Analysis of Song of the Open Road. Whitman separates his poem into four separate stanzas. With the exception of the first stanza, which contains only three lines, the other stanzas contain four lines of verse. The poem utilizes free verse; the lines are unrhymed and of varying lengths.
Unscrew the locks from the doors! Unscrew the doors themselves from their jambs But it is what follows those lines that really demands our attention: Whoever degrades another degrades me, And whatever is done or said returns at last to me.
Through me many long dumb voices, Voices of the interminable generations of prisoners and slaves Whitman himself may seem as though he is rolling all of humanity into one indistinguishable ball, but in fact he is doing the opposite. As we read his poem, hold him by the hand, thrust him next to our hearts, he is urging us as human individuals to see the other human, however lowly especially the lowly as a being like ourselves — separate, but like.
It is a call we need to heed at this moment. Further reading and online references. Thomas Hardy - today Sally Minogue offers some lugubrious birthday reflections. Walt Whitman. May Whoever you are holding me now in hand And later Thrusting me beneath your clothing, Where I may feel the throbs of your heart or rest upon your hip 89 This is uncomfortable stuff. The lines which Allen Ginsberg used as the epigraph to his equally extraordinary American poem, Howl , a hundred years after the first edition of Leaves of Grass , carry the authentic iconoclastic Whitman tone: Unscrew the locks from the doors!
Jun Jan 18, AM. Hannelore books view quotes. Nov 08, PM. Nik books view quotes. Aug 19, PM. Leslie 32 books view quotes. Apr 18, PM. Linda 23 books view quotes. Sep 03, AM. Caitlin 61 books view quotes. Jul 18, PM. World of Tomes 3, books view quotes. Jun 07, PM. Apr 26, PM. Shawna 3, books view quotes. Feb 13, AM. Mostly, we lack the visionary strength to follow him there. There are volumes yet to be written about his achievement, the often misconstrued depth of his ambition for humanity.
However—in an improbable historic irony—there emerges from the shadows, come down to us by circuitous routes, a certain artifact: a recording purporting to be of Whitman himself , made by Thomas Edison. If you are interested in Whitman, probably you have already heard it, and considered the dispute among experts about whether the recording is authentic.
If you want to peruse, or enter, the dispute, it is easy to find. For me, it is much more fruitful to listen to the recording—the deliberate, overarticulated voice, the grinding sound in the background which is the recorder recording itself how appropriate to Whitman!
It sounds like a gravel-grinder in Hell. Is it Whitman? Who hears this voice hears a man. Out of the text, out of the abandonment of song, a living voice arises, transubstantiated.
How glorious to hear him, whoever he might be. A revision of the poem? Or was that all the time the wax cylinder allotted?
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