Walt Whitman

1. Walt , Whitman

Leaves of Grass

This unabridged edition of Leaves of Grass presents the original 1855 versions and limited formatting of Whitman’s most famous poems, including "Song of Myself," "I Sing the Body Electric," and "There Was a Child Went Forth."

1. Walt , Whitman

Essential Whitman

From the introduction by Galway Kinnell: The poems of Walt Whitman meant little to me when I read them in high school and college. Luckily, when I was teaching at the University of Grenoble in my late twenties, I was required to give a course on Whitman. My experience of Leaves of Grass then was intense. . . . Soon I understood that poetry could be transcendent, hymn-like, a cosmic song, and yet remain idolatrously attached to the creatures and things of our world. . . . Once again, as when I first began writing, it seemed it might be possible to say everything in poetry.

1. Walt , Whitman

Leaves of Grass

As Malcolm Cowley says in his introduction, the first edition of Leaves of Grass 'might be called the buried masterpiece of American writing', for it exhibits 'Whitman at his best, Whitman at his freshest in vision and boldest in language, Whitman transformed by a new experience.' Mr Cowley has taken the first edition from its narrow circulation among scholars, faithfully edited it, added his own introduction and Whitman's original introduction (which never appeared in any other edition during Whitman's life), and returned it to the common readership to whom the great poet really speaks.

1. Walt Whitman

Leaves of Wisdom

1. Walt , Whitman

Leaves of Grass