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Whitman Archive Title: poet of Materialism
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Whitman Archive ID: duk.00104
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Repository ID: MS q 44
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Repository: Catalog of the Walt Whitman Literary Manuscripts in the Trent Collection of Whitmaniana, Duke University, Durham, North Carolina
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Date: 1855 or earlier
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Genre: poetry, prose
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Physical Description: 1 leaf, handwritten
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Content:
Manuscript expressing a belief in the continuing "amelioration" of the earth
and humankind, written on a scrap of wallpaper. Although it is cast in
prose, this may be an early draft of a group of lines, expressing
similar thoughts, in "Great Are
the Myths," which was first published as the final, untitled,
poem of the 1855 edition of
Leaves
of Grass
. It also bears some resemblance to lines that appeared in the first poem in that edition, eventually titled "Song of Myself." Whitman continued to revise the poem in later editions of
Leaves of Grass.
In the 1881–1882 edition, Whitman removed "Great Are the Myths" from
Leaves
of Grass
altogether, except for four lines, which he titled "Youth, Day, Old Age, and
Night."
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