Whitman and Homosexuality Essay

Frances Willard and Walt Whitman are two significant nineteenth century American figures. Although Willard and Whitman are famous for different reasons, they do have one characteristic in common: they have both been accused of being homosexuals. However, most people do not know this because it is not put in history textbooks or taught in the classroom, for good reason. Public school students should not learn about Willard and Whitman’s homosexuality through their textbooks and teachers because it does not affect the significance of what these two Americans had accomplished. Not only does it not affect their importance in United States history, but it also cannot be proven. Teaching public school students that Willard and Whitman were homosexuals would be disrespectful to the brave and inspiring acts they have made towards the history of America.

The suggestions of equality between all people are not blatant and are not abundant in “Song of Myself” but they do exist, showing that Whitman was not as neutral as most readers are led to believe. He believed in equality.

Perhaps, in the following essay I put a quart into a pint pot, because I intend to puzzle out, or rather, find and give a deeper insight into Walt Whitman's sexuality that is still a question on agenda. There are readers and critics who state that it is a shame to humble his poetry to this level, but I think that he was homosexual in his era the topic cannot be left untouched, because therefore this factor was very influential on his everyday life, thinking and hence on his poetry, too.

As a forerunner to the free-love movement, late eighteenth century poet, engraver, and artist, William Blake (1757-1827), has clear sexual overtones in many of his poems, and he layers his work with sexual double entendres and symbolism. Within the discussion of sexuality in his work Songs of Innocence and of Experience, Blake seems to take a complicated view of women. His speakers use constructs of contraries, specifically innocence/ experience and male/female. Of the latter sex, he experiments with the passive (dependent, docile, virtuous) and active (independent, evil, a threat to the masculine) female subjects. Blake’s use of personification specifically of nature and botany suggest the use of nature to discuss human society. In Songs

"WHITMAN WAS MORE MAN THAN YOU'LL EVER BE," said a student of Louisiana State University. When asked questions of your sexual preference or thoughts on the issue of sex, I would venture to say it makes most people uncomfortable. This is an age-old topic that people know about, yet do not want to talk about. He was particularly reticent about his issues regarding sex and his particular sexual preference. In fact, of Whitman's struggles the most difficult for him to deal with was his ever so strong homosexual desires (Hubbell 283). Whether homosexuality is right or wrong is not for me to decide. Though I feel it should not be used so explicitly in works of

Clifton also wrote Adam Thinking and I believe Whitman as one of the greats poet would agree with this poem because his faithfulness of humans and as believer of Adam and Eve. Especially this poem is talking about Adam himself asking for partner in life saying that “to reconnect the rib and clay and to be whole again” (Clifton) we see Adam asking god to make out of his rib an other human to fulfill his sexual desire. We also sense the lost of direction because Adam has not named yet by god. Going back to Whitman automatically after reading this poem by the title I remembered Children of Adam by Whitman. Particularly in A Woman Waits For Me in Leaves of Grass shows us the sexual desire of man by saying “A WOMAN waiting for me, she contains all, nothing yet all were lacking if sex were lacking, or if the moisture of the right man were lacking ” (Whitman, 258) this poem is talking about the important of sex and that without female and male in this earth life would not last forever. Therefore, Whitman promotes “sex” because it to help us as human kind not only to be partner, but also to have children to carry on your last name. Overall, to live happily and joyfully in this earth with another human, basically to complete one

Michael Conlin, professor at the University of Wisconsin, stated, "But Whitman was, in the 1850s, consumed by the coming of the Civil War. It was in the midst of the crisis that Whitman wrote some of the most egalitarian and profound verse relating to African Americans." Being born into a lifestyle where he was taught to take full advantage of white privilege and to show nothing more but hatred towards blacks can explain why he was often between mind and matter when expressing himself. The Civil War caused dismay for many whites because they believed that blacks would make life in the North chaotic. Post Civil War drew in even more worry and tension between black and white men. As humans we all want feel accepted by our peers and sometimes worrying about validation from them drifts us away from our own self beliefs. That may have happened to Walt Whitman as well. Deep down he knew that even a scientific theory could not come to the conclusion that integrity, wisdom, and lack of humane quality was based on race. With that thinking, his works provided and showed how e really felt about African Americans. This dismay could have caused him to be called a "nigger lover" by his peers. His thoughts being diminished based on how his peers felt about him may have been what caused him to take advantage of his white privilege and turn the blind eye towards blacks, the ones he once adored and stuck up for. Later on he discovered that that did not solve any problems because he was also confused on how he actually felt himself. That caused his later works to be bright line in which he was helping both races see the sides of their own madness, he too was expressing how he had connected both with the white and the black man. However, some people

