Walt Whitman
And His Web of Influence
Walt Whitman’s Web of Influence
Walt Whitman’s work has farreaching influences across
literature, politics, society and
art.
The Life and Times of
Walt Whitman
People influenced by Walt
Whitman
Art/Movies/Music influenced
by
Walt Whitman
Walt Whitman… growing up
• Born in Long Island, New York in 1819
• He and his family of 11 moved to Brooklyn
• Only went to school for six years before he
started an apprenticeship with a printer. He
was basically self-educated
• After 2 years of his apprenticeship he moved
to New York City and worked in print shops
Walt Whitman… back home
• In 1835 moved back to his hometown and he
became a country school teacher
• Started and edited “The Long Islander”
• Taught in Huntington until 1841 when he
moved back to New York City
Walt Whitman… in NYC
• Whitman worked as a journalist, and as a
printer
• Made political speeches, wrote freelance
writings for popular magazines, and worked
on Martin Van Buren’s Presidential campaign
• There was a split in the Democratic Party,
which put Walt Whitman out of a job. They
didn't like that he supported the Free-Soil
party, so he lost his job editing an influential
newspaper called, “The Brooklyn Eagle”
Walt Whitman… in writing
• 1841, Whitman had his words first published.
Several short stories and two novels:
“Franklin Evans” and “The Child’s Champion”
• In 1855, Walt Whitman paid for the first
edition of Leaves of Grass to be printed. This
contained 12 long poems, without title
• Second edition contained 20 more poems,
and a letter congratulating Whitman from
Ralph Waldo Emerson. When Emerson saw
the letter in the second edition he was
surprised to see it published
Walt Whitman… in the Civil War
• 1841, Whitman had his words first published.
Several short stories and two novels:
“Franklin Evans” and “The Child’s Champion”
• Whitman cared for many wounded soldiers
during the American Civil War
• While doing this, he saw Abraham Lincoln
many times and began to admire him
• After Lincoln got assassinated Whitman wrote
two poems inspired by his grief, “O Captain!
My Captain!” and “When Lilacs Last in the
Dooryard Bloomed”
Walt Whitman… in the End
• After the Civil War Whitman worked in the
Department of the Interior. When found out
that he was the author of the “Leaves of
Green” he got fired because they were
considered 'offensive'
• When Whitman died he owned a house in
New Jersey which he was able to get because
he had published 7 different editions of
“Leaves of Green”
• He died on March 26, 1892 at the age of 73
• An excerpt from one of his poems is
inscribed on his tombstone
People Influenced by
Walt Whitman
Oscar Wilde
Bram Stoker
Richard Maurice Bucke
T.S. Eliot
Allen Ginsberg
Walt Whitman
&
T.S. Eliot
• T.S. Eliot was a poet in Britain. He was strongly influenced
by the French, but Eliot also answered Whitman’s
Revolutionary call
• Eliot was inspired by the hysteria from the fear of the cold
war. He was also influenced by the political persecutions
• Eliot saw Walt Whitman as a great patriot who was really
frustrated with America, but he also saw the love for
freedom and power from his writing, “Song of the Open
Road”
Walt Whitman
&
Bram Stoker
• Bram Stoker had an illness growing up that kept him in bed
most of his life. Because of this illness, a lot of his works
had to to with everlasting sleep and the resurrection form
the dead
• Stoker based his story “Dracula” on Walt Whitman. It is
said that Dracula is symbolic for Walt Whitman, "The
Master", and his effect on society
• Dracula the vampire at times resembles Whitman. Each has
long white hair, a heavy moustache, great height and
strength…
Walt Whitman
&
Oscar Wilde
• Oscar Wilde was one of the writers during the height of the
Victorian Era
• He wrote many short stories, plays and poems that inspired
people all around the world
• He won the Newdigate prize for one of his poems that he
wrote
• Wilde traveled across the US to give lectures to people on
aesthetics
• Walt Whitman was an influence on Wilde with his visions of
an optimistic and a self-reliant America
Walt Whitman
&
Richard Maurice
Bucke
• Bucke was friends with many people that loved
literature.
• He was impressed by Whitman’s “Leaves of Green”
• Bucke was greatly influenced by being friends with
Walt Whitman, philosophically and through his
literature
• Bucke developed a theory of human intellectual and
emotional evolution
• Also wrote and gave professional speeches and wrote a
book on all of his theories called Man's Moral Nature
• Bucke was elected into the English Literature section of
the Royal Society of Canada
Walt Whitman
&
Allan Ginsberg
• Allen Ginsberg is a poet who wrote many things including
“A Supermarket in California”
• In this there are references to Walt Whitman and Frederico
Garcia Lorca
• Ginsberg had a Jewish background, and his works were
mainly based on modernism and romanticism. He thought
that he inherited the visionary and homoerotic poetry from
Walt Whitman
• Ginsberg applied Whitman's tone and stylistic innovations
to the anti-authoritarian politics and insurgent thinking of
the post-World War II era. Ginsberg was one in a long
series of poets to pay homage to Whitman
Art/Movies/Music
Influenced By
Walt Whitman
Movie:
Dead Poet’s Society
Art:
Van Gogh’s “Starry Night”
Art:
Joseph Stella
Walt Whitman
&
“Dead Poet’s
Society”
• The movie focuses on passages from Whitman’s “Oh
Captain! My Captain” as an ongoing theme
• As quoted by main character John Keating when
describing the purpose of poetry:
But poetry, beauty, romance, love, these are what we stay
alive for. To quote from Whitman, "O me! O life!... of the
questions of these recurring; of the endless trains of the
faithless--of cities filled with the foolish; what good amid
these, O me, O life?“
Walt Whitman
&
“Starry Night”
• Van Gogh gave very little explanation or meaning
behind his famous work “Starry Night”. One theory is
that is it a visual interpretation of Walt Whitman’s
poetry
• Whitman's ”From Noon to Starry Night” was first
published in France in 1888
• Also possibly inspired by Whitman’s “Song of Myself”:
Smile O voluptuous cool-breath'd earth!
Earth of the slumbering and liquid trees!
Earth of departed sunset--earth of the mountains misty-top’t!
Earth of the vitreous pour of the full moon just tinged with blue!
Earth of shine and dark mottling the tide of the river!
Earth of the limpid gray of clouds brighter and clearer for my sake!
Walt Whitman
&
Joseph Stella
• Joseph Stella, never having met Whitman, drew
inspiration from his poetry and used it in his art works.
He had no personal relationship with Whitman, but yet
his debt to him was great
• When Stella first started out his drawings, he put
Whitman's democratic ideas in his art work. Joseph
Stella did some drawings for a magazine
• Also, Stella wanted to show the life of humans as an
undisguised and naked life, just as Whitman did