New Ideas?

On Friday we discussed and read more of Walt Whitman’s works. And Mr. Tangen told us to analyze those poems and to identify who Whitman was targeting in his poem, particularly one of America. At first, we got the impression that Whitman was appraising Americans, and he was. But then Mr. Tangen recognized the fact that he was classifying “Americans” in his poems to everyone, because essentially we are a land of immigrants, therefore, we are everyone…according to Whitman. This demeans all Americans because if he is appraising Americans, he is appraising everyone, so his tone and original connotation of his subject is not longer valid.
I found an interesting notion in poem 18 that can easily be related to what we question on Friday about him glorifying Americans. What we didn’t notice was, does he have an opinion on war? And while I read I noticed that poem 18 like I said above is about how Whitman, being an American and idolizing these people, what he thinks of war? Does he talk about it in any of his poems? Yes.

“ Vivas to those who have fail’d!
And to those whose war-vessels sank in the sea!
And to those themselves who sank in the sea!
And to all generals that lost engagements! and all overcome heroes!
And the numberless unknown heroes, equal to the greatest heroes known. ”

Here we see a clear statement of war. The odd thing about this is, like we’ve analyzed already he exalted the American people. With this in mind, we would think that he would talk only of the Americans and their past history: all the wars, the battles, skirmishes, their victories, and finally their vital independence. But he doesn’t, he does the complete opposite, “ And the numberless unkown heroes, equal to the greatest heroes known.” Here he is equalizing both the unknown soldiers, which can give the implication of the opposing soldiers, and the “greatest soldiers known” which implies the glorious ones. Taking all these things into account, I was puzzled when I read the first line of the stanza Whitman writes, “Vivas to those who have fail’d!” I didn’t know what to think anymore, because not so long ago we had established that he was elevating everyone from the rest, but still if he had this mentality than why would he celebrate the failure of those who failed? Might he have been degrading the Americans self-centered egos once again? After evaluating a couple of pieces of Whitman and seeing an Anti-American trend, could he really be against them?