The poet in Whitman developed late and slowly while his early writings came only from the surface of his mind. But when he was scarcely in his teen...
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Sep 04, 2011
Mitchell A.
rated it: 
Whitman used to right fake reviews under false names for Leaves of Grass and send them to publishers, newspapers, and periodicals. I love that about him. So over the top. He had love for everything. Especially himself. As for the quality of the work the words speak for themselves:
"This is what you shall do: Love the earth and sun and the animals, despise riches, give alms to every one that asks, stand up for the stupid and crazy, devote your income and labor to others, hate tyrant More...
"This is what you shall do: Love the earth and sun and the animals, despise riches, give alms to every one that asks, stand up for the stupid and crazy, devote your income and labor to others, hate tyrant More...
4 comments
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(25 people liked it)
Mar 24, 2008
Ben
rated it: 
Leaves of Grass is like reading every single instant message that I and a friend of mine ever wrote to one another over the course of the last ten years. Likely way too long, too self-serving and would have shocked the general public if they cared to read it when it was written. But nestled in there are some real, true brilliant moments.
This is after all Whitman's life work, laid bare and un-edited for the most part. What else are we to expect? He is literally singing a song of h More...
This is after all Whitman's life work, laid bare and un-edited for the most part. What else are we to expect? He is literally singing a song of h More...
3 comments
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(12 people liked it)
Jun 09, 2011
Dan
rated it: 
Alright, my rating here is very misleading. I haven't read Leaves Of Grass. I don't even intend to read Leaves Of Grass. Not all the way through any way. It seems sort of weird to just read a big fat collection of poetry all the way through. The five star rating is for one poem, "Song of the Open Road".
I've never really appreciated poetry. I've liked song lyrics and that's poetry, but it seemed like I needed a tune to go with it. I've liked scripture which can be pretty poeti More...
I've never really appreciated poetry. I've liked song lyrics and that's poetry, but it seemed like I needed a tune to go with it. I've liked scripture which can be pretty poeti More...
2 comments
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(8 people liked it)
Dec 17, 2009
Andrew
rated it:
Literary rapture. I don't know how else I could describe my first experience reading Leaves of Grass. It was pure literary rapture.
I highly recommend Leaves of Grass to everyone - especially those who still believe, or want to believe, in the basic goodness of the American Experiment.
Pick up the slim first edition (Whitman revised and expanded Leaves of Grass throughout his life. The final product, which is what is most often seen on bookshelves, is a bloated, redundant More...
I highly recommend Leaves of Grass to everyone - especially those who still believe, or want to believe, in the basic goodness of the American Experiment.
Pick up the slim first edition (Whitman revised and expanded Leaves of Grass throughout his life. The final product, which is what is most often seen on bookshelves, is a bloated, redundant More...
Aug 23, 2010
Kathryn
rated it:
In 1860, when the United States was on the brink of civil war, Walt Whitman produced a book of poems that he hoped would provide a roadmap for preserving the Union. It was “Leaves of Grass,” the third edition.
Reading Whitman is always an exhilarating experience but when reading from this facsimile edition put out by the University of Iowa Press, there’s a touch of something else – a sense of history. The introduction by antebellum historian and Whitman scholar Jason Stacy does an e More...
Reading Whitman is always an exhilarating experience but when reading from this facsimile edition put out by the University of Iowa Press, there’s a touch of something else – a sense of history. The introduction by antebellum historian and Whitman scholar Jason Stacy does an e More...
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(4 people liked it)
Dec 25, 2009
Collin
rated it: 
Holy shit this is self-important and tedious.
--update: This has sat untouched on my desk all year. I can think of a hundred books I'd rather start than finish this, so I doubt I'll pick it back up unless I run out of books to read, I'm too poor to buy any more books, all my friends turn on me and refuse to loan me anything else, and all the nearby libraries are set on fire simultaneously.
--update: This has sat untouched on my desk all year. I can think of a hundred books I'd rather start than finish this, so I doubt I'll pick it back up unless I run out of books to read, I'm too poor to buy any more books, all my friends turn on me and refuse to loan me anything else, and all the nearby libraries are set on fire simultaneously.
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(9 people liked it)
Jan 29, 2012
Jenny Beth
rated it:
Few people know that I curl up with Song of Myself whenever i am depressed. i gave a nice boy from England my beautiful edition once as a birthday gift, so now i curl up with this dreadful Norton Anthology edition where the pages are thinner than onion skins. once i get to the end and reread some of my favorites bits i always find i am ready to rejoin the family of mankind again as tolerable, if not pleasurable, company. I think, as many do, that the affirmation and daring and greed and urgenc
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(2 people liked it)
May 25, 2011
Jeanette
rated it: 
Did you know that the letters in "Leaves of Grass" can be rearranged to spell "Asses of Gravel"?
