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Whitman Archive Title: A City Walk
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Whitman Archive ID: uva.00292
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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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Box: 1
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Folder: 49
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Date: About 1855
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Genre: poetry
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Physical Description: 1 leaf, 4.5 x 12 cm, handwritten
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Content:
A faint horizontal line beneath part of "A City Walk," along with the words'
capitalization and central position on the page, indicate that Whitman may have
contemplated using the words as the title of an independent poem. The closest he
came to this title was "City of Walks
and Joys," the name he originally assigned to "Calamus" 18 in his "Blue Book" revisions of the 1860
edition of
Leaves of Grass
. This
title was changed in the "Blue
Book" to "City of orgies,
walks and joys" and finally became "City of Orgies" in the 1867 edition. The manuscript
also suggests making a list of things seen while "crossing the ferry," an idea
later developed and published in "Sun-Down Poem" in the 1856 edition of
Leaves
. The poem was retitled "Crossing Brooklyn Ferry" in 1860.
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