I Hear America Singing by Walt Whitman

A modernist ahead of his time

Today, Walt Whitman (1819-1892) is ranked among America’s finest poets. He did not, however, win much acclaim during his own lifetime. He lived in poverty most of his life, and it was not until the last decade of his life that he was recognised and appreciated as the great poet he was.

Whitman was born on Long Island, which was at that time a rural area populated by farmers and fishermen, with the luring lights of Brooklyn and Manhattan across the great harbour – places that could be visited by means of exciting ferryboats. (One of Whitman’s poems is called 'Crossing Brooklyn Ferry').

He had little formal schooling, and he tried his hand at different jobs until he settled on journalism. Whitman lived during a period defined by the growth and expansion of America, but also during the agonising conflict of the Civil War, where he volunteered as a war nurse.

Walt Whitman’s poetry has a down-to-earth and ordinary language, and it concerns everyday subject matters. His free-verse style is prescient of the style of modernist poets that came half a century later. Walt Whitman has later won acclaim also internationally, and he has had a considerable influence on writers both in the United States and in Europe. 'I Hear America Singing' is one of his most popular and cherished poems.

'I Hear America Singing' was first published in 1860. The poem celebrates the industriousness and creativity of America. The country is teeming with joyous activity. The workers sing as they are going about their work.

'Singing' was intended to be understood both literally and metaphorically. At the time, workers often sang as they worked, as they did not have radios or other devices for listening to music. The singing is also a metaphor for the vitality and activity of the American society.