Song of Myself

Special preview note: I have to say these reviews confuse me because I see nothing about Stephen Mitchell in the book I hold in my hands. I don't know where the reference comes from at all, so I am going to write as if I don't know what the reviewers are using as a reference to Mitchell... and now I see, those reviewers were reading an entirely different version of the book - so if you are interested in the Dover edition, my review stands. If you are looking at the Shambala edition, what I say still stands, for the most part... except I haven't read the Mitchell edits and now I understand some of the disdain! And it makes me VERY curious, would like to read both versions side-by-side.) From the preface: This dover edition, first published in 2001, is a unabridged republication from the first 1855 edition of "Leaves of Grass." I sat here, today, re-reading some of the sections I had highlighted from my first read of this epic-length-poem. I wondered, "What would the world be like if each of us took the time to write a 'Song of Myself' according to our own witness of the world we live within? Walt Whitman does exactly that in this poem - he doesn't seek to be understood, he doesn't seek to please the reader, he is simply being present to his world and then capture his meandering path into words and serve it onto the page. Then it is up to us, as the readers, to take our spoon-fuls of Whitman and savor each one. There is much to be learned, experienced, enjoyed, discovered in these words within this very slim volume. Savor each one and consider writing your own song. Now I am off to begin mine.

I always have this book in my travel bag. Hiking the John Muir trail - perfect. A cafe in Budapest - perfect. The Shinkansen train in Japan - perfect. A hammock in Costa Rica - perfect. It's tiny, beautiful, and invigorating - it reminds me of why I/we live. It's learned and raw and revealing and divine; it articulates the sorrow and glory of being human. In my opinion, like the Bible, it is a book everyone should read once. Mitchell did take some liberties by collating different versions of Whitman's work, but keep in mind that Walt re-wrote this poem time and time again. I have read probably a dozen versions of this peom and this is no less valuable than any of the others. Mitchell has fine taste and all the words are Walt's, and Mitchell adequately explains his reasoning in the preface. So, in contrast to what some of the other reviewers have written: If you're going to read this poem only once, Mitchell has presented a great version here.

Walt Whitman may have recorded one short poem on an Edison cylinder before his death in 1892. This recording presents Orson Welles reciting significant passages from the long poem "Song of Myself." In an earlier version, the poem announced Whitman's emergence as a poet--offering, in the body of the poem, the first announcement of the name of the maker of this new, fertile book. The performance is an interesting auxilliary to a reading of the poem. Sections 1, 2, 3, 6, 7, 10, 14, 15, 21, 24, 26, 27, 28, 31, (33), 46, 48, 51, and 52 are presented. Those who find Welles' voice pleasing will enjoy the performance for certain. It raises some of the familiar questions of melodrama etc. common when actors record poetry. Still, without a significant "authorial" performance to prefer, this is quite wonderful to hear. Like the poetry of many, Whitman's is certainly composed for reading aloud and auditing. As we have largely lost this tradition (outside of the poetry slam), Orson Welles provides a useful instance of what it means to "sound" the text.

Reading Walt Whitman's "Song of Myself," he seems to have lived a thousand years and not yet lost his innocence. The "Song of Myself" reads as a inventory of the earth's "plenty," or as a benevolent God might observe his people. Whitman is a celebrant of all things earthy and American. I believe he is correct when he says, "These are really the thoughts of all men in all ages and lands, they are not original with me," (354) but Whitman is certainly the first to collect all of these thoughts and record them so together and beautifully. He seems like an Eastern philosopher at times when he speaks of the cycles of earth. He is high on life; a little too much at times, perhaps. In victory and defeat he finds joy. His candidness about his acceptance of women and men, races and creeds, seems ahead of its time. The descriptions of the motion of life in sections 15, 31, and 33 (and many others) paints a picture of constant energy across the land and surrounding sea. He moves from line to line as he sweeps across the land, profiling the deck-hand, the paving man, the conductor, the drover, and these words are rich in images for us to imagine the era he lived in. To read this poem in our age of instant electronic connectivity, we cannot quite carry the tune as well. So many of these occupations have faded away, we have left the fields for office space.

As with so much of Stephen Mitchell's work, the most important thing is to know what it is before you buy it. It may be exactly what you want, or it may be just the opposite; there's usually not much room in between.In the present case, Mitchell has done something that some readers might consider pretty hubristic and perhaps even sacrilegious: he has produced an edited version of Walt Whitman's great "Song of Myself" that corresponds to no published version whatsoever.How? Well, he started with the original (1855) edition of the poem, and then considered _every single change_ Whitman ever made in the poem clear up to his death in 1892. If Mitchell thought the change improved the poem, he left it in; if not, not. The result, for obvious reasons, is a "Song of Myself" that Whitman himself never actually wrote.That's _not_ necessarily a bad thing. I respect Mitchell's taste and judgment, and I happen to agree with him that some of Whitman's later alterations made the poem worse. In fact I think Mitchell's edition is extremely fine.But some readers may be looking for a version of "Song of Myself" that reflects Whitman's taste and judgment rather than Mitchell's. So let the buyer be aware.At any rate I share Mitchell's high estimation of this poem and I'm happy that he's published his edition of it. Whitman belongs with Emerson and Thoreau on a shortlist of great American sages; this single poem is a large part of the reason why.