If you find yourself anagramming the letters in the title rather than reading the poetry, it's a good sign you're not into the book. But I really wanted some of whatever Whitman was smoking that made him so ecstatically, ebulliently enthusiastic about every molecule on the planet. Including his own b.o.
"The scent of these arm-pits aroma finer than prayer." More...
If you find yourself anagramming the letters in the title rather than reading the poetry, it's a good sign you're not into the book. But I really wanted some of whatever Whitman was smoking that made him so ecstatically, ebulliently enthusiastic about every molecule on the planet. Including his own b.o.
"The scent of these arm-pits aroma finer than prayer." More...
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(2 people liked it)
Jul 07, 2008
Lindsay
rated it:
I always thought it was too spacey for me... His language is so wide open and goes everywhere. But to sit and read it from cover to cover in one sitting was enlightening. Not that I didn't see Whitman in other authors before, but I see so many layers of him now. So well worth the time. I almost wish I had read it aloud.
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(3 people liked it)
May 26, 2009
Evan
rated it:
There are a lot of bullshit abridged editions of "Leaves of Grass" out there, some just over 100 pages, which is just a joke. A lot of them are listed here at GR. I'm reading the complete unabridged version with "posthumous" additions, and it runs about 700 pages.
I was feeling kind of lonely and lowdown today and Bret Easton Ellis' "Less than Zero" was kind of making me feel less than zero and not helping. I picked Whitman up on a complete lark and becam More...
I was feeling kind of lonely and lowdown today and Bret Easton Ellis' "Less than Zero" was kind of making me feel less than zero and not helping. I picked Whitman up on a complete lark and becam More...
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(2 people liked it)
Nov 14, 2008
Ibrahim
rated it:
Whitman so constantly deals with the body. Here we
are in the presence of one of those contradic-
tions, or rather, unifications, which make him in
a certain sense a Hegelian poet. He sings of the
body when he means to sing of the soul simply
because the body, like everything else, is funda-
mentally a manifestation of the soul:
I have said that the soul is not more than the body,
And I have said that the body is not more than the soul. More...
are in the presence of one of those contradic-
tions, or rather, unifications, which make him in
a certain sense a Hegelian poet. He sings of the
body when he means to sing of the soul simply
because the body, like everything else, is funda-
mentally a manifestation of the soul:
I have said that the soul is not more than the body,
And I have said that the body is not more than the soul. More...
5 comments
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(2 people liked it)
Nov 19, 2007
J.P.
rated it:
Another title I'm forever dipping into.
There are many editions of LEAVES; the 1892 'deathbed' edition (Whitman was knocking on Heaven's door when he was editing it) is one I've never been able to finish, mainly because it's just so. . .voluminous. Many poems for the ages there, but just as much dead wood, too, which always bogs me down.
This first, 1855 edition---this is my favorite. I call it the rock n' roll edition. Here, you'll find the poems---in their unadultera More...
There are many editions of LEAVES; the 1892 'deathbed' edition (Whitman was knocking on Heaven's door when he was editing it) is one I've never been able to finish, mainly because it's just so. . .voluminous. Many poems for the ages there, but just as much dead wood, too, which always bogs me down.
This first, 1855 edition---this is my favorite. I call it the rock n' roll edition. Here, you'll find the poems---in their unadultera More...
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(2 people liked it)
Jan 30, 2012
Anne Nikoline
rated it:
Walt Whitman's Leaves of Grass is actually my very first poetry read, so you can imagine that I was fairy excited to get started on it. With a language which is so wide open, the author manage to travel everywhere he possibly could within this poem, which can be just as good as it can be bad, however, I happen to see what he had to say about everything.
Since this is my first poetry read I find it very hard to rate it, because I got nothing to compare it too other than John Keats's Od More...
Since this is my first poetry read I find it very hard to rate it, because I got nothing to compare it too other than John Keats's Od More...
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(1 person liked it)
Mar 12, 2008
Frankie
rated it:
my southern baptist american lit professor told me his work was vulgar and humanist, citing whitman's line – "Divine am I inside and out, and I make holy whatever I touch or am/touch'd from,/The scent of these arm-pits aroma finer than prayer,/This head more than churches, bibles, and all the creeds." these words were the seed to my introspection and doubts of much of the dogma i later rejected.
