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- tex.ead01_tex.00004
[Among the many]; [It is not this]
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Whitman Archive Title: [Among the many]; [It is not this]
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Whitman Archive ID: tex.00004
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Repository: Catalog of the Walt Whitman Literary Manuscripts in the Walt Whitman Collection, Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center at the University of Texas at Austin
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Box: 1
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Folder: 1; 5
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Series: Works, 1846-1913 and undated
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Repository Title: Among the many aspects of thought…; It is not this business of voting…
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Date: about 1881
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Genre: poetry, prose
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Physical Description: 2 leaves, handwritten
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Content:
On one side of the leaves, Whitman explores the idea that life, with its
petty concerns, is "an exercise, a training & development" for an
afterlife. A note at the top possibly indicates that the poet considered
developing this thought in conjunction with "From Noon to Starry Night," a cluster that
first appeared in the 1881–82 edition of
Leaves of Grass
. Edward F. Grier suggests,
alternatively, that the writing is connected with
Specimen Days
(1882–83), "which is full of references to stars" (Walt
Whitman,
Notebooks and Unpublished Prose
Manuscripts,
Edward F. Grier, ed. [New York: New York
University Press, 1984], 6:2106). The writing on the reverse sides of
the leaves explores the ideal roles of authors and the general public in
shaping government and legislation. These notes are possibly related to
Democratic Vistas,
in which Whitman discusses the role of what he calls here the
literary class
in connection to democracy, as well as issues of voting and women's rights. The two leaves are housed and
described separately at the repository.
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