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Comparative study between emerson and whitman
Walt whitman poetry essay
Walt whitman poetry essay
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Ralph Waldo Emerson and Walt Whitman are two of the most iconic American poets of the 19th century. Emerson and Whitman were both revolutionaries in American poetry, in their own time and their own right. When Emerson released his piece “The Poet,” a writing that challenged all of the American poets to become, as he put it, the next “Great American Poet,” which would address all of “the facts of the animal economy, sex, nutriment, gestation, birth.” Of all the poets that read Emerson’s piece, Whitman was the one who decided to “put the living, breathing, sexual body at the center of much of his poetry, challenging conventions of the day” (“Walt Whitman”, The Norton Anthology of American Literature, Baym, Nina, pg. 1005). Emerson and Whitman …show more content…
At the time of it’s publication, the literary piece Song of Myself was considered quite scandalous for its subtle discussions of sexuality. His use of subtle words to represent sexual things, such as the word “jetting” to describe ejaculation seemed to rub critics and some readers the wrong way, which makes sense considering the time period. He uses this subtle style as a way to define one of the muses of the writer. The act of sex has been an integral part of writing for many years and has inspired many works. Whitman understood this and used it as a way to represent what inspired the writer, as a way to define it. When Whitman wrote in Song of Myself, “Prodigal! you have give me love!.... therefore I to you give love!/O unspeakable passionate love!” (Song of Myself, Whitman, Walt, pg. 18, section 21) he was using this talk of making love as an inspiration, which is incredibly important as a writer, which therefore defines him. The act of love also can be inspired by the writer, which therefore defines what it means to be a writer and what his role in society is. The writer’s role in leading the reader to be in love is what defines him. One of the other roles of the writer is to challenge the status quo, which Whitman did …show more content…
But both understand that the writer is the reporter of the world. The writer must observe everything around him and make everyone understand the significance of it all. And while they may not see eye to eye about how to go about explaining what defines the role of the writer, they both have done it in their own way and because of it, have become immortalized by the reader and idolized by the writer. Their words have not only taught us all what it means to be a writer, but what a writer is. He is an interpreter of nature. An inspirer of love. A challenger of the status quo. A teacher of society. A representative for the voiceless. And so much
America was a newly formed country at the dawn of the nineteenth century, and many social issues would be dealt with during this time period. Walt Whitman and Mark Twain were two authors during this era and both authors challenged the views and cultural upbringings that surrounded the nation at that time.
An influential literary movement in the nineteenth century, transcendentalism placed an emphasis on the wonder of nature and its deep connection to the divine. As the two most prominent figures in the transcendentalist movement, Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau whole-heartedly embraced these principles. In their essays “Self-Reliance” and “Civil Disobedience”, Emerson and Thoreau, respectively, argue for individuality and personal expression in different manners. In “Self-Reliance”, Emerson calls for individuals to speak their minds and resist societal conformity, while in “Civil Disobedience” Thoreau urged Americans to publicly state their opinions in order to improve their own government.
The Civil War era serves as a significant literary period in the United States and throughout the world. The monumental period evolves the merging of literature with historical events; sparking the genuine, artistic heart of American literature. One of the first and most prominent Pre-Civil War court case, Amistad versus United States, influence the relations of the Civil War by exploiting the harsh, controversial, and debatable accounts of slavery and personal rights. Subsequently, inspiring the rise of portrait writers—Walt Whitman and Emily Dickinson—to produce literature upon each of his/her newfound views of the era. Thus, establishing the soul of American literature.
The lives of Walt Whitman and Emily Dickinson have many similarities and differences. Here, we will focus on the similarities in their lives in order to bring to attention a correlation between Whitman's poem I Saw in Louisiana a Live-oak Growing and Dickinson's poem # 1510. Both poets wrote during the time of Romanticism, even though Whitman was Dickinson's senior by some eleven years. This however did not influence the way the writing styles of many of their poems coincided.
Walt Whitman’s hard childhood influenced his work greatly, he was an uneducated man but he managed to become one of the most known poets. Whitman changed poetry through his work and is now often called the father of free verse. Especially through Leaves of Grass he expressed his feelings and sexuality to world and was proud of it. He had a different view at life, his hard childhood, and his sexuality that almost no one understood made him introduce a new universal theme to the world. Almost all critics agree that Walt Whitman was one of the most influential and innovative poet. Karl Shapiro says it best, “The movement of his verses is the sweeping movement of great currents of living people with general government and state”.
