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Loading... Walt Whitman: Selected Poems 1855-1892 [ed. Schmidgall]by Walt Whitman
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Sign up for LibraryThing to find out whether you'll like this book. No current Talk conversations about this book. This is the best selection of Whitman's poems in their original form. Included are the original editions of "Leaves of Grass" plus "Drum Taps". Later editions of Leaves plus assorted prose is amplified with appendicies including unpublished poems and additional prose. With a chronology and additional materials this is an essential volume for the serious students of Whitman. ( ) no reviews | add a review
A fully unexpurgated collection that restores the sexual vitality and subversive flair suppressed by Whitman himself in later editions of Leaves of Grass. A century after his death, Whitman is still celebrated as America's greatest poet. In this startling new edition of his work, Whitman biographer Gary Schmidgall presents over 200 poems in their original pristine form, in the chronological order in which they were written, with Whitman's original line breaks and punctuation. Included in this volume are facsimiles of Whitman's original manuscripts, contemporary - and generally blistering - reviews of Whitman's poetry (not surprisingly HenryJames hated it), and early pre- Leaves of Grass poems that return us to the physical Whitman, rejoicing - sometimes graphically - in homoerotic love. Unlike the many other available editions, all drawn from the final authorized or "deathbed" Leaves of Grass, this collection focuses on the exuberant poems Whitman wrote during the creative and sexual prime of his life, roughly between l853 and l860. These poems are faithfully presented as Whitman first gave them to the world - fearless, explicit and uncompromised - before he transformed himself into America's respectable, mainstream Good Gray Poet through 30 years of revision, self-censorship and suppression. Whitman admitted that his later poetry lacked the "ecstasy of statement" of his early verse. Revealing that ecstasy for the first time, this edition makes possible a major reappraisal of our nation first great poet. No library descriptions found. |
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Google Books — Loading... GenresMelvil Decimal System (DDC)811.3Literature English (North America) American poetry Middle 19th century 1830–1861LC ClassificationRatingAverage:
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