My excellent friend Ken just sent me THIS, which is an article from the Huffington Post about Whitman’s poem “Year of Meteors.” Apparently a scientist has used Whitman’s poem, a painting by Church, and some New York newspapers to determine that Whitman actually witnessed a very rare meteroic event. I love this idea of two pieces of art leading to a scientific discovery. And I love the way the article and analysis are all about the scientific event rather than the poem’s more powerful cosmic explosions, homoerotic desire and poetry itself.
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This is awesome! This was never my favorite Whitman poem, but upon reading it again, I’m liking it more now. Whitman WOULD witness some random, rare natural event– it’s only right.
Thanks for posting this; reading it was a nice, refreshing change of pace for me.
Loving that Crerie is still all over the blog, a mapped domain goes a long way. And I couldn’t agree more, something beautiful about art and poetry leading to the scientific discovery, rather than the tired divorce of the two, and like Allison notes, it is fitting that Whitman would pave the way for that marriage.