The Solitary Singer: A Critical Biography of Walt Whitman

Rating:
Summary: The Good Grey Poet
Review: This is a servicable biography of Whitman that gives a solid and straightforward, though relatively unimaginative, overview of his life and writing. First published in 1955, it does a frustrating dance around the subject of Whitman's sexuality. But Jerome Loving's bio from the 1990s, it turns out, doesn't manage to unearth any more concrete evidence about this side of Whitman's life than Allen did nearly half a century ago. Allen's a little dull and unwilling to risk speculation where the record's blank, but writing before the Whitman 'boom' he's able to concentrate on the main outlines of his subject instead of the scholarly bones more recent biographers tend to pick. He sketches in Whitman's family and friends without bogging you down with exhaustive detail, and Whitman stays front-and-center through the tumultuous political crises that could easily swallow a lesser work. A good place to start if you've read the poems and want to know more about the curious man who wrote them.

Rating:
Summary: The Good Grey Poet
Review: This is a servicable biography of Whitman that gives a solid and straightforward, though relatively unimaginative, overview of his life and writing. First published in 1955, it does a frustrating dance around the subject of Whitman's sexuality. But Jerome Loving's bio from the 1990s, it turns out, doesn't manage to unearth any more concrete evidence about this side of Whitman's life than Allen did nearly half a century ago. Allen's a little dull and unwilling to risk speculation where the record's blank, but writing before the Whitman 'boom' he's able to concentrate on the main outlines of his subject instead of the scholarly bones more recent biographers tend to pick. He sketches in Whitman's family and friends without bogging you down with exhaustive detail, and Whitman stays front-and-center through the tumultuous political crises that could easily swallow a lesser work. A good place to start if you've read the poems and want to know more about the curious man who wrote them.