A Touch More Whitmania
It is my intention to elaborate further on what I intend by the term "Romantic Orientalism" but, before I do, I want to make a suggestion that may well amount to nothing more than a futile gesture. Then again, it may cause God to smile on us and send down Her/His/Its angels to remove the mountain of neo-fascistic war-mongering from our backs.
Curtis White, in his essay in the April 2006 issue of Harper's, argued that the question facing the present generation is "...whether we any longer know how to retrieve our own traditions from their institutional entombment. This can't be done by teaching Walden in high school. 'Saved' by the American literary canon, Thoreau is a mere dead letter. Thoreau can only be retrieved if we find a way to integrate his thought into the way we live as a sort of counterlife opposed to the busywork of the legality of the culture of death" (White, "The Spirit of Disobedience: An Invitation to Resistance" Harper's Magazine, April 2006, p. 36). The same holds true for Whitman.
The other day, I found myself suggesting to a friend that people of conscience ought to begin organizing Leaves of Grass study circles in order to become imbued with the Whitmanian vision in a way that no one will pick up from school. I also cautioned that they should be careful not to Christianize Walt. Or Islamize him or Hinduize him or whatever one is tempted to do. By all means, put him in conversation with your pre-modern sacred scripture of choice but, where the two appear to come into conflict, have the courage to tell your pre-modern scripture to stand down: it is on the wrong side of history where the Whitmanian vision of/for America is concerned (America, after all, is a post-medieval invention, no matter what the adherents of the American Religion may fantasize). Blake had no problem doing that with the Bible; we should all follow his lead. Down with bibliolatry! There is no god but God! Onward and upward with Walt Whitman who, in the words of Harold Bloom (who I call my "Imam"), is always up ahead of us, like the Jesus of the Gospel of Mark, waving to us to catch up with him further on down the road.
Now, after I made that suggestion, I confess I started to wonder whether I had finally gone around the bend (I know, I know, anyone who would refer to Harold Bloom as his "imam" is, well, res ipsa loquitur as we say in the law). Alright, granted. Even so, in the immortal words of John Lennon, "You may say I'm a dreamer/But I'm not the only one." I would draw your attention to Peter Simonson's article "A Rhetoric for Polytheistic Democracy: Walt Whitman's 'Poem of Many in One'" published in Philosophy and Rhetoric 36.4 (2003), pp. 353-375. I don't know Professor Simonson beyond this article and the fact that he teaches at one of my alma maters in a Spenglerian province of Western Appalachia; be that as it may, I applaud his scholarship, especially his recognition of the role that Whitman could be destined to play in our collective futures--if we would only let him.
Look; from time to time I subscribe to The Nation. In the back pages one will find advertisements for subscribers to form discussion groups for readers of the magazine. By the looks of it, these groups are forming around the country. I recognize that poetry is probably a tougher sell, and difficult poetry even tougher still. I just can't help wondering what the political climate in this country might be like today if people had started Whitman reading groups back in '75...
Curtis White, in his essay in the April 2006 issue of Harper's, argued that the question facing the present generation is "...whether we any longer know how to retrieve our own traditions from their institutional entombment. This can't be done by teaching Walden in high school. 'Saved' by the American literary canon, Thoreau is a mere dead letter. Thoreau can only be retrieved if we find a way to integrate his thought into the way we live as a sort of counterlife opposed to the busywork of the legality of the culture of death" (White, "The Spirit of Disobedience: An Invitation to Resistance" Harper's Magazine, April 2006, p. 36). The same holds true for Whitman.
The other day, I found myself suggesting to a friend that people of conscience ought to begin organizing Leaves of Grass study circles in order to become imbued with the Whitmanian vision in a way that no one will pick up from school. I also cautioned that they should be careful not to Christianize Walt. Or Islamize him or Hinduize him or whatever one is tempted to do. By all means, put him in conversation with your pre-modern sacred scripture of choice but, where the two appear to come into conflict, have the courage to tell your pre-modern scripture to stand down: it is on the wrong side of history where the Whitmanian vision of/for America is concerned (America, after all, is a post-medieval invention, no matter what the adherents of the American Religion may fantasize). Blake had no problem doing that with the Bible; we should all follow his lead. Down with bibliolatry! There is no god but God! Onward and upward with Walt Whitman who, in the words of Harold Bloom (who I call my "Imam"), is always up ahead of us, like the Jesus of the Gospel of Mark, waving to us to catch up with him further on down the road.
Now, after I made that suggestion, I confess I started to wonder whether I had finally gone around the bend (I know, I know, anyone who would refer to Harold Bloom as his "imam" is, well, res ipsa loquitur as we say in the law). Alright, granted. Even so, in the immortal words of John Lennon, "You may say I'm a dreamer/But I'm not the only one." I would draw your attention to Peter Simonson's article "A Rhetoric for Polytheistic Democracy: Walt Whitman's 'Poem of Many in One'" published in Philosophy and Rhetoric 36.4 (2003), pp. 353-375. I don't know Professor Simonson beyond this article and the fact that he teaches at one of my alma maters in a Spenglerian province of Western Appalachia; be that as it may, I applaud his scholarship, especially his recognition of the role that Whitman could be destined to play in our collective futures--if we would only let him.
Look; from time to time I subscribe to The Nation. In the back pages one will find advertisements for subscribers to form discussion groups for readers of the magazine. By the looks of it, these groups are forming around the country. I recognize that poetry is probably a tougher sell, and difficult poetry even tougher still. I just can't help wondering what the political climate in this country might be like today if people had started Whitman reading groups back in '75...
posted by Sidi Hamid Benengeli | 11:58 AM
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