Whitman was a central voice in Ken Burns's magisterial Civil War series for PBS and again for Rick Burns's PBS series on New York. In recent years his words have been inscribed in public areas with increasing frequency: on the railing above the main terminal of Reagan National Airport, in the Archives-Navy Memorial Metro Station and in the walkway of Freedom Plaza in Washington, D.C., on the railing at the Fulton Ferry Landing at the foot of the Brooklyn Bridge, at the entryway of the Monona Terrace Convention Center in Madison, Wisconsin (Frank Lloyd Wright insisted that the design should include an inscription from his favorite American poet), on a plaque at the entryway to the Willa Cather garden at my own university in Lincoln, Nebraska. Few writers continue to generate as much interest in the wider culture as the poet of Leaves of Grass. The inclusiveness of Leaves of Grass resonates especially powerfully in the United States, a country remarkable for its diverse population and for its ongoing struggle to fulfill its meaning and promise. Walt Whitman is a foundational figure in American culture. I thank University of Iowa Press for allowing me to reproduce that part of Chapter 4 dealing with John Dos Passos and Chapter 6 on Whitman at the Movies, both of which appeared earlier in volumes edited by Ed Folsom, Walt Whitman: The Centennial Essays and Whitman East and West: New Contexts for Reading Walt Whitman, respectively. I am similarly grateful to Texas Studies in Literature and Language for allowing me to reproduce, in Chapter 2, a modified version of an essay on Edith Wharton and Whitman. Their presence is everywhere in these pages.įor permission to reprint, in Chapter 1, a single paragraph from my coauthored essay published in American Literature, I am grateful both to Robert K. My wife Renée and daughters Ashley and Gillian helped in ways large and small-and also in ways that defy description. Nelson, Mary Ann O'Farrell, Venetria Patton, Vivian Pollak, Larry Reynolds, Michael Robertson, Robert Scholnick, and George Wolf. Cox, Linda Frost, Amanda Gailey, Andrew Jewell, Wendy Katz, Diana Linden, Jerome Loving, Arthur Knight, Richard Lowry, Martin Murray, Robert K. Other readers improved the book by commenting on particular sections: Brett Barney, Susan Belasco, Stephanie Browner, Matt Cohen, Jeffrey N.
I owe much to Ed Folsom, Elizabeth Gray, Ezra Greenspan, Sian Hunter, and Marilee Lindemann, each of whom read the entire manuscript and enriched it significantly. I am grateful for support of various kinds from each of these institutions. I began this book at Texas A&M University, expanded its range and altered its orientation at the College of William & Mary, and completed it at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Scene from Love and Death on Long Islandġ7. Jason Priestley in Love and Death on Long Islandġ6. Susan Sarandon and Tim Robbins in Bull Durhamġ5. Kevin Kline, Meryl Streep, and Peter MacNicol in Sophie's Choiceġ4. Claude Rains and Bette Davis in Now, Voyagerġ3. Lillian Gish rocking the cradle in Intoleranceġ1.
Eadweard Muybridge's serial photographs of a trotting horseġ0. The Trapper's Bride, by Alfred Jacob Miller, 1845ģ. The Trapper's Bride, by Alfred Jacob Miller, 1850Ģ. Passing, Fluidity, and American Identitiesġ. Xenophobia, Religious Intolerance, and Whitman's Storybook Democracy
PriceĮdith Wharton and the Problem of Whitmanian Comradeship