The Portable Walt Whitman

by Whitman, Walt (Author); Van Doren, Mark (Editor); Cowley, Malcolm (Revised by)

• ISBN13: 9780140150780
• ISBN10: 0140150781
• Edition: Reprint
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 1977-06-01
• Publisher: Penguin (Non-Classics)

Summary

When Walt Whitman self-published Leaves of Grass in 1855 it was a slim volume of twelve poems and he was a journalist and poet from Long Island, little-known but full of ambition and poetic fire. To give a new voice to the new nation shaken by civil war, he spent his entire life revising and adding to the work, but his initial act of bravado in answering Ralph Waldo Emerson's call for a national poet has made Whitman the quintessential American writer. This rich cross-section of his work includes poems from throughout Whitman's lifetime as published on his deathbed edition of 1891, short stories, his prefaces to the many editions of Leaves of Grass, and a variety of prose selections, including Democratic Vistas, Specimen Days, and Slang in America.

Table of Contents

Introduction	ix
Mark Van Doren
A Note on the New Edition	xxix
Malcolm Cowley
Chronology	xxxiii
Gay Wilson Allen
LEAVES OF GRASS, 1850--1891 (SELECTIONS)
Editor's Note to Preface to Leaves of Grass	3	(2)
Preface to Leaves of Grass, 1855	5	(23)
Editor's Note to Leaves of Grass	28	(2)
The First Edition, 1855
Europe: The 72d and 73d Years of These States, 1850	30	(2)
Song of Myself, 1855	32	(65)
A Song for Occupations, 1855	97	(11)
To Think of Time, 1855	108	(7)
The Sleepers, 1855	115	(11)
I Sing the Body Electric, 1855	126	(7)
There Was a Child Went Forth, 1855	133	(3)
Song of the Broad-Axe, 1856	136	(11)
This Compost, 1856	147	(2)
Crossing Brooklyn Ferry, 1856	149	(7)
Song of the Open Road, 1856	156	(11)
A Woman Waits for Me, 1856	167	(2)
On the Beach at Night Alone, 1856	169	(1)
To a Foil'd European Revolutionaire, 1856	169	(2)
Out of the Cradle Endlessly Rocking, 1859	171	(7)
As I Ebb'd with the Ocean of Life, 1860	178	(3)
Me Imperturbe, 1860	181	(1)
I Hear America Singing, 1860	182	(1)
Poets to Come, 1860	182	(1)
From Pent-up Aching Rivers, 1860	183	(2)
Native Moments, 1860	185	(1)
Once I Pass'd through a Populous City, 1860	186	(1)
Facing West from California's Shores, 1860	186	(1)
As Adam Early in the Morning, 1861	187	(15)
Calamus
In Paths Untrodden, 1860	188	(1)
Scented Herbage of My Breast, 1860	189	(2)
Whoever You Are Holding Me Now in Hand, 1860	191	(1)
For You O Democracy, 1860	192	(1)
These I Singing in Spring, 1860	193	(1)
Of the Terrible Doubt of Appearances, 1860	194	(1)
Recorders Ages Hence, 1860	195	(1)
When I Heard at the Close of the Day, 1860	196	(1)
Roots and Leaves Themselves Alone, 1860	197	(1)
Of Him I Love Day and Night, 1860	198	(1)
I Saw in Louisiana a Live-Oak Growing, 1860	199	(1)
I Hear It Was Charged against Me, 1860	199	(1)
Here the Frailest Leaves of Me, 1860	200	(1)
Sometimes with One I Love, 1860	200	(1)
Among the Multitude, 1860	200	(1)
That Shadow My Likeness, 1860	201	(1)
The World below the Brine, 1860	202	(1)
I Sit and Look Out, 1860	202	(1)
To Him That Was Crucified, 1860	203	(1)
You Felons on Trial in Courts, 1860	204	(1)
To a Common Prostitute, 1860	205	(1)
O Magnet-South, 1860	205	(1)
Mannahatta, 1860	206	(2)
All Is Truth, 1860	208	(1)
I Heard You Solemn-Sweet Pipes of the Organ, 1861	209	(1)
The Ship Starting, 1865	209	(1)
Out of the Rolling Ocean the Crowd, 1865	209	(1)
Pioneers! O Pioneers! 1865	210	(4)
When I heard the Learn'd Astronomer, 1865	214	(1)
A Farm Picture, 1865	215	(20)
Drum-Taps
Beat! Beat! Drums! 1861	216	(1)
City of Ships, 1865	217	(1)
Cavalry Crossing a Ford, 1865	218	(1)
Bivouac on a Mountain Side, 1865	218	(1)
An Army Corps on the March, 1865--66	219	(1)
By the Bivouac's Fitful Flame, 1865	219	(1)
Come Up from the Fields Father, 1865	220	(1)
Vigil Strange I Kept on the Field One Night, 1865	221	(2)
A March in the Ranks Hard-Prest, and the Road Unknown, 1865	223	(1)
A Sight in Camp in the Daybreak Gray and Dim, 1865	224	(1)
As Toilsome I Wander'd Virginia's Woods, 1865	225	(1)
The Wound-Dresser, 1865	226	(3)
Give Me the Splendid Silent Sun, 1865	229	(2)
Over the Carnage Rose Prophetic a Voice, 1860	231	(1)
I Saw Old General at Bay, 1865	232	(1)
Look Down Fair Moon, 1865	233	(1)
Reconciliation, 1865--66	233	(1)
To a Certain Civilian, 1865	233	(2)
When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom'd, 1865--66	235	(8)
O Captain! My Captain! 1865--66	243	(1)
Old War-Dreams, 1865--66	244	(1)
Years of the Modern, 1865	245	(2)
Ashes of Soldiers, 1865	247	(1)
Pensive on Her Dead Gazing, 1865	248	(1)
Shut Not Your Doors, 1865	249	(1)
Chanting the Square Deific, 1865--66	250	(2)
One's-Self I Sing, 1867	252	(1)
Tears, 1867	252	(1)
Aboard at a Ship's Helm, 1867	253	(1)
The Runner, 1867	254	(1)
A Noiseless Patient Spider, 1868	254	(1)
The Last Invocation, 1868	254	(1)
Proud Music of the Storm, 1869	255	(6)
The Base of All Metaphysics, 1871	261	(1)
Song of the Exposition, 1871	262	(10)
On the Beach at Night, 1871	272	(1)
Ethiopia Saluting the Colors, 1871	273	(1)
Sparkles from the Wheel, 1871	274	(1)
Passage to India, 1871	275	(10)
The Mystic Trumpeter, 1872	285	(2)
Prayer of Columbus, 1874	287	(3)
After the Sea-Ship, 1874	290	(1)
The Ox-Tamer, 1874	291	(1)
To the Man-of-War Bird, 1876	292	(1)
The Dalliance of the Eagles, 1880	292	(1)
Good-bye My Fancy! 1891	293	(2)
Editor's Note to ``A Backward Glance O'er Travel'd Roads''	295	(1)
A Backward Glance O'er Travel'd Roads, 1888	296	(19)
DEMOCRATIC VISTAS
Editor's Note to Democratic Vistas	315	(2)
Democratic Vistas, 1871	317	(68)
SPECIMEN DAYS
Editor's Note to Specimen Days	385	(2)
Specimen Days, 1882	387	(254)
Bibliographical Check List	641
Gay Wilson Allen