“Leaves of Grass” is an iconoclasm, to shatter the idols of porcelain worshipped by the average poets of our age. One main contrast of the ideas behind every page of my verses, compared with establish’d poems, is their different relative attitude towards God, towards the objective universe, and still more the quite changed attitude of the ego, the one chanting or talking, towards himself and towards his fellow-humanity.

So I never present for perusal a poem ready-made on the old models; for the old decorums of writing I substitute new decorums. I abandon’d the conventional themes: none of the choice plots of love or war, or high, exceptional personages of Old-World song; no legend, or myth, or romance. It is so different from the accepted forms of poetry that it could not be expected to make its way.

Walt Whitman’s method in the construction of his songs is strictly the method of the Italian opera, which, when heard, confounds the new person and, as far as he can then see, showing no purport for him, nor any analogy to his previous-accustomed tunes, impresses him as if all the sounds of earth and hell were tumbled promiscuously together.

No wonder there are some who refuse to consider my “Leaves” as literature. I am an incongruity to most of them—I make the sort of noise they don’t like; I upset some things they do like. There is much that will not be understood by many, much to which many will object. I therefore do not wonder at the general howl with which these poems have been received both in America and in Europe.

That from a worldly and business point of view “Leaves of Grass” has been worse than a failure—that public criticism on the book and myself as author of it yet shows mark’d anger and contempt more than anything else—and that solely for publishing it I have been the object of two or three pretty serious special official buffetings—is all probably no more than I ought to have expected.
People resent anything new as a personal insult. It is always so. When umbrellas were first used in England, those who carried them were hooted and pelted so furiously that their lives were endanger’d.

Now and then somebody goes for me—gives me hell; I expected hell—I got it. Nothing that has occurred to me was a surprise. There probably is still more to come. That will not surprise me, either. I have adjusted myself for opposition, denunciation, suspicion. I had my choice when I commenc’d. I bid neither for soft eulogies, big money returns, nor the approbation of existing schools and conventions. The objections to me are the objections made to all men who choose to go their own road.

I have some very bitter enemies. The old Devil has not gone from the earth without leaving some of his emissaries behind him. There was a time when the enemy wanted for nothing better or more than simply, without remorse, to crush me, to brush me, without compunction or mercy, out of sight, out of hearing—to do anything, everything, to rid themselves of me.
The fierceness, the bitterness, the vile quality of this antagonism threw aside all reserves and simply tore me to pieces metaphorically without giving me half a chance to make my meanings clear.

I think everything that could happen to a rejected author has happened one time or another to me. I sometimes growl a little about the editors. There is no appeal from the editor—he is a necessary autocrat. These editorial dictators have a right to dictate; they know what their magazines are for.
We all get cranky when they say, “No, thank you.” But after all somebody has got to decide. They are a good lot—they do the best they can.

Most of the book reviews so-called are echoes of echoes; the fellows don’t seem to have a bit of originality, they proceed like so many monkeys on the limb of a tree chattering in concert. I seem to make them mad—rile them; I mystify them, too, but they don’t know it.
Every whipper-snapper of a reviewer, instead of trying to get at the motive of a book or an incident, sets out sharply to abuse a fellow because he don’t accomplish what he never aimed for and sometimes would not have if he could. Probably three-quarters, perhaps even more, of them do not take the trouble to examine what they start out to criticize—to judge a man from his own standpoint, to even find out what that standpoint is.

The truth about the poem and its author is, that they both of them confound and contradict several of the most cherished of the old and hitherto accepted canons upon the right manner and matter of men and books—and cannot be judged thereby—but aim to establish new canons, and can only be judged by them.

Yet there are a thousand and one gnats, mosquitoes, camp-followers, hanging about the literary army, and each of ’em thinks he must have a fling at Walt Whitman. They know nothing about him—maylike never read or even looked at his book—but that’s no matter. That, in fact, seems to be taken as a special qualification for their carpings and crowings. When they condemn it without reading it—that’s what nettles me.

I have had to spend a good deal of time thinking of my enemies; even when I have tried to forget I had any enemies, have been compelled to reckon with them, having clearly known from the very start that if one would be—or had to be—a public man, defamations and lying were things, among other things, which he had to expect. It seems to be a penalty a man has to pay, even for very little notoriety—the privilege of being lied about.
Someone prints: “Whitman a guzzling whiskeydrinker”—that is mild, compared with other things, words, I have met. According to the papers I am crazy, dead, paralyzed—I am sour, sweet—dirty, clean—taken care of, neglected—I meet new Walt Whitmans every day. There are a dozen of me afloat. I don’t know which Walt Whitman I am.

