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Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman
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Leaves of Grass

by Walt Whitman

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5,48025318 (4.21)74
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Showing 1-5 of 23 (next | show all)
Truly remarkable book. From a time when thinkers, ponderers, and wonderers had time to think and write Whitman evoked thoughts and feelings from deep within in his Leaves of Grass. It seemed like a sentimental good-bye to pastoral America while recognizes the rush of forces that was to come. His selected prose was a look at another time so different yet with people's lives so similar to our own. It took two years of bathroom reading to finish this and it was well worth the effort. ( )
  JBreedlove | Oct 28, 2009 |
You may like Walt Whitman or you may not, but you can't claim to know American literature if you've never read Whitman. There it is. Get used to it. If it helps any, remember: you only have to do it once. Wear a bib, you won't get any on ya! ( )
  dekesolomon | Oct 27, 2009 |
Best read on a sunny September or October day when you're ripe for peak experience, dilation of the soul. Full of promise, power, gusts of the sublime; home.
  franx | Sep 3, 2009 |
If there was a single book I could have on a deserted island it would be "Leaves of Grass". It is beautiful, inspired writing. It's been analyzed by many so I'll spare you any grand statements or a lot of detail, but for a taste of the themes Whitman puts across:

- All men are brothers. The book celebrates the common man, and embraces the man that society has cast out or looked down upon.

- Delight and oneness with nature. Delight in the small things in nature.

- Spirituality achieved not by subjugating the senses or pleasures but by embracing them, and living life to the fullest.

- The belief in the innate power, spirituality, and goodness of man.

All of this is done in a very natural, unpretentious way ... I believe Whitman was truly inspired when he initially wrote this book, and was not regurgitating someone else's philosophy or metaphysics.

There are so many wonderful passages and quotes, maybe someday I'll include some here but for now I'll just say I highly, highly recommend this book.

Read it outside, under a tree. ( )
  gbill | May 15, 2009 |
I hated "Leaves of Grass" when I was an English major in college. Over the many intervening years I have grown to appreciate Whitman's work more and more. I know it was just me, but I had to grow up to realize the genius of his words. ( )
  CarmenOhio | Dec 29, 2008 |
Showing 1-5 of 23 (next | show all)
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Epigraph
Come, said my Soul,
Such verses for my Body let us write, (for we are one,)
That should I after death invisibly return,
Or, long, long hence, in other spheres,
There to some group of mates the chants resuming,
(Tallying Earth's soil, trees, winds, tumultuous waves,)
Ever with pleas'd smile I may keep on,
Ever and ever yet the verses owning - as, first, I here and now
Signing for Soul and Body, set to them my name,
Walt Whitman
Dedication
First words
Quotations
Last words
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Canonical titleLeaves of Grass
Original publication date1855
Awards and honorsNewsweek 50 Books for Our Times (2009), Newsweek's Top 100 Books: The Meta-List (2009, No. 53), NPR's Complete Holiday Book Recommendations (2006)
EpigraphCome, said my Soul,
Such verses for my Body let us write, (for we are one,)
That should I after death invisibly return,
Or, long, long hence, in other spheres,
There to some group of mates the chants resu... (show all)
Book description

Amazon.com Product Description (ISBN 0060956976, Paperback)

Leaves of Grass, first published in 1855, contained twelve long untitled poems, but Whitman continued to expand it throughout his life. Whitman's poetry was unprecedented in its unapologetic joy in the physical and its inextricable link to the spiritual. As Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote to him: "I am very happy in reading [Leaves of Grass], as great power makes us happy ... I find incomparable things said incomparably well, as they must be."

(retrieved from Amazon Fri, 24 Apr 2009 07:57:53 -0400)

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