QuoteProject
The United States themselves are essentially the greatest poem.
Walt Whitman
ShareWTF𝕏

Interpretation

What this quote means

Whitman emphasizes the beauty and significance of the United States as a creative and poetic entity.

In this quote, Walt Whitman expresses the idea that the United States embodies a grand and continuous poem, representing the collective experiences, struggles, and aspirations of its people. He likens the nation to a work of art, highlighting its diversity, creativity, and the profound narrative that is formed by the lives and histories of its citizens.

Themes

PoemUnited StatesBeautyArtIdentity

In practice

Example use cases

In a speech about national pride, one might say, 'As Walt Whitman put it, the United States themselves are essentially the greatest poem.'

More from Walt Whitman

All music is is what awakes from you when you are reminded by the instruments.
Walt WhitmanRead
Did you, too, O friend, suppose democracy was only for elections, for politics, and for a party name? I say democracy is only of use there that it may pass on and come to its flower and fruit in manners, in the highest forms of interaction between people, and their beliefs - in religion, literature, colleges and schools- democracy in all public and private life.
Walt WhitmanRead
In the confusion we stay with each other, happy to be together, speaking without uttering a single word.
Walt WhitmanRead
A morning-glory at my window satisfies me more than the metaphysics of books.
Walt WhitmanRead
Now, dearest comrade, lift me to your face,_x000D_ _x000D_ We must separate awhileHere! take from my lips this kiss._x000D_ _x000D_ Whoever you are, I give it especially to you;_x000D_ _x000D_ So long!And I hope we shall meet again.
Walt WhitmanRead
And whoever walks a furlong without sympathy walks to his own funeral drest in his shroud.
Walt WhitmanRead

Similar quotes

The Last Airbender is an agonizing experience in every category I can think of and others still waiting to be invented. The laws of chance suggest that something should have gone right. Not here. It puts a nail in the coffin of low-rent 3D, but it will need a lot more coffins than that.
Roger EbertRead
I suspect that all the agony that goes into writing is borne precisely because the writer longs for acceptance-but it must be acceptance on his own terms.
Ralph EllisonRead
In art, truth is a means to an end; in science, it is the only end.
William WhewellRead
The adoption of the required attitude of mind towards ideas that seem to emerge "of their own free will" and the abandonment of the critical function that is normally in operation against them seem to be hard of achievement for some people. The "involuntary thoughts" are liable to release a most violent resistance, which seeks to prevent their emergence. If we may trust that great poet and philosopher Friedrich Schiller, however, poetic creation must demand an exactly similar attitude.
Sigmund FreudRead
The more dollars the studio producers put in, the less freedom we have. If the budget hits $100m, they get scared - they'll take the existing score of a successful movie and expect composers to copy it, like wallpaper. The biggest challenge for any composer in Hollywood is to be as creative as possible within those boundaries.
A. R. RahmanRead
Images of people, cities, and landscapes from the air tell a unique story about our personal space and how we relate to one another. I've always aimed to address the bigger picture and later trends. In many ways, what a photographer does is give others a chance to step back and look at their world and gain perspective on where we stand, and what that means.
Vincent LaforetRead

A little wisdom, now and then

Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.