During the time in American history known as the, several poets began to stray from the traditional methods of writing poetry. Among these poets were Walt Whitman and Emily Dickinson. While these writer's led drastically different lifestyles and had drastically different styles of writing, the messages they presented through their writing were often surprisingly similar. Whitman's poem "Song of Myself, No.6" and Dickinson's poem "This quiet Dust was Gentlemen and Ladies" are examples of pieces which, on the surface, appear completely different, but in fact contain several similarities. Indeed, several similarities and differences can be found between these two poems.
Miller, James E., Jr. "The Walt Whitman Archive." Sex and Sexuality. Creative Commons, n.d. Web. 23 Apr. 2014.
Walt Whitman has a plethora of writing techniques that change the reader’s view of controversial topics. Walt Whitman engages with the reader’s by using the topics of homosexuality helping the individual fully develop, contradicting views on African Americans during the time of the Civil War, the idea of “sexual tolerance” and sexual “freedom” in the society, and how human traits can be depicted from an imaginary square relating to religious figures.
Walt Whitman had many ideas of how America was not living up to what the founding fathers had hoped to have achieved in their democracy a century before in succeeding from England. Whitman thought that the government was beginning to resemble what the founding fathers had fought and multitudes of soldiers died to escape from. In contrast to what the government had been returning to, Americans as a whole were finding their identity as a very young nation and were proud to call themselves Americans. Whitman was progressive when it came to his ideas on women and industry and it showed in the book Democratic Vistas.
(A critique of Walt Whitman’s themes and ideas in Song of Myself 6, 46, 47)
Whitman opted to publish his own passionate evaluation of Leaves of Grass. Whitman’s style of writing was quite unnerving to readers and critics. His poems received minimal public acclaim owing to a number of reasons: this openness in regard to sex, his self-portrayal as a rough working man and his outstanding innovations. He appeared to be a poet who didn’t adhere to the normal meter and rhyme schemes as set by his contemporaries.
Poems are used to convey a strong message to the audience and reader. These poems conveyed the theme of sorrowness and death. An example of sorrowness in Walt Whitmans “O Captain! My Captain” is “Where on the deck my Captain lies / fallen cold and dead”(7-8), which means that the president is laying fallen and dead after the homecoming of the ship. An example of sorrowness in W.H. Auden’s “Elegy for JFK” is.“When a just man dies / lamentation and praise / sorrow and joy are one”(13-15). This quote is saying that when the president, John F. Kennedy, died there was sorrowness as well as joy and praise. The poems “Elegy for JFK” and “O Captain! My Captain!” conveyed the theme of sorrow by using figurative language such as metaphors, rhyming, and over exaggeration.
Walt Whitman is Jay Leno and Ralph Emerson is Ed Hall. Walt takes the instructions announced by Emerson and runs gallantly with them making beautiful and insightful poetry. Walt Whitman and Ralph Emerson spoke out in an age where society was not ready for such dramatic writers. Whitman uses several of Emerson's topics and styles to be that good poet. Whitman elaborates on the characteristics of a poet, freedom, children, and animals.
He crossed the boundaries of the poetry literature and gave a poetry worth of our democracy that contributed to an immense variety of people, nationalities, races. Whitman’s self-published Leaves of Grass was inspired in part by his travels through the American frontier and by his admiration for Ralph Waldo Emerson (Poetry Foundation). He always believed in everyone being treated equally and bringing an end to slavery and racism. Through his poetry, Whitman tried to bring every people in America together by showing them what happiness, love, unison, and real knowledge looked. His poetry and its revolution changed the world of American literature
Walt Whitman used free verse in “Song of Myself” in order to connect with the common man and his American readers. In this first person narrative, Whitman deconstructs the “self” into many different sections that all are a part of the celebration of the individual. Some of the topics he breaks the “self” into are self- identity, and human exploration (including the human body and sexuality). In the poem, Whitman uses a speaker to exclaim that for individuals to grow they must discover themselves spiritually, physically, and mentally. The speaker in the poem