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Whitman Archive Title: To a Cantatrice
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Whitman Archive ID: uva.00215
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Repository: Catalog of the Walt Whitman Literary Manuscripts at the Clifton Waller Barrett Library of American Literature, Albert and Shirley Small Special Collections Library, University of Virginia
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Folder: 50-51
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Date: 1857-1859
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Genre: poetry
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Physical Description: 1 leaf, 9 x 16 cm, handwritten
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Content:
This poem was first titled "To an
artist," then "To an
architect"; the smudged-out words "Lecture[s] / To" appear in light ink
in the upper-left corner. These lines were revised and published under the title
"To a Cantatrice" in the
"Messenger Leaves" cluster
of 1860. After being ungrouped and permanently retitled "To A Certain Cantatrice" in 1867,
it was revised for inclusion in the cluster "Songs of Insurrection" in the 1872 and 1876
Leaves of Grass
. In 1881 it was
finally transferred to the cluster "Inscriptions". On one section of the same leaf of white ruled laid
paper used for "To a
Historian," and with another fragment of the same pencil draft of the
speech or essay "Slavery—the
Slaveholders—/ —The Constitution—the/ true America and Ameri-/ cans, the
laboring persons.—" on verso.
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