Interactive Time Line

Milestone: Walt Whitman

Milestone: Emily Dickinson

Milestone: Civil War

What Have You Learned?

Feature Menu

American Masters: Whitman and Dickinson

Choose a link on the time line to go to a milestone.

1800 1900

1819–1892Walt Whitman

1830–1886Emily Dickinson

1850

1861–1865Civil War

American Masters: Whitman and Dickinson

• Spent five years teaching school

1819–1841 Student of the World

• Dropped out of school at age eleven and became a printer’s assistant

• Born on Long Island, just outside of Brooklyn on May 31, 1819

Walt Whitman

Walt Whitman

1819–1841 Student of the World

• Traveled to New Orleans; saw American frontier firsthand

• Returned to New York, became an editor, and began writing poetry

• Supplemented income working as carpenter and contractor

Walt Whitman

Leaves of Grass

• Self-published in 1855 and sent to select people to raise interest

• Praised by Emerson as “extraordinary piece of wit and wisdom”

• Expanded and revised nine times

• “Deathbed edition” published in 1891

Walt Whitman

• Incorporated lists, repetition, and contradiction

• Technique based on cadence and free verse

• Celebrated American life and the power of the individual

Leaves of Grass

• Introduced bold new style of poetry

Walt Whitman

• Profoundly affected by experience

1861–1892

• Stayed to help thousands of other injured soldiers

• During Civil War, traveled to Virginia to nurse his injured brother

Union Hospital at Fair Oaks, Virginia

Walt Whitman

• Lived in Camden, New Jersey, from 1884 until his death

• Included elegies for Lincoln—“When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom’d” and “O Captain! My Captain!”

• After the Civil War and Lincoln’s assassination, published Drum-Taps

1861–1892

Emily Dickinson

• Attended Mount Holyoke Female Seminary for one year

Recluse of Amherst

• Born in Amherst, Massachusetts

Emily Dickinson

• Began writing poems—sent some as birthday or valentine greetings

• After trip, retreated from society, rarely leaving her house

• Traveled to Washington, D.C.

Recluse of Amherst

Emily Dickinson

• Stanzas controlled by rhyme and meter commonly used in hymns

Style of Writing

• Language concise and evocative

• Delicate, careful observations of life from behind curtains

The Civil War

• Lincoln was assassinated in 1865, after the war ended.

• President Lincoln issued Emancipation Proclamation, freeing slaves in South.

War between the States (1861–1865)

• Issue of slavery divided the nation.

• Union forces fought Confederate forces.

“Home Sweet Home”

The Civil War

Whitman, Dickinson, and the Civil War

• Whitman had firsthand experiences of the war—he cared for wounded soldiers and worked as a war correspondent. He wrote extensively about the war and his experiences.

• Although Dickinson did not experience the war firsthand, she was aware of happenings of the war. Dickinson produced the majority of her work during this time period.

_____________ Wrote Leaves of Grass

_____________ Became a recluse as an adult

_____________ Used rhyme and meter of hymns in poetry

_____________ Used cadence and free verse in poetry

What Have You Learned?

Indicate whether the following statements refer to Emily Dickinson or Walt Whitman.

Emily Dickinson

Emily Dickinson

Walt Whitman

Walt Whitman

The End