But I don’t care what they call me, by one name or another—it is all one. Not my enemies ever invade me—no harm to my pride from them I fear. I have the hide of the rhinoceros, morally and in other ways—can stand almost anything—so that I produce the result, so that I get my word spoken and heard—maybe move men and women.
I like the outright person—the hater, the lover—the unmistakable yes or no. Better to have people stirred against you if they can’t be stirred for you—better that than not to stir them at all.

Some of my opponents are fairly on the other side—are honest—I respect them. Others are malignants—are of the snake order. But I am sure I never have felt sore about any negative experience I had, and I have had plenty of it—yes, more that than the other—mostly, in fact. I used to worry over it, just a little—resent it, too, just a little, but I am past that now.
I am not embittered by my lack of success. A man who proposes something new and will not give people time to see it is not worthy of his message.

The fact is I have been about as well received as I expected to be, considering the proposition I set forth in the “Leaves,” considering the rumpus I made, considering my refusal to play in with the literary gang. Why should I expect to be received?
I sometimes wonder that I am not more ostracized than I am on account of my free opinions. I was more used to being kicked out than asked in. The wonder is not that I am sometimes kicked out—the wonder is that anybody will receive me.

We are not always patted on the back—sometimes we are kicked on the behind—and who knows but the kicks do as much good as the pats. My disposition is to hear all—the worst word that is said—the ignorantest—whatever. I have always craved to hear the damndest that could be said of me, and the damndest has been said, I do believe.
A general comment on the book is of the pity-the-old man order. I would rather be damned than be saved by pity. “To hell with you, Walt Whitman” sounds very good—it is tonic—a slap in the face that does a fellow more good than a kiss.

I have had that inestimable benefit which comes of being fought against, bespattered, denounced. If certain outsiders stop puzzled, or dispute, or laugh, or rage, very well—I am more resolute because all have denied me than I could ever have been had all accepted me. Ease, comfort, acceptation, would have ruined me.
They sail into me in great style—but that is the great test. It is best for any man to be tried by fire; it is good discipline for a man in the face of such an abuse of criticism to sit down and keep cool. If I cannot stand their attack I might as well go out of the “Leaves” business.

It is a good and safe rule, always to take care to be introduced to the fellow you don’t want to meet. These do us the most good. Often the man who despises you, won’t have you on any terms, is most rich in benefits. Even if we realize that he don’t grasp us, we see an importance in his statement; we surely learn deepest from a sincere opponent, from the light thrown even scornfully on dangerous spots and liabilities.

I like to get at the fellows who oppose me—have them explain themselves. I am always interested in what is said by the opposition. I like to hear all that is to be said in criticism of my work, my life, since I only see myself from the inside, with the ordinary prejudice a fellow has in favor of himself. So I don’t know what I deserve or what I don’t deserve.
I have always been disposed to hear the worst that could be said against the poems—even the most rasping things—everything, in fact which would serve to give me an honest new point of observation. That was a necessary part of my career. It does a man good to turn himself inside out once in a while, to look at himself through other eyes—especially skeptical eyes. It takes a good deal of resolution to do it, yet it should be done.

I guess we all like to have someone who presents those sides of a thought, or possibility, different from our own—different and yet with a sort of home-likeness—a tartness and contradiction offsetting the theory as we view it. I am sure I do, for I know—never hide from myself—how much is to be said on the other side, antagonistically—however cherished our own notions are.
Have you not learn’d great lessons from those who reject you, and brace themselves against you? or who treat you with contempt? No one is safe until he can give himself such a drubbing, until he can shock himself out of his complacency. We’ll get conceited if we are too correct. A few errors are salt for the spirit.

Yet the public has little to do with my acts, deeds, words. Never, never, has even calumny deflected me from the course I had determined to pursue. I long ago saw that if I was to do anything at all I must disregard the howling throng—must go my own road, flinging back no bitter retort, but declaring myself unalterably, whatever happened.
If I had stopped to dispute with my enemies the book would have gone begging. So I make it a rule never to affirm or deny stories the design of which is to malign or injure me. My final conviction has always been that there is no better reply than silence.

NEXT: WRITING ABOUT SEX

The texts in this anthology should NOT be cited as direct quotations from Whitman. If you want to quote from this site for something you are writing or posting, please read this first (click here).