Leaves of Grass
Course Description
Summary
This 2-credit course is an introduction to Walt Whitman’s Leaves of Grass, which inaugurated a distinctly American free verse by breaking with European formal traditions of poetry. We will read the entire original 1855 version (a self-published volume with only twelve poems) as well as selections from some of the subsequent editions that Whitman published over his lifetime (including the 1892 “deathbed” edition, which contains 383 poems!). Alongside Leaves of Grass, we will examine writing about Whitman by his contemporaries, place this text in its larger cultural and historical context, and discuss its impact on subsequent generations of poets. This course will be a slow, thorough reading of a seminal work of American literature and may appeal to students with interest in poetry, American culture, the 19th Century, being large, containing multitudes, etc.
Students will submit reading responses, give in-class presentations, and write either a final paper tracing Whitman’s influence on a contemporary American poem or a creative final project adapting a portion of Leaves of Grass for our current historical moment.
Learning Outcomes
- Become familiar with a major work in the American poetic tradition and trace its impact on subsequent literary movements
- Learn how to close read and gain a deeper understanding of the workings of a poem by considering such elements as form, meter, image, figurative language, anaphora, etc.
- Gain a firsthand understanding of these tools through creative emulations and exercises
- Read works of literature in conversation with critical texts and through the lens of race, class, sexuality, and national identity