Walt Whitman's Drum-Taps
F.
"Drum-Taps."
New York Saturday Press,
27 January 1866, p. 3.
Few persons, we imagine, have read the much over-praised, as well as
greatly underrated writings of Walt Whitman, without a conviction
that their author is a genuine poet, although they may not agree
with his more enthusiastic critics in ranking him above all of the
moderns, and finding his true place beside Isaiah, Ezekiel and Job. It
is impossible to sympathize heartily with the greatest thoughts that
have found utterance in literature, and not to admire; him. The two
ideas which have him in their possession, - the omnipresence of; the
soul, and the sacredness of the individual - lie at the roots of poetry
and civilization; and he chants them with an invincible faith, which is,
of itself,
sufficient to place him on a plane beyond that of the poets who believe
in art as a finality.
But to be a Pantheist and a Democrat, does not constitute a claim sufficient
to entitle any man to the distinction of being a great poet; and Walt Whitman
has no other, save a picturesqueness of phrase unsurpassed in literature,
and a powerful rhythm, whose long musical roll is like that of the
waves of the sea. For he is not a man of ideas. What is called his
sanity, his tenacious grasp on realities, is, after all, the monomania
of a man whom a great thought has robbed of his self-possession. The unity
of the soul is a key that unlocks all doors, but Walt Whitman stopped at
the first one to which he applied it. He celebrates the divinity of matter,
and worships the shells of things with such fervor that he almost persuades
us that there is no substance behind them. It is a dangerous error. The
sphinx, Matter, stands in her terrible beauty before every soul, and no
answer to her riddle is more fatal than this. Whisper to her that she is
divine, and her smiling lips open surely for your destruction. The idea
which led Oriental thinkers to the life of contemplation, and which gives
Emerson a serenity like that of the unclouded summer sky, leads this poet
to materialism. His songs, though beautiful and inspiring, smack too strongly
of the earth. His suggestions are sometimes vast, but himself is
chaotic and fragmentary. The truth is that the two ideas which find expression
through him are antagonistic. Because the soul is one and all mighty,
the individual is nothing. "I want no masses at all," says Emerson; but
in Whitman the passion for individuals is so strong that it continually
wrestles
with and overthrows his belief in the universal. Democracy is a good thought
to found a state upon, but it is not the profoundest basis for a poem.
Jefferson may claim that "all men are born free and equal," and Whitman
may "accept nothing which all cannot have the counterpart of on the same
terms;" but the soul, which does not divide itself impartially through
the whole universe, but incarnates itself wholly in each atom, is an aristocrat
- does not whiffle about rights and duties - claims all and will not be
hindered of its own. Mr. Gradgrind's facts, Walt Whitman's patriotism,
the vilest man, the purest saint, are equally sacred, and equally valueless,
for they are the stepping- stones only, to the unattainable beyond. Let
any man assume the attitude of adoration, no matter how fair the shrine,
and his shell instantly hardens around him. And porous as this poet thinks
himself to all the influences of the universe, he is prostrated, deaf,
dumb and blind, before an idol from which the god has departed.
And yet, as Thoreau said, he suggests at times something more than
human. In his latest volume there are a few passages which contain the
very essence of poetry, and are inexpressibly pathetic, moreover, with
the yearning humanity that breathes through them. Setting aside his war
chants, which are remarkable for nothing but the startling vividness
of their pictures, there are certain poems which make one doubt the correctness
of the impression made by the whole man. Such, for instance, are the invocation
to Death in the poem called "When last in the dooryard the lilacs bloomed
[sic]," "Chanting the Square Deific," and "As I lay with my head
in your lap." If his faith in the unseen were more of a prophetic fury,
and less a premeditated and coolly considered belief; if he clung closer
to realities and less tenaciously to appearances, he would be the greatest
poet of our day. But he hesitates, as he says, with a rare self-appreciation,
at the first step in his progress. He shuts himself from hearty sympathy
on all sides. His music, his picturesque force avail him little with the
poets, while he so persistently produces poetical effects outside of the
accepted rules of their art; and his vast ideas fail of half their force
to those who, believing in them as faithfully as he, feel that his application
of them is limited and material.
Return to Drum-Taps Review
Index