands, in return." Similar to "I Sing the Body Electric,"
Whitman uses this list of physical assets to form the connection between the body and
the soul. He writes, "[Y]our body has become not yours only, not left my body mine only,"
he claims. The relationship between body and soul is a frequent theme in Whitman's work.
Whitman draws on the ideas of Transcendentalism to emphasize the spiritual connection
between physical body and nature.

"To a Stranger" is similar to Whitman's earlier poem "To You." In both poems, Whitman
expresses astonishment at the societal norm of polite reserve between strangers. "To

Facebook Page MA / BS English University of Sargodha Pakistan

 19

You" questions why it is inappropriate to address a stranger if both parties are willing, but
in "To a Stranger" the speaker interprets an unspoken connection with a stranger to mean
that they shared a past life. Despite this connection, though, the speaker acknowledges
that it would not be proper to directly address the stranger, simply because they are
strangers. All he can do is hold onto the hope that their spiritual connection will lead to a
physical connection in another life.

Whitman invokes the idea of the democratic self in this poem by leaving the stranger's
gender indeterminate. Due to this lack of specificity, the stranger represents anyone and
everyone. Whitman uses the ambiguity of the subject's identity to extend his tenderness
towards humanity in general. Therefore, the connection between these strangers extends
far beyond the boundaries of the speaker's own life.

The voice of the speaker certainly represents Whitman's own opinions (as it does in many
of his poems) However, it also represents the democratic self, which allows Whitman to
identify with the reader more strongly. Whitman often treats the reader as a character in
his poems in order to achieve his goal of his poetry functioning as a democratizing force.

Facebook Page MA / BS English University of Sargodha Pakistan