Walt Whitman: Songs of Myself

The page traces Whitman from obscurity to the poet it calls quintessentially American, and names his influence on Wallace Stevens, William Carlos Williams, Hart Crane, and Allen Ginsberg. It argues Howl would have been impossible without Song of Myself.

Whitman is presented as the poet of free verse, common American speech, and a spiritual tie between people and nature. The film is built on the central poem of Leaves of Grass.

Ramey’s reading is paired with archival photographs, Hudson River School paintings, and landscape imagery. The page calls the result a deeply moving experience and an illustration of a key poem in American literature.

Walt Whitman rose from obscurity to become the quintessential American poet.