Grass As a Symbol For Life and Death in Walt Whitman's "Song of myself" (PDF)

Research Paper (undergraduate) from the year 2017 in the subject American Studies - Literature, grade: 2.3, University of Erfurt, course: Nature in American Poetry, language: English, abstract: In this paper the author concentrates on one of Walt Whitman's most important poems: "Song of Myself" ,which is an exploration of the author himself, nature and his surroundings ,especially the symbolism of "grass" in it.

The author starts by classifying Leaves of Grass in American Literature, and to put the title of the book in context with the usage of grass in the poem. In the main part of the paper she is of course going to focus on the grass, how it is used and what it means, spanning themes of individuality, knowability of nature and ecology, also using theoretical approaches by Greg Garrard, W.J.T. Mitchell and Lawrence Buell.

Whitman tries to abstractly answer those questions for himself, especially considering how frail Americans must've felt on the brink of the Civil War and over the controversy of the slave trade. The theory brought forward is that the grass in the poem symbolizes humanity and life, but also death and decay, which is in one way a stark contrast. But then again, it also makes total sense after having read the whole poem, because it all connects in the life span of a human being.