A truly significant discovery, Walt Whitman’s Manly Health and Training is an entertaining health manifesto that sheds new light on one of America’s major nineteenth-century authors. In the fall of 1858, a thirteen-part essay series appeared in the New York Atlas, under the title Manly Health and Training. This nearly 47,000-word journalistic effort, written by Walt Whitman under his pen name “Mose Velsor,” was lost for more than 150 years, buried in just a handful of library archives, until its recent unexpected discovery. What you hold in your hands is a long-lost health manifesto that, remarkably, is as relevant today as it was back in the nineteenth century. A truly illuminating discovery that reveals much about a little-known period in Whitman’s life, this men’s guide features earnest recommendations for eating, sleeping, and exercise, emphasizing moderation and focusing on the holistic relationship between the mind and the body: —Be a carnivore: “Let the main part of the diet be meat, to the exclusion of all else.” —Engage in vigorous exercise: “Habituate yourself to the brisk walk in the fresh air—to the exercise of pulling the oar—and to the loud declamation upon the hills, or along the shore.” —Go to bed by 10 p.m.: “. . . with a plentiful supply of good air, during the six, seven, or eight hours that are spent in sleep. During most of the year, the window must be kept partly open for this purpose.” —Take a cold shower in the morning: “In most cases the best thing he can commence the day with is a rapid wash of the whole body in cold water, using a sponge, or the hands.” —Wear comfortable shoes: “Most of the usual fashionable boots and shoes, which neither favor comfort, nor health, nor the ease of walking, are to be discarded.” —Grow a beard: “The beard is a great sanitary protection to the throat—for purposes of health it should always be worn, just as much as the hair of the head should be.” —Banish depression: “If the victim of ‘the horrors’ could but pluck up energy enough to strip off all his clothes and gives his whole body a stinging rubdown with a flesh-brush till the skin becomes all red and aglow, he would be thoroughly cured of his depression, by this alone.” Filled with Whitmanic aphorisms and beautifully illustrated with contemporary artwork, Manly Health and Training provides essential insight into one of the world’s most beloved poets and his philosophy on manhood, bodily perfectibility, and the future of the American body politic.

Highlights the latest currents in Whitman scholarship and demonstrates how Whitman's work transforms discussions in literary studies.

Erkkila's aim is to repair the split between the private and the public, the personal and the political and the poet and the history that has governed the analysis and evaluation of Whitman and his work in the past.

WITH WALT WHITMAN: HIMSELF immerses the reader in the life and times of the poet called "America's bard," with over 300 period images and text including extensive quotes by Walt Whitman and his family and friends (and a few enemies). Explore the fascinating roots of Whitman's great work Leaves of Grass: a family harrowed by alcoholism and mental illness; the bloody Civil War; burgeoning, brawling Manhattan and Brooklyn; literary allies and rivals; and his beloved America, racked by disunion even while racing westward. The coming year 2019 will mark the bicentennial of Walt Whitman's birth; this book anticipates the celebration with a perspective of Walt Whitman "in the nineteenth century, in America," as he himself put it. Praise for With Walt Whitman: Himself"A beautiful book of windows onto the life of Walt Whitman. From the clear ringing prose to the fascinating photographs and colored illustrations of the great poet's life we find the man anew-standing in his time and looking straight at us¿. [Huets] has made a book of marvels and I can't put it down." - Steve Scafidi, author of To the Bramble and the Briar, recipient of prizes including Miller Williams Prize and Library of Virginia Literary Award for Poetry"Jean Huets' With Walt Whitman: Himself is a true Whitmanian feast-for the intellect as well as for the eyes. It is hard to put this remarkable book down once you've opened its riches-illustrations of Whitman's various places, friends, family, disciples, contemporaries-his cities and his rural retreats. The descriptions of his life and times are concise and smart. The book keeps opening up to new facets of Whitman, his work, and his era." - Ed Folsom, Editor of Walt Whitman Quarterly Review, Co-Director of Walt Whitman Archive

Walt Whitman is a poet of contexts. His poetic practice was one of observing, absorbing, and then reflecting the world around him. Walt Whitman in Context provides brief, provocative explorations of thirty-eight different contexts - geographic, literary, cultural, and political - through which to engage Whitman's life and work. Written by distinguished scholars of Whitman and nineteenth-century American literature and culture, this collection synthesizes scholarly and historical sources and brings together new readings and original research.