O Captain, My Captain by Robert Burleigh

Author:Robert Burleigh
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: ABRAMS, Inc. (Ignition)
Published: 2019-02-15T00:00:00+00:00

“O CAPTAIN! MY CAPTAIN!

OUR FEARFUL TRIP IS DONE,

THE SHIP HAS WEATHER’D EVERY RACK,

THE PRIZE WE SOUGHT IS WON . . .”

WALT WHITMAN

A BRIEF OVERVIEW

WALT WHITMAN, 1862. PHOTO BY MATTHEW B. BRADY. LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

Walt Whitman is considered today to be one of America’s greatest and most influential poets. His book of poetry, Leaves of Grass, is an American classic.

Born May 31, 1819, in West Hills, Long Island (near New York City), young Walt was part of a large family. His father struggled to provide for the family, and Walt was taken out of school at age 11 and sent to work.

Whitman was mostly self-educated. His various jobs during his youth and young manhood included typesetting, teaching in a one-room schoolhouse, house-building, and later working as an author and journalist. He published one novel and several short stories, none of which were particularly successful. He also worked for various newspapers in New York.

Then, in a surprising turn, he began to explore and write poetry, and in 1855 published (at his own expense) the first volume of a book that would engage him for the rest of his life, Leaves of Grass. The book is marked by a confident voice, a free-verse style (that is, unrhymed), and a willingness to celebrate himself and deal with various topics that were considered controversial in his time, including women’s rights, sexuality, anti-slavery, and a kind of personal religion.

During the Civil War, Whitman offered his services as an unpaid friend-nurse to thousands of wounded soldiers in Washington hospitals. Many soldiers later wrote Whitman thank-you notes and letters for helping them, and in some cases, saving their lives, in the hospitals. One or two even named a child after him!

He also strongly identified with President Abraham Lincoln. After Lincoln’s death, Whitman wrote two of his most famous poems in mourning for the dead president. They are “O Captain! My Captain!” and “When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom’d.”

In his later years, Whitman fell ill (due in part to his strenuous work in the hospitals), but continued to write and comment on American life and politics. He also gave lectures on the life and death of Abraham Lincoln. Walt Whitman died on March 26, 1892, and is buried in Camden, New Jersey.

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