Whitman make it clear that he loves women and mothers. He's by people being prudent and insecure. He sing the song of "pride" and celebration. He identify with the fact that his point of view is unusual and different, but he believes people need to get over their individual tensions.…
She sharply admonishes females who criticize her wild and passionate flings, choosing instead to honor the traditional rules of their maternal role models who are ‘long necks Of neighbours sitting where their mothers sat” (5-6). Millay is proud of the critically acclaimed work she accomplishes during the day within the boundaries of “the lofty tower [she] labour[s] at,” but she is clearly unashamed of the sordid affairs in which she engages in the evening (3). The author readily accepts full responsibility for both her accomplishments and her transgressions acknowledging, “To what it is, this tower; it is my own” (10). She reprimands her critics who condemn her insatiable sexual appetite responding that those encounters are the stimulants which create the passion for her poetry. While her contemporaries may offer a more sterile, less scandalous alternative to her work, Millay’s poetry is the result of her personal experiences of “anguish; pride; and burning thought; And lust is there, and nights not spent alone”…
Thoreau Whitman and Emerson are each classified as writers of the transcendentalist movement. These three writers deeply admire nature and do not view it simply as a beautiful landscape, instead they look past the superficial aspects of nature in order to find the keys in which to live a right…
“Poetry is not an expression of the party line. It's that time of night, lying in bed, thinking what you really think, making the private world public, that's what the poet does.” Allen Ginsberg believed this wholly and based his means of poetry by what he said in this sentence. One cannot censor thoughts, just as one can’t censor expression. Ginsberg faced controversy for sexual content and profanities that he used in his poetry, but those were merely his private thoughts that he brought to the public. His poetry fueled a whole generational revolution in the 1950s. In times of cookie cutter uniformity Allen Ginsberg went against norm and wrote explicit poetry for the sake of expressing a counter-culture point of view. The way he used inappropriate language and sexual content was his weapon against the institutions of the time. He performed live readings that captivated and roused the crowd. Ginsberg did not write his poems for public approval, his poem “Howl,” in particular received bad press. The press bad or otherwise only added desire to read this poem (“Allen Ginsberg.”). The explicit language and sexual content Ginsberg used in his poetry was meant to start a revolution of sorts and many thought it did. It questioned the preconceived concepts society had been accepting, such as consumerism, a close-minded view on sexuality, and an intolerant stand on drug use. Many said that the crudeness of his poetry was unnecessary, but it can be argued that his uncensored expression was the basis of his genius.…
Walt Whitman was a great american poet that wrote about the CIvil War and life in general. In 1886, at the young age of 17, he became a school teacher and later became a journalist just five years later. In 1855 Whitman made Leaves of Grass, his first step toward poetry. He wrote this book of twelve poems and published it himself. Walt Whitman made, edited, and published many great american poems, including O Captain! My Captain! and Song of Myself, that he often included his views about transcendentalism and realism.…
Walt Whitman, generally ignored in his time, has come to be recognized as a great poet among the American romantics. His works emphasize romantic ideals such as reverence towards nature, examination of the inner self, and distaste for scientific thought. Whitman's poems piece together life lessons and observations of existence into a message which promotes reader based reflection. His strongest works are debatable, but his poems with the strongest messages remain clear. "When I Heard the Learned Astronomer," "A noiseless patient spider," and "A Clear Midnight" each present a fascinating insight into the nature of human existence.…
Walt Whitman was an egotistical, self-absorbed, wild heretic. “I celebrate myself, and sing myself” (Songs of Myself 1). Multiple times in his books and essays he claims to be better than the masses. “I am as bad as the worst, but, thank God, I am as good as the best” (Preface to a Leaves of Grass). Henceforth I ask not good fortune. I myself am good fortune (Songs of the Open Road). Walt Whitman is often thought of as an atheist, but I’m not buying it. In my opinion Whitman deep down believed that there was a God, and not only did he believe that there was a God, he believed himself to be better than God. That’s why it’s nearly impossible to read a Whitman book or poem without seeing some sort of reference to God. I don’t believe in the tooth fairy and that’s about the only quote you’ll get from me regarding the tooth fairy. If I ever end up writing any form of literature I will rarely make, if any, references to the tooth fairy. Whitman claims to not believe in God but you’ll find thousands of quotes of him regarding God. It’s like when one of your friends says that they don’t like a person, yet they never stop talking about that person, it’s safe to say that subconsciously they like that person. Since Whitman won’t stop ranting about God I’m going to say and aim to prove that he subconsciously believed in God, tried to get others to not believe in God, thought of himself as God and that he was better than God.…
