Walt Whitman's Song Of Myself

t Whitman was an american poet and journalist. He was born in 1819 and died in 1892. He was the second child out of eleven. Whitman grew up in Brooklyn, New York and Long Island. At the age of twelve, he began learning to be a painter and grew a passion for literature. He lost his job at the age of 17 due to a fire in New York and then decided to moved to Long Island to teach in a one room schoolhouse. He taught until 1841, to become a full-time journalist. Whitman returned back to New York, founded some newspapers, and became an editor. During his inexperienced career in literature, he worked on Leaves of Grass, which is a collection of poems divided into 12 sections.

In Leaves of Grass, is a poem called the “Song of Myself”. Whitman’s purpose of the poem was to explain “Me, Myself, and I” (Shmoop Editorial Team) in 52 stanzas. it was first published in 1855, with no title, included in his collection of poems, Leaves of Grass. There is not a way to fully summarize this poem because there is too much poem (52

In the lines above, the word “assume” can mean “believe” or “take for granted,” but it can also mean, “to take on” or “believe,” according to Shmoop Editorial team. The second meaning becoming important in the poem because Whitman tries to unite his identity with all people, including the reader. He never judges or criticizes. He is very friendly, comforting, and uplifting by the way he brings people together using words. Throughout his life, Whitman has been eager to be friends with “literally, every single person he has ever met” (Shmoop Editorial Team) and shows this in “Song of Myself”. Walt Whitman viewed “friendship as the last hope to save a fractured union” (Shmoop Editorial Team) and the fractured union meaning the United States. The poem was written a few years before the Civil War which influenced his poems in Leaves of Grass including “Song of