Name__________________________________
Walt Whitman, from Song of Myself
Song of Myself 10
In number 10 of Song of Myself, the speaker describes ___________________________ in the wilderness,
sharing chowder with _____________________-diggers, witnessing a trapper’s _________________________
into a __________________________________________ family, and sheltering a _______________________
_____________________________.
Free Verse Poetry (definition): ________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________________________
Whitman’s free verse poetry, absent any regular meter or rhyme, still has a balance and rhythm to it. This
musical run of words that rises and falls is called _______________________________. The best way to get a
feel for Whitman’s use of this device is to read the poem aloud.
Imagery (definition): ________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________________________
Use the organizer below to analyze Whitman’s use of imagery. What emotion does he want the reader to feel
about each subject?
Subject
Reader’s emotion
The hunter in the wilderness
The marriage of the trapper and
Indian woman
The runaway slave
Point of view:
1st Person Point of View (define): ______________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________________________
Omniscient Point of View (define): _____________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________________________
Whitman’s omniscient first person speaker allows him to “jump into” the shoes of a variety of Americans. He
takes on the _____________________________________ of a number of speakers, but usually retains the first
person “____” when speaking. This develops a central theme of his poetry: that he represents all of the varied
images of _______________________________________.
Song of Myself 33
In number 33, the speaker takes on the voices of ________________________ heroes: a __________________
in a storm, a ____________________________ burnt as a witch in front of her _________________________,
a hunted _________________________, a ________________________________ crushed by a falling
building, and a dying ______________________________ under enemy fire. The speaker proclaims, “All
these I feel or am.”
In Whitman’s portrayal of the runaway slave and the mother burned as a witch, he emphasizes
______________________ and ____________________________ in moments of injustice
Based on depictions of each hero listed below, make an inference regarding Whitman’s personal views and
beliefs:
Hero
Inference (Whitman seems to believe that…)
Skipper
(lines 5-11)
Runaway
Slave (lines
17-25)
Firefighter
(lines 2636)
One way of creating cadence in free verse poetry is through parallelism, the repetition of similar words, phrases,
or grammatical structures. Identify the parallel material in each range of lines:
Lines 3-10: ________________________________________________________________________________
Lines 19-31:_______________________________________________________________________________
Lines 39-41:_______________________________________________________________________________
The tone of this poem shifts from being very ___________________________________ in the first two stanzas
to being more ___________________________________ in the remainder of the poem. How is the tone of this
poem different from the tone in Song of Myself number 10?
__________________________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________________________
Song of Myself number 52
Whitman declares his ____________________________ with the soil and nature and claims his
_________________________________ with the reader’s everyday lives. He addresses the readers directly.
_______________________ (definition): a final section of a poem that sums up its major themes.
Whitman begins the section by comparing himself to a hawk, who like Whitman himself is “not a bit
___________________” and “untranslatable.” How might both Whitman and the hawk be “untranslatable?”
__________________________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________________________
A line that demonstrates Whitman’s connection with nature in this poem is
“________________________________________________________________________________________”
Whitman believes that his poetry will have a _____________________________ effect on the reader. Copy a
line from the poem that supports this statement:
“_________________________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________________________”
Whitman says, “If you want me again look for me under your boot-soles.” Based on this statement, draw a
conclusion about how Whitman views himself and his poetry.
__________________________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________________________
RAFT Writing:
Role: News Reporter
Audience: Newspaper readers
Format: Obituary (Newspaper)
Topic: The passing of Walt Whitman
In newspapers, obituaries mark the death of significant figures by describing the deceased and noting
accomplishments in their lives. Demonstrate your familiarity with Walt Whitman by writing an obituary that
gives very brief biographical information, describes him as a person and a poet, and notes significant impact he
had on American poetry. Your obituary should be around 100 words in length. You may complete it on a
separate sheet of paper and file it behind this notes sheet.