Faculty Mentor
Todd Kennedy
Location
Hamilton Hall 113
Session
Session 2
Start Date
11-4-2014 2:15 PM
End Date
11-4-2014 3:15 PM
Description
While the majority of Walt Whitman’s prosody celebrates the self, “Song of the Open Road” combines a conceptual appreciation of autonomy with a dedication to functionality. In drafting “Song”, Whitman was no longer interested in merely discussing autonomy; he instead delivers a method of attaining autonomy. Whitman describes “the open road” for eight sections of the poem in a vivid, ambiguous style reminiscent of his other verse, then abandons his philosophical meandering for the simplicity of “Allons!”—a French word meaning “Let’s go!”—creating a strikingly terse parallel for Whitman’s delayed poetics.
Allons! A Universal Call to Freedom in Walt Whitman’s Song of the Open Road
Hamilton Hall 113
While the majority of Walt Whitman’s prosody celebrates the self, “Song of the Open Road” combines a conceptual appreciation of autonomy with a dedication to functionality. In drafting “Song”, Whitman was no longer interested in merely discussing autonomy; he instead delivers a method of attaining autonomy. Whitman describes “the open road” for eight sections of the poem in a vivid, ambiguous style reminiscent of his other verse, then abandons his philosophical meandering for the simplicity of “Allons!”—a French word meaning “Let’s go!”—creating a strikingly terse parallel for Whitman’s delayed poetics.