Loneliness was an important characteristic of both poet's lives during the writing years. Whitman, whose sexuality has been questioned, was never one for social interaction. Much of his time was spent

Paragraph 9:Whitman sexuality was judged rather he was homosexual or bisexual people that because of the way he wrote on his poems most of his poems were depicts love and sexuality in a more earthy individualistic way. Though Leaves of Grass was often labeled pornographic or obscene.

Walt Whitman is considered one of the most important writers in the history of American Literature. The people of his own time called him a radical, a madman, and a pornographer. These days he is greatly appreciated and entitled as a fearless prophet of a new stage of human development. Sometimes Whitman would be in a slump and he felt that he needed to deflect the people who inquired too directly. This even meant using examples of homosexual elements in his work, as well as unbelievable stories of him having affairs with numerous women and fathering many children, unknown to him. Throughout these sorts of times W. Whitman has gone through both resentment and flattery, nevertheless showing us

After the Civil War, Walt Whitman realized that the American people were in need of their own identity. Therefore, he wrote the book “Leaves of Grass” with the goal of creating a literature piece that was authentic and organic to the United States in every sense. Whitman introduced to literature the idea of the “American Dream” and highlighted how important it was for the American people to develop their own identity. Consequently, he rejected the European writing styles and adapted the use of free-verses to his writing, making it a popular writing style in American poetry. Whitman valued of humanity, nature and spirituality. Therefore, he joined the Transcendental literary movement and

In 1855 when the first edition of Leaves of Grass was published, the first Women’s Convention had already taken place in Seneca Falls. According to Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass is a women’s book. In the epigraph of Sherry Ceniza’s Walt Whitman and 19th-century women reformers she quotes him having said “Leaves of Grass I essentially a woman’s book: the women do it know it, but every now and then a woman shows that she knows it” (Ceniza). The implication here combined with the text in Song of Myself suggest a phenomenon that is all too common. Whitman is seen as and sees himself as a poet beyond racial and gender distinctions but like many in a position of privilege, their appropriation of the pain felt by these opposed groups serves only

Leaves of Grass is Walt Whitman’s life legacy and at the same time the most praised and condemned book of poetry. Although fearful of social scorn, there are several poems in Leaves of Grass that are more explicit in showing the homoerotic imagery, whereas there are several subtle – should I say “implicit” – images woven into the fabric of the book. It is not strange, then, that he created many different identities in order to remain safe. What Whitman faced in writing his poetry was the difficulty in describing and resonating manly and homosexual love. He was to find another voice of his, a rhetoric device, and his effort took two forms: simplified, and subverted word play.

& nbsp;Divinity, Sexuality and the Self in Whitman’s Song of Myself       Through his poetry, Whitman's "Song of Myself" makes the soul sensual and makes divine the flesh.  In Whitman's time, the dichotomy between the soul and the body had been clearly defined by centuries of Western philosophy and theology.  Today, the goodness of the soul and the badness of the flesh still remain a significant notion in contemporary thought.  Even Whitman's literary predecessor, Emerson, chose to distinctly differentiate the soul from all nature.  Whitman, however, chooses to reevaluate that relationship.

Whitman's Poem "Out of the Cradle, Endlessly Rocking," is not, at first glance, an obvious love poem. Most readers would probably consider this a tragic poem about death and love lost. In spite of the fact that the poem is about intrinsically sorrowful events, or perhaps because of it, Whitman is able to capture a very unique and poignant portrayal of love. There are three major perspectives to examine how Whitman develops the theme of love in Out of the Cradle, and by examining each reoccurring theme in the poem separately, we can come to a more complete understanding of how they work together to communicate Whitman's message about love.