Walt Whitman
Walt Whitman was a follower of the two Transcendentalist Ralph Waldo Emerson and
Henry David Thoreau. He believed in Emerson and Thoreau's Trascendentalist beliefs.
Whitman believed that individualism stems from listening to one's inner voice and that one's
life is guided by one's intuition. The Transcendentalist centered on the divinity of each
individual; but this divinity could be self-discovered only if the person had the independence of
mind to do so. Whitman lent himself to this concept of independence. He once said,"Everything
on earth has the divine spark within and thus is all part of a whole."(web.pg2trans.) This
philosophy of individualism led to an optimistic emphasis on society. Because Whitman
immodestly praised the human body and glorified the senses, "Walt Whitman's poems assert the
worth of the individual and the oneness of all humanity."
Walt Whitman was an American poet who was born on May 31, 1819, near Huntington,
N.Y. He......
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