Song of Myself (quoted above) eventually helped shake me out of quite a few delu More...
Song of Myself (quoted above) eventually helped shake me out of quite a few delu More...
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(2 people liked it)
Sep 15, 2007
Michelle
rated it:
52. To a Stranger
PASSING stranger! you do not know how longingly I look upon you,
You must be he I was seeking, or she I was seeking, (it comes to me, as of a dream,)
I have somewhere surely lived a life of joy with you,
All is recall’d as we flit by each other, fluid, affectionate, chaste, matured,
You grew up with me, were a boy with me, or a girl with me, 5
I ate with you, and slept with you—your body has become not yours only, nor l More...
PASSING stranger! you do not know how longingly I look upon you,
You must be he I was seeking, or she I was seeking, (it comes to me, as of a dream,)
I have somewhere surely lived a life of joy with you,
All is recall’d as we flit by each other, fluid, affectionate, chaste, matured,
You grew up with me, were a boy with me, or a girl with me, 5
I ate with you, and slept with you—your body has become not yours only, nor l More...
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(2 people liked it)
Mar 21, 2009
Lindsay
rated it:
This is my new Bible. I can't imagine a spiritual text that better encompasses the joy of existence. I know its roots are in Eastern philosophies and Buddhist teachings, which is fine by me, but it also incorporates those philosophies with the Western experience and introduces an organic and concrete aspect that makes the whole doctrine beautiful and warm and fragrant and REAL. Whitman, you are my hero!
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(4 people liked it)
Jun 05, 2007
Bryan (Beej)
rated it:
"Song of Myself" is a work of pure genius comparable to Shakespeare's greatest. I love these last three stanzas especially. When my wife and I were dating long distance and when I was deployed, I would end alot of my letters with "I stop somewhere waiting for you."
I bequeath myself to the dirt to grow from the grass I love.
If you want me again look for me under your bootsoles.
You will hardly know who I am or what I mean,
But I shall be goo More...
I bequeath myself to the dirt to grow from the grass I love.
If you want me again look for me under your bootsoles.
You will hardly know who I am or what I mean,
But I shall be goo More...
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(4 people liked it)
Dec 16, 2009
Nils
rated it:
Almost impossible to imagine how this pansexual poem made its way into the hearths and hearts of American critics and readers. The 1855 original version is more impressionistic than later versions. All feature Whitman's aeronautical lists of places and people from all over America. The poem's first word is "I." Its last is "you." The quest is to bridge that gap. A quintessential transcendental poem of the sort that Emerson imagined and was lucky enough to witness if not
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Apr 13, 2008
Claudia
rated it:
I read this for several reasons: my American literature background is pathetic; I bought this book (the 1855, self-published edition) in DC at a Whitman exhibit, and a book I recently finished, "Self Storage," had the main character quoting Whitman. Come to find out, her pivotal decision is greatly informed by knowing and loving Whitman! So glad I did finally read it. I was drawn to two contradictory thougths as I read: the amazing strength and passion of the poetry, and the secret des
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(1 person liked it)
Dec 08, 2008
Mark
rated it:
Yesterday's Washington Post book section featured a review of yet another Walt Whitman biography (the reviewer notes the yet-anotherness of any such effort and maintains that this author has found a fresh perspective).
In reading the review, it dawned on me that it had been years since I read Leaves of Grass, so before I went to bed I picked up my Bantam Classic paperback edition from the '80s to see what I might be able to recall or find anew (Whitman scholars and the otherwise detai More...
In reading the review, it dawned on me that it had been years since I read Leaves of Grass, so before I went to bed I picked up my Bantam Classic paperback edition from the '80s to see what I might be able to recall or find anew (Whitman scholars and the otherwise detai More...
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(2 people liked it)
Dec 01, 2008
Antonio
rated it:
The best poetry I've ever read. Difficult to describe or analyze, but Walt was a mystic best understood intuitively. The sheer power of the words alone might be enough to just read and forget trying to understand. Walt's command of the English language and the way he blends words together is inexplicable. Going to the index and reading the first lines of the poems is an experience in and of itself. I imagine that if Beethoven expressed himself verbally, this would be how it would sound.
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Jan 22, 2012
Max
rated it:
Leaves of Grass is a compilation of poems by Walt Whitman. The best poem is by far the most famous one, Song of Myself. I first found out about Leaves of Grass from John Green's Paper Towns; a year later the poem Song of myself was mentioned in a YouTube movie, "Life in a Day" (which is one of the greatest compilations of everyday life from around the world I know of). Song of Myself contains some of favorite literary quotes such as "Have you reckoned a thousand acres much? Have y
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Dec 07, 2011
Tamara
rated it:
Oh, everyone please read this poetry in your lifetime. I come back to it again and again... it's rich and authentic and deeply American at its heart, but its messages are universal.
