Walt Whitman

Born in a farming village on Long Island, New York, in 1819, Walt Whitman was the second of nine children to a Quaker house-builder father. He developed a close relationship with his mother throughout his life. After receiving only an elementary education, Whitman embarked on a path of self-education through extensive reading and held various jobs, including printer, journalist, and schoolteacher, between 1832 and 1845. In 1846, he became an editor for the Brooklyn Eagle, but his progressive views, particularly his support for abolitionism and free soil, led to his termination. A subsequent two-week train journey to New Orleans for a newspaper job exposed him to a vast expanse of the country, significantly broadening his perspective and influencing his poetic vision. Unable to find a publisher, Whitman self-published the first edition of "Leaves of Grass" in 1855, a collection of twelve poems that garnered praise from figures like Ralph Waldo Emerson, despite initial mixed critical reception. In 1862, Whitman moved to Virginia to care for his brother, who had been injured during the Civil War. The profound suffering he witnessed during this period inspired him to volunteer in Washington, D.C. hospitals, where he served for 11 years while also working as an army paymaster and later for the Department of the Interior. A debilitating stroke in 1873 resulted in paralysis, forcing him to leave his government position and relocate to Camden, New Jersey, to live with his brother George. Despite his declining health and increasing feebleness, Whitman continued to write brief poems, published "November Boughs" in 1888, and received numerous visitors from both the United States and abroad. Before his death, he completed "A Backward Glance O'er Travel'd Roads." Whitman passed away on March 26, 1892, in Camden, New Jersey, at the age of 72, due to complications from pleurisy, consumption, tuberculosis, and nephritis.