Walt

“ Would not Walt almost have preferred it to be so, with its humble homeliness, so instinct with humanity, rather than a neatly tidied mausoleum? If Walt had believed that a man must live in a colonial cot in a fashionable suburb in order to write great poetry he would not have been Walt. ”

“ So too was Walter, the father of Walt, and one of Jesse’s many sons.
Born in 1789—the year in which the amended Constitution of the United States actually came into force—Walter grew up into a silent giant, [21] a serious solid man, reserved and slow of speech, kindly but shrewd and obstinate; capable too, when he was roused, of passion. He was a wood-cutter and carpenter, a builder of frame-houses and barns, solid as himself. He learnt his trade in New York, and afterwards wandered from place to place in its pursuit. ”

“ Walt knew Willy wouldn't risk a sudden motion.
But Walt was wrong. As he bent down, the lever snapped in place. The saucer shuddered.
And Walt, using the focus rod for power, fuzed the control panel in an instant beyond all use. Before the other mutants could strike, his extended shielding was back around himself and the laboratory.
You're going to listen, Walt told him calmly. All of you. You're an earthling. Every one of you. You were born here of Earth parents. ”

“ On many a Saturday night Walt and his wife will sit up there, tweaking back the lace curtains that cover the windows, gazing at the crowds below like children watching a Memorial Day parade. It’s a real bit of Americana up to date.
He doesn’t acknowledge that anything but clean, good-humored pictures exist. He has never, to the best of my knowledge, sat through a single reel of the off-color, highly seasoned imports from France, Japan, and Italy that flood our screens today. By sticking to purity and fun he makes more money than ever before—and spends it as fast as it pours in. ”

“ They rush upon me, seven women laying hold of one man; and the divine efflux that thrilled all living things before the nuptials of the Saurius, overflows, surrounds, and interpenetrates their souls, and they say, Walt, why don’t you come and see us? ”

“ Dazzling and tremendous how quick the sunrise would kill me,
If I could not now and always send sunrise out of me.
We also ascend dazzling and tremendous as the sun,
We found our own my soul in the calm and cool of the daybreak.
My voice goes after what my eyes cannot reach,
With the twirl of my tongue I encompass worlds and volumes of worlds.
Speech is the twin of my vision .... it is unequal to measure itself.
It provokes me forever,
It says sarcastically, Walt, you understand enough .... why don’t you let it out then?
Come now I will not be tantalized .... ”

“ He thinks Walt is the greatest poet in the world.”
“Walter Mason?” murmured Lester. “I don't think I know his work.”
“Hasn't Walt made Oxford yet?” asked Miss Denver. “He writes the prose poems in the evening papers, syndicate stuff, you know. Printed to look like prose, just the opposite of the free-verse gag.” She smiled reminiscently, and quoted:
When I am as dry as a fish up a tree, then I to the hydrant repair, and fill myself up, without ticket or fee, with the water that's eddying there. I drink all I want—half a gallon or more—and then I lie down on my couch ”

“ Rhos were numbskulls, dwelling in an amplified smoking-room, Walt must admit; their control of the Eleven and of the Glee Club was nothing. And now his future was black with philology prizes, with meals at which stew was a staple, and where only visitors had clean napkins.
The two fellows had by this time reached the trotting stables. They looked in at the beautiful, sleek racers, carefully blanketed and booted, and stroked an inquisitive nose or two, reached out over the white doors. ”

“ He was swinging his arms and shouting, but the noise of the falling box had already frightened the bear away.
Walt stood in the moonlight, smiling foolishly.
"I guess I came too late," he said.
"I'm quite sure the bear would have left of its own accord, Walt. They're always quite tame in the national parks, you know." As soon as she said it, she knew it was a mistake. Even though he had done nothing, it would have cost her little to thank him. The words had come instinctively; she hadn't thought how her answer would affect him. Walt turned on his heel stiffly and walked back to his tent. ”

“ Walter was starting off again, with a sort of blind purpose to find Ramon, collar him, and make him disgorge his ill-gotten gains on the spot, when Bill held him back. "Tut, tut, Walt," he expostulated, "if the lubber sees you before we're good and ready to nab him, won't he be off in a jiffy? Now we know he's here, ain't that something? So much for so much. Lay low and keep shady, is our best holt." ”