I'll share a piece:
from "Sea-Drift"
"Out of the Cradle Endlessly Rocking"
Out of the cradle endlessly rocking,
out of the mockingbird's throat, the musical shuttle
Out of the ninth-month midnight,
over the sterile sands and the fields be More...
I'll share a piece:
from "Sea-Drift"
"Out of the Cradle Endlessly Rocking"
Out of the cradle endlessly rocking,
out of the mockingbird's throat, the musical shuttle
Out of the ninth-month midnight,
over the sterile sands and the fields be More...
Aug 09, 2011
Regina
rated it:
Due to three different college classes, Whitman has been required reading on my desk for months. Thus, I took this excellent opportunity to try to finally spend some quality time with the man. I have spent the better part of a few months revisiting Whitman, sitting with his poetry for hours, trying to understand his universal appeal. I can can almost sympathize why people like him so much, he has very pretty words, I can see there's something to it, oh wait, I can almost understand a More...
Aug 09, 2011
Constance
rated it:
Due to three different college classes, Whitman has been required reading on my desk for months. Thus, I took this excellent opportunity to try to finally spend some quality time with the man. I have spent the better part of a few months revisiting Whitman, sitting with his poetry for hours, trying to understand his universal appeal. I can can almost sympathize why people like him so much, he has very pretty words, I can see there's something to it, oh wait, I can almost understand a More...
May 03, 2011
When I decided to read Whitman, I asked a friend who's a specialist on 19th Cen. American Lit. He told me that between the 1855 and the so-called Deathbed editions, the 1855 is a better place to start: though shorter, the poems of the 1855 edition are fresher, purer, bolder (Whitman toned down some of it as he went along), and also because the 1855 edition contains Whitman's important Preface.
He thinks the best general edition of Whitman is this one, which has both the 1855 and the More...
He thinks the best general edition of Whitman is this one, which has both the 1855 and the More...
Apr 15, 2011
Charles
rated it:
OK, I feel a bit like I've wiped myself on the Gettysburg Address or something because "Leaves of Grass" is such an American classic, almost universally praised it seems, and yet I just don't like it. I don't think it works well as poetry in most cases. I had a horrible time finding a sense of rhythm in much of any of it. Quiet often the poems seem to be mostly lists of things. For example:
"Land of coal and iron! land of gold! land of cotton, sugar, rice! Land of More...
"Land of coal and iron! land of gold! land of cotton, sugar, rice! Land of More...
Mar 16, 2011
Sarah
rated it:
A review for Leaves of Grass? Hmm...
Due to three different college classes, Whitman has been required reading on my desk for months. Thus, I took this excellent opportunity to try to finally spend some quality time with the man. I have spent the better part of a few months revisiting Whitman, sitting with his poetry for hours, trying to understand his universal appeal. I can can almost sympathize why people like him so much, he has very pretty words, I can see there's something to it, More...
Due to three different college classes, Whitman has been required reading on my desk for months. Thus, I took this excellent opportunity to try to finally spend some quality time with the man. I have spent the better part of a few months revisiting Whitman, sitting with his poetry for hours, trying to understand his universal appeal. I can can almost sympathize why people like him so much, he has very pretty words, I can see there's something to it, More...
Jul 06, 2010
Andrea
rated it:
Holy crap! It's a huge book, very intimidating when you first pick it up - mostly because you know the vast majority of it is poetry and it's something everyone should have read before you got to it. I kind of forgot I had it for a while, which took the shine off my panic. It should be required reading in schools. The first edition, I wondered why he's such an ego-maniac but by the time I got to the death-bed edition I realized it's the difference between third-person storytelling and 1st.
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Feb 27, 2010
Mj
rated it:
I first bought a copy of Leaves of Grass around 1980- a 400-some page mass market paperback with tiny print that I never actually read but would pick up from time to time, promising myself that I would soon spend time reading. In usual epic fashion I dragged this out 'til
2007 when I decided that now I really, really, really would read Leaves of Grass. So of course I had to go out and buy a new copy that I would really really read, and this one was over 700 pages- even more intimidating and More...
2007 when I decided that now I really, really, really would read Leaves of Grass. So of course I had to go out and buy a new copy that I would really really read, and this one was over 700 pages- even more intimidating and More...
