The “I” or “Self” in Whitman’ Song of Myself

I celebrate myself, and sing myself,

And what I assume you shall assume,

For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you.

This is the starting of "Song of Myself", a poem by Walt Whitman included in his work Leaves of Grass. In this poem Whitman seems to put himself in the center, but the "self" of the poem's speaker - the "I" of the poem - should not be limited to or confused with the person of the historical Walt Whitman. This is an expansive persona exploding the conventional boundaries of the self.

          A clear understanding of the opening lines is very important to know the nature of self in Song of Myself. The first and second lines might give us a notion of egotism and megalomania. As John Updike (1978:33) notes that the

"I" and "myself" are the "superb subjects" of the poem, the "exultant egotism which only an American could have voiced."

But when we come to the third line, the egotistic notion is somewhat replaced by a mystical notion. The word “atom” bears a mystical sense as well as a physical sense. “Myself” is no longer merely a personal “I”, which we might assume in the very beginning, but the totality of “I”, mystical as well as non-mystical.

Thus, there seems to be, on the poem, a strong influence of Ralph Waldo Emerson’s Transcendentalist philosophy which advocates a core belief,

“an ideal spiritual state that 'transcends' the physical and empirical and is realized only through the individual's intuition.” (wikipedia)

The personal “I” in the first line, the communal “I” in the second line, and the macrocosmic “I” in the third line, because of cross reflections, turns out to be the total “I”, personal, communal, microcosmic and macrocosmic.

In the following lines, Whitman reflects two levels of sensibilities of his “self”: the tactile and the transcendent.

I loafe and invite my soul,
I lean and loafe at my ease observing a spear of summer grass.

(Section: 1)

The use of the word “loafe” suggests, on the one hand, a languorous sensuality, on the other hand, a spiritual rest and stillness that genuinely invites the sacred experience. Mystically Whitman invites his soul to be merged with nature, the blade of grass, a little creation of God because all things, both inanimate and animate, share a holy, divine and single entity.

          Therefore, Whitman’s “I” suggests a direct communication with nature, as the “I” discards, like the mystics, the second hand knowledge from books:

A morning-glory at my window satisfies me more than the metaphysics of books. ((Section: 24)

          Again, his self or “I” pervades everything: there is no barrier between body and soul:

I am the poet of the Body and I am the poet of the Soul,
The pleasures of heaven are with me and the pains of hell are with me,

(21)

There is also no difference between men and women to Whitman’s self:

I am the poet of the woman the same as the man,
And I say it is as great to be a woman as to be a man,
(21)

         

Moreover, Whitman talks like a pantheist. Since everything in the world has legacy to the same “divine” self, there is no room for evil.

Divine am I inside and out, and I make holy whatever I touch or am touch'd from,

(24)

Furthermore, Whitman’s “I” talks like the Sufis in Islam. According to Sufis, it is not reason but love for God that sustain one’s self.

          And nothing, not God, is greater to one than one’s self is,(48)

Further,

In the faces of men and women I see God, and in my own face in the glass,(48)

Nicholson (2009: ) says,

This inner light is its own evidence; he who sees it has real knowledge, and nothing can increase or diminish his certainty.(p. )

Whitman’s self represents the basic ideals of American democracy- equality, fraternity and liberty. Kenneth M. Price (1996: 183) truly comments,

Whitman is the representative in art of American democracy.

In section 22, Whitman sings of equality and fraternity: the poet has achieved self realization and recognizes his true identity,

In all people I see myself, none more and not one a barley-corn less,
And the good or bad I say of myself I say of them.

The first section ends with a declaration of liberty, liberty of everything:

I harbor for good or bad, I permit to speak at every hazard,
Nature without check with original energy.

(01)

          Whitman’s I is a national “I”, a collective ego of humanity. His national identity is

Of every hue and caste am I, of every rank and religion,

(16)

He further declares

          I am large, I contain multitudes.

(51)

         

          Having catalogued a continent and encompassed its multitudes, he finally decides:

“I too am not a bit tamed, I too am untranslatable,

I sound my barbaric yawp over the roofs of the world.” 

(52)

Thus, as we journey further through the many chapters of this long poem, we understand that the "self" Whitman is celebrating exists on countless levels. On the simplest level, he is celebrating the life-affirming sensuality of his very body. But on the larger level, his pen describes a self which includes a vast landscape of places and people, high and low dramas, measureless expanses, universes of being. He asserts that we each are much more immense than we imagine and that we partake in each other and no one exists in a separate, isolated self.

Works Cited:

Updike, John. “Walt Whitman: Ego and Art”. The New York Review of Books, February 9, 1978.

Nicholson, Reynold A. The Mystics of Islam. BiblioBazaar, LLC, 2009

Price, Kenneth M. “Walt Whitman: the contemporary reviews” Volume 9 of American Critical Archives. Cambridge University Press, 1996 p.183