“ When is this thing going to cook?"
"Directly."
"What are we waiting for?"
"Walt."
"I'm ready," came Walt's voice through the speaker.
"About time, slowpoke."
"Really, it was not his fault," objected Wes. "I wanted to check the scanner-synchronization."
"He's precious," chortled Arden in Don's ear. "He wouldn't think of letting Walt, the big bum, take the blame for anything that wasn't Walt's fault."
"That's a good line," grinned Don. "Walt's faults. After we set this thing aside as a finished project, we'll set that 'Walt's Faults' to music. Ready, Walt?" ”

“ Even as a lad, Walt discovered those provinces of the world of romance which lie across the footlights, and in the dazzling pages of the Arabian Nights; [42] and, as a youth, he followed the wizard of Waverley through all his stories and poems, becoming, soon after Sir Walter’s death, the happy possessor of Lockhart’s complete edition, in a solid octavo volume of 1,000 pages. From this time forward he was an insatiable novel-reader, especially devoted to Fenimore Cooper, who was then delighting the younger generation with stories of pioneer life. ”

“ Her letters to Walt, which were published recently by Thomas Harned, are among the most searchingly beautiful expressions of human attachment. After Whitman's paralytic stroke Anne Gilchrist insisted on coming from London to Philadelphia to be near the poet and help him in any way she could; and to this little house on Twenty-second street Walt used to go day after day to take tea with her and her children. Walt had tried earnestly to dissuade her from coming to America, and his few letters to her seem a curiously enigmatic reply to her devotion. ”

“ This passage the American translator has rendered as follows [11] :—
"It was sad and bitter to Walt to bid farewell to the poor pleasure-loving bird, who would have left him both feathers and golden eggs. Heering lighted both him and the witnesses down the stair. ' I will swear,' he said, 'he does not survive the night; there are many curious indications; but if he really gets over the night, I will hang out my handkerchief from the tower early in the morning.' Shuddering with cold, they descended the long ladder through the empty dark descent in which there was nothing but steps. ”

“ To go on about Whitman and suggest that Walt was a great human comrade who at a time when there were no "legs" and no "spades" spoken of in the world believed in men and women recognizing the glory of sex and helping each other; believed in something divine inside of each that works its way through, no matter how low we sink; believed that we must struggle and overcome, yet be honest while conquering, sincere about life while controlled with it, that would be to receive the casual answer, "Say, that's some little Walt. ”

“ Walt was always an incurable giver of gifts, and these, one may be sure, never weakened the manly independence of their recipients. His admiration for generous men of wealth, like George Peabody, has found a place in Leaves of Grass. ”

“ Of an earlier date, and more sentimental than comic in the character of its humour, is the unfinished novel entitled the "Flegeljahre," or lubber years, of which, under the title of "Walt und Vult," the names of the two heroes of the tale, the American editor of the Life of Jean Paul has just published a translation. The story itself, strange, as all our author's stories are, is a kind of mythic representation of the two sides of his own poetic genius; one of the twin brothers, Walt, being a dreamy sentimentalist, the other, Vult, a man of the world, full of practical sense and humour. ”

“ His father was some sixty years of age and failing in health, and for lack of anything more suited to his state of mind, Walt joined him, taking up his business and becoming a master carpenter, building small frame-houses in Brooklyn and selling them upon completion as his father had been doing these thirty years. ”

“ His father was a carpenter. After the family removed to Brooklyn Walt became apprenticed to a newspaper, and at 12 began to write bits of verse, some of which were published in the New York Mirror. He made a series of long tramping tours through the country, returning finally to newspaper work in Brooklyn. He became known to the public as a poet through his “Leaves of Grass,” published in 1885. ”

“ There are many interesting considerations to be drawn from the two volumes of Walt's writings for the Eagle, which were collected (under the odd title "The Gathering of the Forces") by Cleveland Rodgers and John Black. We have always been struck by the complacent naïveté of Walt's judgments on literature (written, perhaps, when he was in a hurry to go swimming down at the foot of Fulton Street) . Such remarks as the following make us ponder a little sadly. Walt wrote:
We are no admirer of such characters as Doctor Johnson. ”

