Whitman as a Poet of Nature

Extract

The life of Walt Whitman may be divided roughly into two parts. The first extends from his birth on Long Island in 1819 to that “transparent summer morning” when be and his soul lay together on the grass and the sudden revelation came with its surpassing peace and knowledge; the second embraces the rest of his life, when he lived under the “potent, felt, interior command” and set forth his propaganda to America.