Whitman writes, “How you settled your head athwart my hips and gently turn’d over upon me, And parted the shirt from my bosom-bone, and plunged your tongue to my bare-stript heart, And reach’d till you felt my beard, and reach’d till you held my feet”. Whitman is describing lying in the grass together on a “transparent” or clear and beautiful summer morning. He is becoming in touch with himself and his soul that is moving around his body in a pleasant and warming way. His beautiful souls starts feeling his way around him wanting to give his body this biggest kiss to himself ever imaginable. His soul goes to his waist and his hips and then simply and gracefully moves around to his tailbone, then goes up to his heart finishing this soulful kiss that arises…
Walt Whitman is considered one of America’s greatest poets. During his lifetime, Whitman wrote hundreds of poems about life, love and democracy, among many others. In particular, Whitman’s poetry reflects the spirit of the age in which he lived, the Civil War. In taking a closer look at one of his most renowned and brilliant pieces, “When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom’d”, three particular themes are observed; his love for nature, the cycle of life, as represented by both life and death, and rebirth.…
In “Song of Myself” Walt Whitman is trying to see self as a whole. He wants to find strength and beauty as to make self whole and to be unified with humanity and nature. While people are condemning him, because the expression of a sexual content and a connection that makes use body and soul as well as the shock value. Whitman’s friend Ralph Waldo Emerson decides to back him in his writing. Emerson’s letter to Whitman calling Leaves of Grass "the most extraordinary piece of wit and wisdom that America has yet contributed" saved Whitman 's self-published first edition from sinking into obscurity. Yet even more important, Emerson 's work as a whole helped to prepare readers for the liberal, post-Christian spirituality that pervades Leaves of Grass. (Insert my source). Whitman wants to bring…
Larkin may also be seen as objectifying women in another poem “Wild Oats” where he writes “in my wallet are still two snaps of bosomy rose with fur gloves on.” The way he uses “bosomy” as an adjective referring to the aesthetic qualities of her breasts instead of any genuine compliment on her personality so this comment could be seen as disrespectful. In addition he writes “with fur gloves on” which gives a sexual illusion of this woman, as fur gloves and large breasts are a provocative combination and the fact he has this picture in his wallet seams rather perverse. The fact that the title of the poem itself can be used as a euphemism for sex highlights the idea that perhaps he only sees women as a means for sex.…
It seems as though we have become an easier target to reach. We, as Americans, pride ourselves on being the greatest. However, it seems as though this hasn't stopped people from easily snatching up priceless artwork that we own. In the 40s—and later the 90s in Boston,—artwork stored in the Midwest was stolen, and many worked to try to recover it. We seem to have not gotten very far, though. In 1942, the Library of Congress lost some of Walt Whitman's valuable poetry. They sent it to a guarded facility in the Midwest, where it was stored inside of sealed containers. This, however, hasn't stopped the master thief from snatching up ten of the notebooks. A similar incident happened in Boston, Massachusetts in the 90s, where a reporter by the name…
Between their respective poems, a theme of sexual frustration can be seen in both John Wilmot’s “The Imperfect Enjoyment” and Mark Strand’s “Courtship.” What distinguishes these poems from each other is the type of sexual frustration being portrayed in the poem and how the speaker deals with said frustration. By looking at this shared theme in these poems from different time periods, there can be better understanding on how sexuality has changed in recent centuries. “The Imperfect Enjoyment” begins with the speaker embracing a naked woman, but as they are engaging in foreplay, the speaker prematurely ejaculates, as seen by the lines “ But whilst her busy hand would guide that part which would convey my soul up to her heart, in liquid raptures I dissolve all o’er, melt into sperm. . .…
What is American Identity? American identity could be any specific way a person would perceive America, or how he or she can identify America. Walt Whitman, a strong independent person but willingly was considered the most American of American poets here today. Mr. Whitman is part of American identity. The way Mr. Whitman lives his life and writes his poems it reflects some methods or behaviors of things that are going on in America today. Song of Myself (1855) is one of the most famous work that Whitman has done. Song of Myself was one of the original twelve pieces in the 1855 first edition of Leaves of Grass. Walt spent a lot of time to revise and edit, reaching…
Many people don’t really know much about Walt Whitman’s early childhood, as neither did I. I did not know that he was very fond of his father, but had an intense amount of love for his mother. (Reynolds) In one of his poems, Walt Whitman idolizes his mother by…