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The Complete Poems (Penguin Classics)
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Manufacturer: Penguin Classics
Author: Walt Whitman
Publisher: Penguin Classics
Average Customer Rating:
Our Price: $12.06
You Save: $ 5.94 ( 33% )
Usually ships in 24 hours
Manufacturer: Penguin Classics
Author: Walt Whitman
Publisher: Penguin Classics
Average Customer Rating:
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The Complete Poems (Penguin Classics) Description
Binding: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 811.3
EAN: 9780140424515
ISBN: 0140424512
Label: Penguin Classics
Manufacturer: Penguin Classics
Number Of Items: 1
Book Pages: 912
Publication Date: 2005-03-29
Publisher: Penguin Classics
Product Release Date: 2005-03-29
Studio: Penguin Classics
Dewey Decimal Number: 811.3
EAN: 9780140424515
ISBN: 0140424512
Label: Penguin Classics
Manufacturer: Penguin Classics
Number Of Items: 1
Book Pages: 912
Publication Date: 2005-03-29
Publisher: Penguin Classics
Product Release Date: 2005-03-29
Studio: Penguin Classics
Editorial Review of The Complete Poems (Penguin Classics)
In 1855 Walt Whitman published Leaves of Grass, the work that defined him as one of America’s most influential voices and that he added to throughout his life. A collection of astonishing originality and intensity, it spoke of politics, sexual emancipation, and what it meant to be an American. From the joyful “Song of Myself” and “I Sing the Body Electric” to the elegiac “When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom’d,” Whitman’s art fuses oratory, journalism, and song in a vivid celebration of humanity. Containing all Whitman’s known poetic work, this edition reprints the final, or “deathbed,” edition of Leaves of Grass (1891–92). Earlier versions of many poems are also given, including the 1855 “Song of Myself.”
Customer Reviews of The Complete Poems (Penguin Classics)
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: One of the Greats
Review: Walt Whitman is, indisputably, America's poet. He is vast, large, contradictory (Do I contradict myself?/Very well then I contradict myself/(I am large, I contain multitudes)), beautiful and loose and American to the core!
His greatest poem is, in my opinion, "Song of Myself." This is far from a controversial opinion, and for good reason; the eighty-odd page long poem is an astounding epic--albeit, an unusual one, but a monumental achievement of literature. It is Whitman as Everyman, Whitman as you, as me, as all other mortals from China to Peru. I quote his beautiful closing stanzas:
"I bequeath myself to the dirt to grow from the grass I
Love,
If you want me again look for me under your bootsoles.
You will hardly know who I am or what I mean,
But I shall be good health to you nevertheless,
And filter and fibre your blood.
Failing to fetch me at first keep encouraged,
Missing me one place search another,
I stop some where waiting for you"
Such beauty in verse, especially free verse, is scarcely found, and, when found, must be cherished. There is a reason almost all poets after him--and not just poets in the English language, either (Borges, for example, aspired to be the "Whitman of Argentina")--have been influenced by him more so than any other poet besides perhaps Shakespeare and Milton.
Nor is "Song of Myself" his only great poem, though it surely be his greatest. His elegy for Abraham Lincoln, "When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom'd" is monumental (the great critic Harold Bloom declares it Whitman's finest poem, and thus the greatest of all American poems--I dissent, but uphold its marvel nonetheless), as is almost all of his wonderful corpus of poetry. Whitman is remarkable; he is inescapable; he is beautiful. Read him, and thou shalt be infinitely rewarded.
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: The collection I always wanted
Review: I was turned on to "Uncle Walt," as my high school teacher described him, while taking American Literature, and am thankful for it. While Whitman has a unique style of writing, I am drawn to it and enjoy this book emensely. I definetely recommend this book to any Walt Whitman fan, and to those that appreciate American poetry.
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: Welcome to Whitman's World
Review: Whitman is a special poet. As you read through his poems you get the feeling that you are not reading poetry but rather going through Whitman's mind. His compulsive style both simple and meticulous, his whirling rhythym, and his proud usage of the first person, all give you a vivid glimpse of the world through his eyes and heart; the eyes of his time and the poetic heart of his thoughts. Yet even though Whitman talks to you in social vocab. you know that you are listening to a poet because ast is ineveitable to sense his power to overwhelm. Lorca described Whitman as "viejo" and "hermoso", and these descriptions are true of Whitman the poet as Whitman the man. After reading this book you'll be short of words to describe it as I appear to be. It has too much inside it. But it is beautiful because the words inside it come from a man who knew how to appreciate and merge with the antiquity and great elderiness of the world.
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: !!!EMERALD!!!
Review: not only the greatest selling poet who has been dead for more than fifty years, not only the poet whose translations are regularly read abroad, not only the poet whose name has in-spired countless others, not only the poet who freed us from the manacles of rhyme and decapitated the tyranny of meter but also a man of enthusiasm, a titan, a man whose soul floods with belch, fume and quake, a man who confronts the ravenous centaurs of humdrum and blugeons them swiftly in a spasmo of frenzy-fire, a wanderer, a searcher, one whose mind travels vig-orously throughout the cosmimosa and embellishes it with jac-inths of thought and blooms of popy! not only a man of gargan-tuan passions, one who rages in the face of metallic storm but also a man whose depressions, fogs, glooms and sensitivity to flowers, softness and the defenseless bloom in stark heart-throb. no doubt he is a poet well worth a place beside such other titano-giants such as goethe, milton and homer, for he too sings the song of war, his book is a chanson of bellum for he sings of the battle of the passions, the climaximum of the emo-ceans, he challenges the raw specters of gash, their eyes oozing of slime-drab and rather than succumb to the oxen of indiffer-ence he instead triumphs over the gray and his book thus re-sounds in shinning claria! his is an adventure of thought sur-real in its gusto, jumping in its excitica and wild in its leap of ideas! thank celestium that he liberated us poets from the ab-surd manacles of rhyme and meter and we can now surge through horiza with countless new devices, metaphors and similies awaiting in our platoons! he is the cougar of innova-tion, the lion of spasmo and the giant of vision.
