Books with title LEAVES OF GRASS

REA's MAXnotes for Walt Whitman's Leaves of Grass MAXnotes offer a fresh look at masterpieces of literature, presented in a lively and interesting fashion. Written by literary experts who currently teach the subject, MAXnotes will enhance your understanding and enjoyment of the work. MAXnotes are designed to stimulate independent thought about the literary work by raising various issues and thought-provoking ideas and questions. MAXnotes cover the essentials of what one should know about each work, including an overall summary, character lists, an explanation and discussion of the plot, the work's historical context, illustrations to convey the mood of the work, and a biography of the author. Each chapter is individually summarized and analyzed, and has study questions and answers.

Walt Whitman's Leaves of Grass is a clarion call to his country's people to join together in the "crowning growth of the United States". Its patriotic zeal made him a symbol of democracy in his country long before he achieved fame there as a poet.The intense emotion of Whitman's verse celebrates the regenerative power of nature and the immortal divinity of the human soul. His passionate beliefs are evident throughout this volume - in the radical "I Sing the Body Electric"; the patriotic "I Hear America Singing"; and the romantic "As if a Phantom Caress'd Me".This collection (the so-called "deathbed" edition of 1892) represents the culmination of Whitman's life's work and contains more than 400 poems.

First published in 1855 with Whitman’s own money, Leaves of Grass is a highly sensual collection of verses that became a monument to American poetry. The journalist, philosopher, clerk, and Civil War nurse spent the following four decades revising and expanding the work from twelve poems to a massive four-hundred-poem compilation. Celebrating nature and human sexuality with explicit imagery, his poetry was controversial but also drew high praise from the likes of Alfred Tennyson and D. H. Lawrence, who called him the “greatest modern poet.” With its sensuous and highly imaginative free-form verses, Walt Whitman’s greatest masterpiece is now available in an elegantly designed clothbound edition with an elastic closure and a new introduction.

This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work was reproduced from the original artifact, and remains as true to the original work as possible. Therefore, you will see the original copyright references, library stamps (as most of these works have been housed in our most important libraries around the world), and other notations in the work.This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work.As a reproduction of a historical artifact, this work may contain missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.

Leaves of Grass is a poetry collection by the American poet Walt Whitman (1819–1892). Though the first edition was published in 1855, Whitman spent most of his professional life writing and re-writing Leaves of Grass, revising it multiple times until his death. This resulted in vastly different editions over four decades—the first a small book of twelve poems and the last a compilation of over 400.

Leaves of Grass is a poetry collection by the American poet Walt Whitman (1819–1892). Though the first edition was published in 1855, Whitman spent most of his professional life writing and re-writing Leaves of Grass, revising it multiple times until his death. This resulted in vastly different editions over four decades—the first a small book of twelve poems and the last a compilation of over 400.

Leaves of Grass, a collection of poems written and re-published by Walt Whitman from 1855 to 1891 celebrates the triumph of America. Writing in a unique literary style, the poet depicts a land that is vast and sweeping in its grandeur, with scenes of epic proportions : majestic skies, billowing waves, fields of grain extending to the horizon. He sings of a free nation confident in the pursuit of its destiny. He captures the essence of the American spirit – proud in its accomplishments, having tamed the wilderness of the great frontier and survived a bloody civil war, confident in its newfound powers. One is apt to become spell-bound by the poems’ robust cadence, the trace of sensuality, the lofty symbols, the rich imagery, the vigorous rhyme. It seems that nature perpetually calls attention unto itself, but man ordinarily ignores it or is not sensitive enough to perceive its charms. Thus, the poet continually exhorts the onlooker to behold the beauty unfolding before his eyes. As in theatre, the poet conjures images to create moods as would suit his purpose. Whitman’s poems overflow with vivacity and energy as he writes about the pioneers of a new nation leaving the sanctuary of their homes to tame the great outdoors. In the process he is overwhelmed by the magnificence of nature as well as the great cities and industries built by man’s labor. If his medium were a film screen, Whitman would come up with glorious takes of canyons and sunsets and deserts in Cinemascope, of buffalo herds grazing the plains, interspersed with the creaking wheels of industry. When Whitman hears America singing, the songs he hears are those of vigorous workmen as they go about their daily tasks. For him, America is one vast theatre with the American common man as hero.

Influenced by Ralph Waldo Emerson and the transcendentalist movement, Walt Whitman’s groundbreaking collection of poetry broke from the meditative traditions of the symbolic, the allegorical, and the religious. Instead, Whitman celebrated the natural world—and humanity’s individual connection with it.In elevating the human mind, and daring to embrace the human body and its pleasures, Whitman, often called the father of free verse, composed one of the most influential and controversial works of American literature.Revised edition: Previously published as Leaves of Grass, this edition of Leaves of Grass (AmazonClassics Edition) includes editorial revisions.

In 1855, Walt Whitman published — at his own expense — the first edition of Leaves of Grass, a visionary volume of twelve poems. Showing the influence of a uniquely American form of mysticism known as Transcendentalism, which eschewed the general society and culture of the time, the writing is distinguished by an explosively innovative free verse style and previously unmentionable subject matter. Exalting nature, celebrating the human body, and praising the senses and sexual love, the monumental work was condemned as "immoral." Whitman continued evolving Leaves of Grass despite the controversy, growing his influential work decades after its first appearance by adding new poems with each new printing.

Leaves of Grass is a poetry collection by the American poet Walt Whitman (1819–1892). Though the first edition was published in 1855, Whitman spent most of his professional life writing and re-writing Leaves of Grass, revising it multiple times until his death. This resulted in vastly different editions over four decades—the first a small book of twelve poems and the last a compilation of over 400.

Published at the author's expense on July 4, 1855, Leaves of Grass inaugurated a new voice and style into American letters and gave expression to an optimistic, bombastic vision that took the nation as its subject. Showing the influence of a uniquely American form of mysticism known as Transcendentalism, which eschewed the general society and culture of the time, the writing is distinguished by an explosively innovative free verse style and previously unmentionable subject matter. Whitman continued evolving ‘Leaves of Grass’ despite the controversy, growing his influential work decades after its first appearance by adding new poems with each new printing.Ralph Waldo Emerson found it, "the most extraordinary piece of wit and wisdom that America has yet produced."About the Author:Before the age of thirty-six there was no sign that Walt Whitman would become even a minor literary figure, let alone the major poetic voice of an emerging America. Born in 1819 on Long Island, he was the second son of a carpenter and contractor. His formal schooling ended at age eleven, when he was apprenticed to a printer in Brooklyn. He became a journeyman printer in 1835 and spent the next two decades as a printer, free-lance writer, and editor in New York. In 1855, at his own expense, he published the twelve long poems, without titles, that make up the first edition of Leaves of Grass. The book, with its unprecedented mixture of the mystical and the earthy, was received with puzzlement or silence, except by America's most distinguished writer, Ralph Waldo Emerson. Whitman lost no time in preparing a second edition, adding ‘Crossing Brooklyn Ferry’ and nineteen other new poems in 1856. With the third edition (1860), the book had tripled in size. Whitman would go on adding to it and revising it for the rest of his life. Whitman's poetry slowly achieved a wide readership in America and in England. He was praised by Swinburne and Tennyson, and visited by Oscar Wilde. He suffered a stroke in 1873 and spent the remainder of his life in Camden, New Jersey. His final edition of Leaves of Grass appeared in 1892, the year of his death.