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American air I have breathed

About This Item

  • Title: American air I have breathed
  • Date: Between 1850 and 1859
  • Creator(s): Walt Whitman
  • Whitman Archive ID: uva.00270
  • Source: Papers of Walt Whitman (MSS 3829), Clifton Waller Barrett Library of American Literature, Albert H. Small Special Collections Library, University of Virginia. Transcribed from digital images of the original. For a description of the editorial rationale behind our treatment of the manuscripts, see our statement of editorial policy.
  • Editorial note: Similarities of phrasing between this and other manuscripts that either contributed to the preface of the first edition of Leaves of Grass in 1855 or that represent Whitman's efforts to recast the preface in poetry suggest that Whitman probably created this manuscript sometime in the 1850s. See "Remembrances I plant American ground with" and "A Remembrance."
  • Notes written on manuscript: On leaf 1 recto, in unknown hand: "20"
  • Cite this page: Whitman, Walt. "American air I have breathed." The Walt Whitman Archive. Gen. ed. Matt Cohen, Ed Folsom, & Kenneth M. Price. Accessed 08 May 2025. <http://www.whitmanarchive.org>.
  • Source File: uva.00270.xml (TEI)

Key

Textual Feature Appearance
Overwritten brown with strikethrough
Added inline purple with double underline
Uncertain gray with wavy underline
Supplied from another source turquoise with brackets
Metamark green with triple underline
Long deletion gray background with top and bottom border
  [begin leaf 1 recto] 20 American air I ^have [cut away] breathed, breathe henceforth also of me, American ground that supports me, I will support 
  you also. ? Personality Echos of voices   [begin leaf 1 verso]
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