kyle foley, author of Lorelei Pursued and Wrestles with God
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: A beautiful intoduction to Whitman
Review: This collection of Whitman's poetry has the ulitimate selection for any reader, whether one is experienced in the composition and analyzation of Whitman or simply reading for pleasure. The book contains every known work by the author, as well as numerous editions of poems such as "Song of Myself" which was revised and reprinted by the author several times. If one is a fan of Walt Whitman, this is an excellent source of all his poetry compact into one book. If a person is just begining to experience the poet, everyting someone would want to read is at his or her fingertips.
Review Summary: One of the Greats
Review: Walt Whitman is, indisputably, America's poet. He is vast, large, contradictory (Do I contradict myself?/Very well then I contradict myself/(I am large, I contain multitudes)), beautiful and loose and American to the core!
His greatest poem is, in my opinion, "Song of Myself." This is far from a controversial opinion, and for good reason; the eighty-odd page long poem is an astounding epic--albeit, an unusual one, but a monumental achievement of literature. It is Whitman as Everyman, Whitman as you, as me, as all other mortals from China to Peru. I quote his beautiful closing stanzas:
"I bequeath myself to the dirt to grow from the grass I
Love,
If you want me again look for me under your bootsoles.
You will hardly know who I am or what I mean,
But I shall be good health to you nevertheless,
And filter and fibre your blood.
Failing to fetch me at first keep encouraged,
Missing me one place search another,
I stop some where waiting for you"
Such beauty in verse, especially free verse, is scarcely found, and, when found, must be cherished. There is a reason almost all poets after him--and not just poets in the English language, either (Borges, for example, aspired to be the "Whitman of Argentina")--have been influenced by him more so than any other poet besides perhaps Shakespeare and Milton.
Nor is "Song of Myself" his only great poem, though it surely be his greatest. His elegy for Abraham Lincoln, "When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom'd" is monumental (the great critic Harold Bloom declares it Whitman's finest poem, and thus the greatest of all American poems--I dissent, but uphold its marvel nonetheless), as is almost all of his wonderful corpus of poetry. Whitman is remarkable; he is inescapable; he is beautiful. Read him, and thou shalt be infinitely rewarded.
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: The collection I always wanted
Review: I was turned on to "Uncle Walt," as my high school teacher described him, while taking American Literature, and am thankful for it. While Whitman has a unique style of writing, I am drawn to it and enjoy this book emensely. I definetely recommend this book to any Walt Whitman fan, and to those that appreciate American poetry.
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: Welcome to Whitman's World
Review: Whitman is a special poet. As you read through his poems you get the feeling that you are not reading poetry but rather going through Whitman's mind. His compulsive style both simple and meticulous, his whirling rhythym, and his proud usage of the first person, all give you a vivid glimpse of the world through his eyes and heart; the eyes of his time and the poetic heart of his thoughts. Yet even though Whitman talks to you in social vocab. you know that you are listening to a poet because ast is ineveitable to sense his power to overwhelm. Lorca described Whitman as "viejo" and "hermoso", and these descriptions are true of Whitman the poet as Whitman the man. After reading this book you'll be short of words to describe it as I appear to be. It has too much inside it. But it is beautiful because the words inside it come from a man who knew how to appreciate and merge with the antiquity and great elderiness of the world.
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: !!!EMERALD!!!
Review: not only the greatest selling poet who has been dead for more than fifty years, not only the poet whose translations are regularly read abroad, not only the poet whose name has in-spired countless others, not only the poet who freed us from the manacles of rhyme and decapitated the tyranny of meter but also a man of enthusiasm, a titan, a man whose soul floods with belch, fume and quake, a man who confronts the ravenous centaurs of humdrum and blugeons them swiftly in a spasmo of frenzy-fire, a wanderer, a searcher, one whose mind travels vig-orously throughout the cosmimosa and embellishes it with jac-inths of thought and blooms of popy! not only a man of gargan-tuan passions, one who rages in the face of metallic storm but also a man whose depressions, fogs, glooms and sensitivity to flowers, softness and the defenseless bloom in stark heart-throb. no doubt he is a poet well worth a place beside such other titano-giants such as goethe, milton and homer, for he too sings the song of war, his book is a chanson of bellum for he sings of the battle of the passions, the climaximum of the emo-ceans, he challenges the raw specters of gash, their eyes oozing of slime-drab and rather than succumb to the oxen of indiffer-ence he instead triumphs over the gray and his book thus re-sounds in shinning claria! his is an adventure of thought sur-real in its gusto, jumping in its excitica and wild in its leap of ideas! thank celestium that he liberated us poets from the ab-surd manacles of rhyme and meter and we can now surge through horiza with countless new devices, metaphors and similies awaiting in our platoons! he is the cougar of innova-tion, the lion of spasmo and the giant of vision.
kyle foley, author of Lorelei Pursued and Wrestles with God
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: A beautiful intoduction to Whitman
Review: This collection of Whitman's poetry has the ulitimate selection for any reader, whether one is experienced in the composition and analyzation of Whitman or simply reading for pleasure. The book contains every known work by the author, as well as numerous editions of poems such as "Song of Myself" which was revised and reprinted by the author several times. If one is a fan of Walt Whitman, this is an excellent source of all his poetry compact into one book. If a person is just begining to experience the poet, everyting someone would want to read is at his or her fingertips.