Do I not prove myself | Whitman Archive

Whitman Archive Title: Do I not prove myself
Whitman Archive ID: uva.00251
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
Box: 1
Folder: 88
Date: Between 1850 and 1855
Genre: poetry
Physical Description: 1 leaf, 8 x 18.5 cm, handwritten
View Images: 1 | 2
Content: Whitman probably drafted this manuscript in the early 1850s as he was composing the first (1855) edition of Leaves of Grass . In language, ideas, and structure, the manuscript most closely resembles lines 39–43 in "Debris," a poem published in the 1860 edition of Leaves of Grass . However, the ideas and some of the language are also similar to other early manuscripts that relate to the first and second poems in the 1855 edition of Leaves , ultimately titled "Song of Myself" and "A Song for Occupations" (see "Priests" [loc.00013], "I know as well as" [duk.00051], and "[Fa]bles, traditions" [duk.00261]). In his transcription of this manuscript, Richard Maurice Bucke combines it with "I ask nobody's faith" (nyp.00102), but the manuscripts do not appear to be continuous ( Notes and Fragments [London, Ontario: A. Talbot & Co., printers, 1899], 25). Poetic lines written on the back of this manuscript leaf (uva.00568) appeared in the poem eventually titled ""Song of Myself."