Listen free for 30 days

Listen with offer

Preview
  • Leaves of Grass

  • By: Walt Whitman
  • Narrated by: Mel Foster
  • Length: 15 hrs and 55 mins
  • 4.5 out of 5 stars (2 ratings)

£0.00 for first 30 days

Thousands of incredible audiobooks and podcasts to take wherever you go.
Immerse yourself in a world of storytelling with the Plus Catalogue - unlimited listening to thousands of select audiobooks, podcasts and Audible Originals.
£7.99/month after 30 days. Renews automatically. See here for eligibility.

Leaves of Grass

By: Walt Whitman
Narrated by: Mel Foster
Try for £0.00

£7.99/month after 30 days. Renews automatically.

Buy Now for £21.99

Buy Now for £21.99

Pay using card ending in
By completing your purchase, you agree to Audible's Conditions of Use and authorise Audible to charge your designated card or any other card on file. Please see our Privacy Notice, Cookies Notice and Interest-based Ads Notice.

Summary

Abraham Lincoln read it with approval, but Emily Dickinson described its bold language and themes as "disgraceful". And Ralph Waldo Emerson found Leaves of Grass "the most extraordinary piece of wit and wisdom that America has yet contributed," calling it a "combination of the Bhagavad Gita and the New York Herald."

Published at the author's own expense on July 4, 1855, Leaves of Grass initially consisted of a preface, 12 untitled poems in free verse (including the work later titled "Song of Myself", which Malcolm Cowley called "one of the great poems of modern times"), and a now-famous portrait of a devil-may-care Walt Whitman in a workman's shirt. Over the next four decades, Whitman continually expanded and revised the book as he took on the role of a workingman's bard who championed American nationalism, political democracy, contemporary progress, and unashamed sex. This volume, which contains 383 poems, is the final "Deathbed Edition", which was published in 1892.

Public Domain (P)2010 Tantor
activate_Holiday_promo_in_buybox_DT_T2
activate_samplebutton_t1

Listeners also enjoyed...

The Poems of T. S. Eliot cover art
Thoreau: Walden / Civil Disobedience (Unabridged) cover art
Faust cover art
Shōbōgenzō cover art
Paradise Lost cover art
Atlas Shrugged cover art
Don Quixote cover art
Gargantua and Pantagruel cover art
The Inferno cover art
Absalom, Absalom! cover art
Faust: Parts 1 & 2 cover art
A Season in Hell & The Drunken Boat cover art
Don Juan cover art
Hero and Leander cover art
Cosmic Consciousness cover art
Remembrance of Things Past cover art

What listeners say about Leaves of Grass

Average customer ratings
Overall
  • 4.5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    1
  • 4 Stars
    1
  • 3 Stars
    0
  • 2 Stars
    0
  • 1 Stars
    0
Performance
  • 5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    1
  • 4 Stars
    0
  • 3 Stars
    0
  • 2 Stars
    0
  • 1 Stars
    0
Story
  • 5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    1
  • 4 Stars
    0
  • 3 Stars
    0
  • 2 Stars
    0
  • 1 Stars
    0

Reviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.