The Walt Whitman Archive
Life & Letters
Correspondence
About this Item
Title: James R. Osgood & Company to Walt Whitman, 21 March 1882
Date: March 21, 1882
Whitman Archive ID: loc.05567
Source: The Thomas Biggs Harned Collection of the Papers of Walt Whitman, 1842–1937, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C. Transcribed from digital images or a microfilm reproduction of the original item. For a description of the editorial rationale behind our treatment of the correspondence, see our statement of editorial policy.
Contributors to digital file: Stefan Schöberlein, Nima Najafi Kianfar, Eder Jaramillo, and Nicole Gray
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JAMES R. OSGOOD & CO., Publishers.
211 Tremont St.
Boston,
March 21 1882
Walt Whitman Esq
Dear Sir:
Since our letter of yesterday we have received a memorandum of the passages & lines which are recommended to be expunged. Please look it through (we enclose it in detail) and advise us at your earliest convenience whether the suggestions meet your approval. In case they do we shall then proceed to consider the mechanical difficulties in the way and how far and how easily they may be overcome.
Yours truly
James R. Osgood & Co.
D
Passages to be expurgated from Walt Whitman's "Leaves of Grass."
Page. Lines
31. 15-16 inclusive
32. 19-22 "
37. 14-15 "
48. 20, 28, 29
49. 11, 20
52. The remainder of paragraph 28 beginning at the 12th line.
59. 11, 12
66. 15-16 inclusive
79. 21-22
80. Entire passage from 14th line, ending with the line "And you Stalwart loins" on page 81.
84. 1-7 inclusive
87. 13, 28
88. "A woman waits for me" entire, on 88th and 89th pages.
Page. Lines.
90. The whole of page 90 and the first half of page 91 to line 11 inclusive.
94. The first six lines and the first half of the 7th line to the words "indecent calls" inclusive.
216. The ten lines entitled "The Dalliance of the Eagles."
266. 21, 22.
299. The seven lines entitled "To a Common Prostitute" beginning on page 299 and ending on page 300
303. 2-3 inclusive.
325. The remainder of the fourth line from the bottom beginning with the words "he with his poem."
331. 9, 10.
355. 13-17 inclusive
Notes:
1. Whitman renumbered these pages in blue pencil. [back]