Whitman's Assumptions"Song of Myself," in Leaves of Grass, Walt Whitman

Whitman's Song of Myself is one of the most original poems in the English language, and the evidence of an impulse utterly new in the American version of English. Its greatness comes from an idea of the self that is energetic, variable in its moods, and endlessly accessible to experience. The language of the poem—from declaration to catalogue to prayer—strives to afford a correlative to such personal qualities. The proof of its success comes with the sensations of reading and rereading the poem itself.