Here we have a book which fairly staggers us. It sets all the ordinary rules of criticism at defiance. It is one of the strangest compounds of transcendentalism, bombast, philosophy, folly, wisdom, wit and dullness which it ever catered into the heart of man to conceive. Its author is Walter Whitman, and the book is a reproduction of the author. His name is not on the frontispiece, but his portrait, half length, is. The contents of the book form a daguerreotype of his inner being, and the title page bears a representation of its physical tabernacle. It is a poem; but it conforms to none of the rules by which poetry has ever been judged. It is not an epic nor an ode, nor a lyric; nor does its verses move with the measured pace of poetical feet - of Iambic, Trochaic or Anapaestic, nor seek the aid of Amphibrach, of dactyl or Spondee, nor of final or cesural pause, except by accident. But we had better give Walt's own conception of what a poet of the age and country should be. We quote from the preface:
"Other States indicate themselves in their deputies, but the
genius of the United States is not best or most in
executives or legislatures, nor in its ambassadors or
authors, or colleges, or churches, or parlors, nor even in
its newspapers or inventors; but always most in the common
people, their manners, speech, dress, friendship - the
friendship and candor of their physiognomy - the picturesque
looseness of their carriage - their deathless attachment to
freedom - their aversion to anything indecorous, or soft or
mean, the practical acknowledgment of the citizens of all
other States - the fierceness of their roused resentments -
their curiosity and welcome of novelty - their self-esteem
and wonderful sympathy - their susceptibility of a slight -
the air they have of persons who never knew how it felt to
stand in the presence of superiors - the fluency of their
speech - their delight in music, the sure symptom of manly
tenderness and native elegance of soul - their good temper
and open handedness -the terrible significance of their
elections - the President's taking off his hat to them, not
they to him - these too are unrhymed poetry."
But the poetry which the author contemplates must reflect the
nation as well as the people themselves.
"His spirit responds to his country's spirit; he incarnates
its geography and natural life, and rivers and lakes. Mis-
sissippi with annual freshets and changing chutes, Missouri,
and Columbia, and Ohio, and the beautiful mascu-line Hudson,
do not embouchure where they spend themselves more than they
embouchure into him. The blue breadth over the inland sea of
Virginia and Maryland, and the sea of Massachusetts and
Maine, over Manhattan Bay, and over Champlain and Erie, and
over Ontario and Huron, and Michigan and Superior, and over
the Texan, and Mexican, and Floridian and Cuban seas, and
over the seas of California and Oregon, is not tallied by
the blue breadth of the waters below more than the breadth
of above and below is tallied by him.
... "To him enter the essence of the real things, and past
and present events - of the enormous diversity of
temperature, and agriculture, and mines - the tribes of red
aborigines - the weather-beaten vessels entering new ports
or making landings on rocky coasts - the first settlement
North and South - the rapid stature and muscle - the haughty
defiance of '76, and the war, and peace, and formation of
the constitution - the union surrounded by blatherers, and
always impregnable - the perpetual coming of immigrants - the
wharf-hemmed cities and superior marine - the unsurveyed
interior - the log houses, and clearings, and wild animals,
and hunters, and trappers - the free commerce, the fishing,
and whaling, and gold digging - the endless gestation of
new States - the convening of Congress every December, the
members duly coming up from all climates and the uttermost
parts - the noble character of the young mechanics, and of
all free American workmen and workwomen - the general ardor,
and friendliness, and enterprise - the perfect equality of
the female with the male - the large amativeness - the fluid
movement of the population," &c....
"For such the expression of the American poet is to be
transcendent and new."
And the poem seems to accord with the ideas here laid down. No
drawing room poet is the author of the Leaves of Grass; he prates
not of guitar thrumming under ladies' windows, nor deals in the
extravagances of sentimentalism; no pretty conceits or polished
fancies are tacked together "like orient pearls at random
strung;" but we have the free utterance of an untramelled spirit
without the slightest regard to established models or fixed
standards of taste. His scenery presents no shaven lawns or
neatly trimmed arbors; no hot house conservatory, where delicate
exotics odorise the air and enchant the eye. If we follow the
poet we must scale unknown precipices and climb untrodden
mountains; or we boat on nameless lakes, encountering probably
rapids and waterfalls, and start wild fowls never classified by
Wilson or Audubon; or we wander among primeval forests, now
pressing the yielding surface of velvet moss, and anon caught among
thickets and brambles. He believes in the ancient philosophy that
there is no more real beauty or merit in one particle of matter
than another; he appreciates all; every thing is right that is in
its place, and everything is wrong that is not in its place. He
is guilty, not only of breaches of conventional decorum but
treats with nonchalant defiance what goes by the name of
refinement and delicacy of feeling and expression. Whatever is
natural he takes to his heart; whatever is artificial (in the
frivolous sense) he makes of no account. The following
description of himself is more truthful than many self-drawn
pictures:
"Apart from the pulling and hauling, stands what I am,
Stands amused, complacent, compassionating, idle,
unitary,
Looks down, is erect, bends an arm on an impalpable
certain rest,
Looks with its side-curved head curious, what will come
next,
Both in and out of the game, and watching and wondering
at it."
As a poetic interpretation of nature, we believe the following
is not surpassed in the range of poetry:
"A child said, What is grass! fetching it to me with full
hands;
How could I answer the child! I do not know any more than
he.
I guess it is the handkerchief of the Lord;
A scented gift and remembrancer, designedly dropped,
Bearing the owner's name someway on the corners, that
we may see, and remark, and say, Whose?
We are afforded glimpses of half-formed pictures to tease and
tantalize with their indistinctness: like a crimson cheek and
flashing eye looking on us through the leaves of an arbor -
mocking us for a moment, but vanishing before we can reach them.
Here is an example:
"Twenty-eight young men bathe by the shore;
Twenty-eight young men, and all so friendly.
Twenty-eight years of womanly life and all so
lonesome.
She owns the fine house by the rise of the bank;
She hides handsome and richly drest aft the blinds of
the window.
Which of the young men does she like the best?
Ah, the homeliest of them is beautiful to her.
Dancing and laughing along the beach came the
twenty-ninth bather;
The rest did not see her, but she saw them, &c."
Well, did the lady fall in love with the twenty-ninth bather,
or vice versa? Our author scorns to gratify such puerile
curiosity; the denouement which novel readers would expect is not
hinted at.
In his philosophy justice attains its proper dimensions:
"I play not a march for victors only: I play great
marches for conquered and slain persons.
Have you heard that it was good to gain the day?
I also say that it is good to fall - battles are lost in
the same spirit in which they are won.
I sound triumphal drums for the dead - I fling thro' my
embouchures the loudest and gayest music for them.
Vivas to those who have failed and to those whose war
vessels sank in the sea.
And to those themselves who sank into the sea.
And to all generals that lost engagements, and all
overcome heroes and the numberless unknown heroes equal
to the greatest heroes known."
The triumphs of victors had been duly celebrated, but surely a
poet was needed to sing the praises of the defeated whose cause
was righteous, and the heroes who have been trampled under the
hoofs of iniquity's onward march.
He does not pick and choose sentiments and expressions fit for general circulation - he gives a voice to whatever is, whatever we see, and hear, and think, and feel. He descends to grossness, which debars the poem from being read aloud in any mixed circle. We have said that the work defies criticism; we pronounce no judgment upon it; it is a work that will satisfy few upon a first perusal; it must be read again and again, and then it will be to many unaccountable. All who read it will agree that it is an extraordinary book, full of beauties and blemishes, such as nature is to those who have only a half formed acquaintance with her mysteries.