“Is there even one other like me-distracted-his friend, his lover, lost to him?”
After reading Fone’s introduction to “Masculine Landscapes,” the Encyclopedic entry on “Women as a Theme in Whitman’s Writing,” and after close readings of some of his poetry (Namely, “Song of Myself” and the “Calamus” poems), and after reflecting on some sections of Reynolds, I feel informed and comfortable enough to offer my opinion on the related topics of Whitman’s sexuality and how that sexuality, to borrow a term of Whitman’s, emanates through his writing.
Was Walt Whitman a homosexual? I asked myself early in the semester when we first began reading Reynolds and several students appeared to “know” already that he was gay. I did not immediately share this instinct and for me, the issue of Whitman’s sexuality was malleable and inconclusive- sure, his writing appeared at times homo-erotic and at most times, passionate and sensuous, but at the same time, in Whitman’s own words, “I turn the bridegroom out of bed and stay with the bride / myself, / I tighten her all night to my thighs and lips” (“Song of Myself “) As we “took the dive” so to speak, into Whitman’s America with Reynolds, it sounded like Reynolds himself approached Whitman’s sexuality with a kind of hesitation-to-define in clear terms, one way or the other, which side of the sexual “line” Whitman ought to be situated, in light of the evidence.
The strongest evidence I came across, and the evidence which eventually swayed me, finally, conclusively, in one direction over the other, was 1) Whitman’s experiences at Southold (p.70 and on-he is accused of pederasty and chased out of town by a mob) and the subsequent outpouring of emotions those experiences loosed in his writing as well as 2) his phrenological self-therapy, wherein Whitman, quite clearly, attempts to suppress his overly-intense feelings for Peter Doyle (p.250) whom he encodes as 16.4 <-for anyone wondering, 16 stands for the sixteenth letter of the alphabet “P” and 4 for the fourth, “D.” His coding of Doyle’s initials, far from complex, suggests a desire to mask his true, homosexual affections towards “his friend,” at a time (late 19th century) when homosexuality gradually came to be viewed, in medicine and psychiatry, as a treatable affliction: it is likely that Whitman himself had, to a certain extent, perhaps even unconsciously, internalized some of the growing homophobia of the day.
And so, “the bard of comrades” is gay. So, what? Does it really mean anything? Does it change anything? I am sure that it does mean something, maybe some things. For instance, I think that it is important to understand how Whitman’s repressed homosexuality may have influenced and even shaped, I think probably to a large degree, his confrontational approach to the process of writing poetry as exemplified by his pervasive “Fierce Wrestler” icon. Also, I feel that Whitman’s writings, held to be enabling for women, may be interpreted (especially in the Calamus group) as enabling, if only in that his struggle is made manifest, for homosexuals with whom, in lines that read like my opening quote, he empathizes and perhaps even sympathizes.
But, I believe that there is more that is unchanged by Whitman’s sexuality.
The Whitman who speaks in his poems, the independent “I” is not always the same as (and often seems to be denied by) the vocal, public Walt Whitman. Two examples of this pattern: 1) Whitman’s assertion, in a letter to Emerson, that there is “not the first breath of manly love in print,” and 2) Whitman’s flat denial to British writer John Addington Symonds point-blank question about the possibility of semi-sexual emotions and actions intruding upon Whitman’s conception of comradeship (Reynolds 198). Whitman even confides in Traubel that he himself may not know after all what he meant (Fone 7). So, who are we to trust? I say that if we trust the independent “I,” who speaks in his poetry, that same Whitman who “contains multitudes,” than the sexuality of the real, the denying, sexually-repressed/public Whitman seems less immediate than the “I” whose sexuality it is much more difficult to put a finger on. The “I” Whitman is neither strictly heterosexual nor homosexual: “I am the poet of the woman the same as the man.” The same “I” who “turns the bridegroom out of bed” in the very next line, is “the wife’s voice.” The “I” in section 16 of “Song of Myself” is “Maternal as well as paternal.” The “I” Whitman seems to defy all categorization, including sexual. The “I” fosters a more fluid and open attitude towards sexuality and prevents even Whitman’s propensity for homosexuality to intrude in its integrating processes: “I do not ask who you are, that is not important to me, / You can do nothing and be nothing but what I will infold you.”
And so, while Walt Whitman himself may have been a homosexual, Whitman’s ideal, poetic-independent “I” confronted homosexuality along with heterosexuality and absorbed them both: the “I” combined reverence and admiration of the reproductive processes between men and women as well as an understanding of and appreciation for the comradeship shared between members of the same sex. What are we to make of this? Well, I like to think that the open-mindedness and peaceful acceptance of all forms of sexual expression of Whitman’s “I” serves as a standard against which we, as Americans, might constantly measure and improve ourselves.
Works Cited
Fone, Byrne R. S. Masculine Landscapes: Walt Whitman and the Homoerotic Text. Carbondale and Edwardsville: Southern Illinois University Press, 1992.
Le Master, J.R., Donald D. Kummings, eds. “Women as a Theme in Whitman’s Writing.” Walt Whitman: An Encyclopedia. New York: Garland Publishing, 1998.
Reynolds, David S. Walt Whitman’s America: A Cultural Biography. New York: Vintage Books, 1996.
Whitman, Walt. “Hours continuing long. . . (1860).” Whitman Poetry & Prose. Library of America, 1996.
Whitman, Walt. “Song of Myself (1855).” Whitman Poetry & Prose. Library of America, 1996.
Whitman, Walt. “States! (1860).” Whitman Poetry & Prose. Library of America, 1996.
Image 2: “Whitman with Peter Doyle” Art Durkee (Blogger, Musician, Artist) <http://www.arthurdurkee.net/images/WhitmanDoylew.jpg>.