“ I, Walt, I call to you! I am all on deck. Come and loafe with me! Let me take you around by your elbow and show you things.
You listen to my ophicleide!
Home!
Home I celebrate. I elevate my fog-whistle, inspired by the thought of home.
Come in! take a front seat. All you have to pay me is to take in my romanza.
* * * * *
Part of a long parody, which appeared in Scribner’s Monthly. May, 1881.
This is a Poem.
I am the Poet of progress:
I sing the athletic life of the great University, the triumphs of the river, the apotheosis of muscle. ”

“ He points to a large bag lying near, with its contents half poured out—a varied collection of articles of bijouterie and virtu, resembling a cornucopia; spilling its fruits. Hamersley recognises them as part of the penates of his late host.
“Stolen goods,” continues Walt, “that’s what they air. An’ stole from a master he’s basely betrayed, may be to death. ”

“ Walt had gone back to school teaching at Babylon. [65] He continued this work for two years more, wandering from place to place, now at the Jamaica Academy, now at Woodbury, now at Whitestone. He was, at this time, a keen debater and politician, an Abolitionist, a Washingtonian teetotaler, and ardently opposed to capital punishment. ”

“ He would often come into the wards carrying wild flowers newly picked, and strewing them over the beds, like a herald of the summer. Well did he know that they were messengers of life to the sick, words to them from the Earth-mother of men.
Whatever he might be in the literary world of Washington or New York, here Whitman was nothing but Walt the comrade of soldiers. And for himself, he said in later years, that the supreme loves of his life had been for his mother and for the wounded. [385] It is a saying worthy of remembrance, for it indicates the man. ”

“ I began young, you see," with another of her mirthless laughs. "But," sitting upright and speaking emphatically, her frail figure dilating with pride, "nobody needn't make any mistake about one thing. Walt would marry me like a shot, just like a shot, if he could. Oh, the law's an awful stupid thing. It makes me tired." Her head drooped. "Say," with sudden animation, "I tell you what. You want to see Angel. Wa—a—lt! say, Walt!" as he answered the summons, "tell one of those Chinamen to chase Angel in here. I want the lady to see her." Then to Frances. "Are you going to have Sunday school? ”

“ But he believ' d always in the universal church, in the soul of man, invisibly rapt, ever-waiting, ever-responding to universal truths.—He was fond of pithy proverbs. He said, "It matters not where you live, but how you live." He said once to my father, "They talk of the devil—I tell thee, Walter, there is no worse devil than man." ”

“ The wintry days at the junction of the years went by in suffering and patience. Walt was affectionately grateful for the intimate services of his nurse and of Horace Traubel; writing of the latter as “unspeakably faithful”. [766] Though he was generally calm he was longing for death. He had dreadful hiccoughs, and grew colder and more emaciated. The suffering had become terrible, and the anticipation of its long continuance brought fear for the first time to his strong heart.
HORACE TRAUBEL AT FORTY-FIVE
In mid-January, however, he rallied. ”

“ Whatever they want I give; though it be something else, they shall have it.
Drunkard, leper, Tammanyite, small-pox and cholera patient, shoddy and codfish millionnaire,
And the beautiful young men, and the beautiful young women, all the same,
Crowding, hundreds of thousands, cosmical multitudes,
Buss me and hang on my hips and lean up to my shoulders,
Everywhere listening to my yawp and glad whenever they hear it;
Everywhere saying, say it, Walt, we believe it:
Everywhere, everywhere.
Bayard Taylor. IMITATION OF WALT WHITMAN
WHO am I? ”

“ There is no indication in Whitman’s writings that he was ever swept off his feet by this fierce tide of adventure. Anyone who has felt such a current setting in among the fluid populations of the West is not likely to underestimate its power. Even in the more staid and sober East the excitement must have been intense: and it is, at the first thought, surprising that Walt, who was still full of youth and strength and ambition, should have remained at home. ”