In Whitman:  A Study, east coast naturalist John Burroughs presented his friend Walt Whitman as the poet of democracy, primal man, visionary of the open air, barbarian in the parlor, force of nature, prophet.  The famous literary critic Harold Bloom goes even further, placing Whitman on par with Shakespeare and describing him as “the greatest artist his nation has brought forth” and “as close to an authentic American saint as we will ever know.”  I was thus very excited recently to come across Whitman’s memoir, Speciman Days, which would give me a chance to better understand the poet’s vision.

Speciman Days is not a conventional life story but rather a series of vignettes.  What I loved the most was how Whitman described the simple experience of being outdoors, which was for him a source of health, joy, and even ecstasy, and also the standard of beauty against which he judged art and literature.  In fact, the outdoors life was in his view critical for “the whole politics, sanity, religion, and art of the New World.”  Without a direct connection to nature, he warned, American democracy would “dwindle and pale.”

Readers of this blog won’t be surprised that I sympathize with this view.  But in modern America, the outdoors life is for the most part a thing of the past:  according to recent data, the average American today spends only 7% of their time outdoors.

Should we be worried?

Continue reading “Walt Whitman’s Speciman Days” →