Whitman's Copy of the 1855 Leaves of Grass

Whitman's copy of the 1855 Leaves of Grass, into which he inserted a series of prose manuscripts, is now part of the Oscar Lion Collection at New York Public Library. One of four copies of the first edition in the Lion Collection, it is currently off-limits to researchers. Because of this, one must piece together information about it from the library's online catalog and from secondhand sources, including the work of Clifton Joseph Furness and Edward F. Grier, two earlier editors who had direct access to this unique copy and published editions of the manuscripts contained in it. The catalog entry (in which Whitman's copy is labelled simply "Copy 4") notes that the volume has "original pink paper covers" and contains "8 booklets of manuscripts, 52 leaves in all."¹ The library has created digital images of the front cover and most (though apparently not all) of the manuscript pages.²

Figure. Image of the paper front cover of Whitman's copy of the first edition of Leaves of Grass, as presented in the Digital Collection of New York Public Library.

On the cover, below the title, Whitman has written, "2'd & fullest version of original Edition / 1855–'56 / (the 1st edition consisted of the Poems alone—some months afterwards the extracts &c. prefacing the text, as here, were added—making this edition)." Another note, in the hand of Horace Traubel, is written above the title. What is known about the history of Whitman's copy of the 1855 edition of Leaves of Grass comes from this note, from a brief mention in Traubel's With Walt Whitman in Camden, and from a May 12, 1928, letter from Anne Montgomerie Traubel to Oscar Lion. In a conversation with Horace Traubel in February, 1889, Whitman said that he had kept "only one copy" of the first edition, that he didn’t at the time know where it was, and that he intended for Traubel "to have it when it reappear[ed]"³ (151). According to Anne Traubel, Whitman never did find the book; it was discovered only "several years after Whitman’s death," during the division of papers among his literary executors (Furness 118-119).

The manuscripts in Whitman's copy of the 1855 Leaves of Grass vary in apparent completeness, as well as in tone and implied audience. All of them, however, are written in prose and can be fairly described as providing some sort of introduction to Leaves of Grass. A few dates appear in the manuscripts, and these, along with other clues, suggested to Grier a range of dates during the 1860s. None of the manuscripts were published in Whitman's lifetime, though they share similarities with some of the poet's published statements, especially the introduction to As a Strong Bird on Pinions Free (1872).⁴

Unfortunately, both Furness and Grier focus almost exclusively on the manuscript material; neither provides much information about the printed book into which it is fastened. This silence—along with the lack of page images or other information in the New York Public Library catalog—leaves many basic questions about Whitman's copy of the first edition unanswerable at present.

Bibliography

Grier, Edward F. "Introductions to Leaves of Grass," Notebooks and Unpublished Prose Manuscripts (New York: New York University Press, 1984), 4:1445–1490.

Furness, Clifton Joseph. "Introductions Intended or American Editions of 'Leaves of Grass,'" Walt Whitman's Workshop (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1928), 115–137.

Traubel, Horace L. With Walt Whitman in Camden. 9 vols. 1906–1996.