Walt-Whitman-沃爾特·惠特曼-英美文學(xué)綜述課件

1、Walt Whitman (1819-1892)I celebrate myself, and sing myself,And what I assume you shall assume,For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you Excerpt from Song of MyselfWalt Whitman (1819-1892)I celeLifeBorn: 31 May 1819Birthplace: Long Island, New York. Died:26 March 1892LifeBorn: 31 May 181

2、9Born in a working-class family, son of a carpenterAt four, family moved to Brooklyn, New YorkAttended public school Apprenticed to a printerReturned to Long Island in 1835 and taught in country schoolsEdited a newspaper, the Long-Islander, in HuntingtonBack to New York City to work as a printer and

3、 journalistExperienced various jobsBegan writing a new kind of poetry (free verse)Born in a working-class familyWhitmans democratic ideals& individualismAmericas first “poet of democracy”Whitmans democratic ideas govern his poetry-writing. In his famous poetry, openness, freedom, and above all, indi

4、vidualism (the belief that the rights and freedom of individual people are most important) are all that concerned him. Whitman brings the hard-working farmers and laborers into American literature ,attack the slavery system and racial discrimination. Whitmans democratic ideals& iThe themes in Whitma

5、ns poetryfilled with optimistic expectation and enthusiasm about new things and new epoch.The whole hard-working people The burgeoning life of cities. The fast growth of industry and wealth in cities2. Individual valuePursuit of love and happiness Sexual love The individual person and his desires mu

6、st be respected. The themes in Whitmans poetryAmericas first “poet of democracy”Walt Whitman was an American poet, essayist, journalist, and humanist. Proclaimed the greatest of all American poets by many foreign observers a mere four years after his death. His Leaves of Grass has always been consid

7、ered a monumental work. It commands great attention because of its uniquely poetic embodiment of American democratic ideals. He is the poet of the common people and the prophet and singer of democracy.InfluenceAmericas first “poet of democInfluences the 20th century world literature: His works is pa

8、rt of western culture / many poets in France, Italy, England, and Latin America are in his debt. His poetry also influences modern American poets such as Pound, T.S. Eliot, Hart Crane, Carl Sandburg. Influences the 20th century woThe first person narrator: “I” the subject in the poem, “you” the read

9、er Invites us to participate in the process of sympathetic identification.Style: free verse Important Features in Whitmans PoemsNo fixed rhyme and schemeA looser and open-ended syntactical structure The habit of using snapshots（快照）Use of conversational image Strong tendency to use oral EnglishVocabu

10、lary- powerful, colorful, rarely-used words of foreign origin, wrong wordsSentences- different lengths, disturbed, separateThe first person narrator: “I”Rhymea rhythm of thought cadences of his feelingParallelism To repeat the idea in the lines with minor changes in wording (the line is the rhythmic

11、al unit)Phonetic recurrence Repetition of the first words and phrasesRhymeworks Leaves of Grass Songs of Myself There was a Child Went forth I hear America sining Drum Taps works Leaves of GrassLeaves of GrassWhitmans originality first in his use of the poetic form free verse (i.e. poetry without a

12、fixed beat or regular rhyme scheme)The first version of his masterpiece, Leaves of Grass, appeared in 1855.Emerson praised Whitmans poetry as “the most extraordinary piece of wit and wisdom that America has yet to contribute.”Leaves of GrassWhitmans origiLeaves of GrassWalt Whitman has devoted all h

13、is life to the creation of the “single” poem, Leaves of Grass .The work has nine editions.In this giant work, openness, freedom, and individualism are all that concerned him. His purpose is to express some new poetical feelings and to initiate a poetic tradition in which difference should be recogni

14、zed. He wanted to behave as a supreme individualist.Leaves of GrassWalt Whitman haLeaves of GrassMost of the poems in Leaves of Grass sing of the “en-masse” and the self as well. Whitman also gives emphasis to the physical dimension of the self and openly celebrates sexuality.Pursuit of love and hap

15、piness is approved of repeatedly affectionately in his lines.If two persons are really in love, “what is to us what the rest do or think?” The individual person and his desires must be respected. Obviously, Whitmans sexual themes are beyond the physical.Leaves of GrassMost of the poeSong of MyselfSo

16、ng of Myself was originally published in the 1855 edition of Leaves of Grass in which it was the first of twelve poems. At the time this poem was untitled, in 1881 Whitman gave the poem its final name: Song of Myself.In Song of Myself, Whitman believed that two people could be “twain yet one”, their

17、 paths could be different, and yet they could achieve a kind of transcendent contact.Song of Myself is a history of the poets movement from loafing individual to active spirit.Song of MyselfSong of Myself wDrum TapsIn May 1865 Walt began printing his Civil War literature, entitled Drum-Taps. Some of Whitmans poems are political committed. Before and during the Civil War, he stood firmly on the side of the North. Drum Taps Dru