Content:
This manuscript consists of a backing sheet with two smaller manuscript scraps pasted on, which together, at one time, likely formed part of Whitman's cultural geography scrapbook. The pasted-on manuscript scraps were originally part of the notebook "women" (loc.05589), which probably dates from about 1854 to about 1860. Prose notes written on the back of the bottom paste-on (duk.00878) relate to what became section 2 of "I Sing the Body Electric," first published as the fifth poem in the 1855 edition of
Leaves of Grass
. Both manuscript scraps were probably written shortly before or early in 1855, though the notes on the backing sheet to which they have been pasted may have been written at a later date.
Content:
Prose notes that relate to "I Sing the Body Electric," first published as the fifth poem in the 1855 edition of
Leaves of Grass
. The first line of the manuscript may relate to information Whitman used to write the article "One of the Lessons Bordering Broadway: The Egyptian Museum," published in
Life Illustrated
on December 8, 1855. This manuscript is pasted to a larger document along with another scrap that includes information used in that article. Both manuscript scraps were probably written shortly before or early in 1855, though the notes on the backing sheet to which they have been pasted may have been written at a later date. The reverse side of the leaf is part of a manuscript (duk.00066) discussing the conception of time.
Content:
This manuscript is an adaptation of notes Whitman took about Egypt, almost certainly based on his reading of Sir John Gardner Wilkinson's
Manners and Customs of the Ancient Egyptians
, 3 vols. (London: John Murray, 1837). Related information about Sesostris appears on page 29 of the first volume in Wilkinson's collection, though Whitman may have been reading a different edition. Whitman used the information in his article "One of the Lessons Bordering Broadway: The Egyptian Museum," published in
Life Illustrated
on December 8, 1855. Similar descriptions of Sesostris appear in several of Whitman's other notes and manuscripts, including "Immortality was realized" (mid.00018) and "Abraham's visit to Egypt" (tex.00200) two sets of manuscript notes about Egypt that Edward Grier dates to between 1855 and 1860 (
Notebooks and Unpublished Prose Manuscripts
[New York: New York University Press, 1984], 5:1922; 6:2022); the notebook "women" (loc.05589); and the poetic rendition "Advance shapes like his shape" (tex.00028). The manuscript is pasted to a larger document along with another scrap, the reverse of which (duk.00878) features prose notes that relate to what became section 2 of "I Sing the Body Electric," first published as the fifth poem in the 1855 edition of
Leaves of Grass
. Both manuscripts were probably written shortly before or early in 1855, though the notes on the backing sheet to which they have been pasted may have been written at a later date.
Content:
This notebook, now lost, contains much draft material used in the 1855 edition of
Leaves of Grass
, in addition to a few images and phrasings that Whitman used in the second (1856) and third (1860) editions. As the folder title indicates, the notebook is currently represented by photocopied images of each page derived, apparently, from a microfilm of the original that was made in the 1930s prior to the notebook's disappearance from the collection during World War II. As Floyd Stovall has noted, the few datable references in this notebook (e.g., the fighting at Sebastopol during the Crimean War) are to events from about 1853 to late 1854, shortly before the first publication of
Leaves of Grass
. See Stovall, "Dating Whitman's Early Notebooks,"
Studies in Bibliography
24 (1971), 197–204. See also Edward Grier,
Notebooks and Unpublished Prose Manuscripts
(New York: New York University Press, 1984), 1:138–155. Surfaces 9, 10, 54, and 55 bear passages that probably contributed to the first poem of the 1855 edition, eventually titled "Song of Myself," and other material, on surfaces 26, 46, 51, 54, and 58, is clearly linked to the evolution of that poem. A passage on surface 23 is also perhaps related to its development. Surfaces 11 and 12 both have material probably used as fodder for the poem "Song of the Answerer," first published as the seventh poem in the 1855
Leaves.
A brief passage on surface 12 possibly contributed to the poem first published in 1860 as the fourth of the "Chants Democratic" and later retitled "Our Old Feuillage." Surfaces 13 and 46 contain drafts of passages used in the second poem of 1855, later titled "A Song for Occupations." Material on surfaces 24 and 47 probably also contributed to this poem. Passages on surfaces 17, 18, 40, 42, and 45 are likely early drafts toward lines used in "Poem of the Sayers of the Words of the Earth" (1856), which later became "A Song of the Rolling Earth." Surface 18 also bears writing probably related to the twelfth and final poem of the 1855
Leaves,
later titled "Faces." On surfaces 18, 24, and 51 are lines that might represent draft material toward "I Sing the Body Electric" (first published as the fifth poem of the 1855
Leaves
). Other passages, on surfaces 47 and 55, are likely related to that poem; those on surfaces 36, 37, 44, 45, and 47 are certainly related. Ideas and images written on surfaces 20 and 46 are likely related to the poem "Song of the Open Road," which first appeared as "Poem of the Road," and a passage on surface 24 may also be related. Two passages on surface 21 were used in the tenth poem of the 1855
Leaves of Grass,
later titled "There Was a Child Went Forth." Surface 22 contains writing probably used in "Sun-Down Poem" (1856), titled "Crossing Brooklyn Ferry" in later editions. Some of the writing on surface 24 might also have contributed to the development of that poem. Another passage on surface 22, as well as passages on surfaces 26, 47, and 60, are possibly related to the 1855 Preface. A different passage on surface 60 is clearly related to the Preface, and a passage on surface 45 is likely related to it. Two of the draft lines of poetry on surface 31 were used in the untitled third poem of the "Debris" cluster in the 1860 edition of
Leaves of Grass.
This poem was retitled "Leaflets" in 1867 and dropped from subsequent editions. The writing on surface 41 contributed to the 1856 "Poem of Salutation," which was eventually titled "Salut au Monde!" The jotting at the top of surface 43 is also likely connected to this poem.
