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Speaker 1: They should make a table where the legs are in

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Speaker 1: the not in the corners, but in the middles. And

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Speaker 1: before everybody emails it, tells me why that's a bad idea.

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Speaker 1: Just let's just try it. Has anybody tried it, you

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Speaker 1: should build it. Well you if you build it, they

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Speaker 1: will come sit at it feels topple it over as

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Speaker 1: they lean. I'm saying to always have one person on

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Speaker 1: either side of the table to keep balance. No elbows

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Speaker 1: on the table. Well, keep our manners here. Um. I

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Speaker 1: just you know, I got a leg in my way

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Speaker 1: right now. I'm sorry and I can't get close. Um,

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Speaker 1: but it's okay. We're here, we're family. Yeah, I gotta

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Speaker 1: tell you all. My my mother was helping my sister

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Speaker 1: by a home and she's they're trying to somebody was

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Speaker 1: trying to scam her, like total made up company, made

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Speaker 1: up business, made up phone number is. You can't trust people.

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Speaker 1: I'm just saying, be vigilant out there, everybody. True. I

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Speaker 1: had one last a couple of years ago or somebody.

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Speaker 1: It was during the pandemic. You were out of town

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Speaker 1: and somebody texted me pretending to be an old boss

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Speaker 1: that I had previously worked for because they found my

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Speaker 1: name on the company website. They were like, hey, it's

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Speaker 1: it's so and so your old boss. Can you do

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Speaker 1: me if I'm in a conference in a conference meeting,

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Speaker 1: I need some help real quick. I need you to

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Speaker 1: go buy some gift cards. That gift cards thing was

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Speaker 1: going around and there were people like in the d

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Speaker 1: M s being like, hey, it's Kanye. I just need

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Speaker 1: to prove like what I promised me and you know,

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Speaker 1: or like they would say, I'll send you a pick

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Speaker 1: to prove it, and it would be like clearly runway

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Speaker 1: shot or stone like a shot from set, like they

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Speaker 1: have blood on their face, something like it's me Andrew Lincoln.

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Speaker 1: I'm currently being attacked by zombies. But if you could

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Speaker 1: help me out, he could send me dollar Apple gift cards.

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Speaker 1: I think I can give them to each of these

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Speaker 1: zombies that make them go away. Anyway, Stay safe out there,

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Speaker 1: every buddy, Stay sweat, stay vigilant, don't give anyone your

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Speaker 1: name ever. Hide in your homes, don't answer the phone,

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Speaker 1: don't turn on your computer. Line your walls with dinfoil. Oh,

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Speaker 1: we're going off on a direction. Make sure you've got

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Speaker 1: six months worth of drink of clean drinking water, and

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Speaker 1: don't trust anyone. You know, if your spouse calls, it's

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Speaker 1: not them. Damn, you're really going in on this. Look,

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Speaker 1: I'm just it's better safe than sorry. I've been burned before.

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Speaker 1: I almost bought some iTunes cards. Look, we're not scamming you.

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Speaker 1: In fact, I really am Eli and I really am

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Speaker 1: Diana really are here with an exciting new episode of

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Speaker 1: Ridiculous Romance. Yes, I'm excited about this one because I

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Speaker 1: love Walt Whitman absolutely. Before you get that, we really

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Speaker 1: got some really nice reviews from some of y'all, and

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Speaker 1: I just want to say, it's the best thing in

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Speaker 1: the world, the messages we get from you all, uh

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Speaker 1: comments on our Instagram posts and these Apple podcast reviews

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Speaker 1: really do a lot, not just for our self esteem,

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Speaker 1: which they do so much, but they help other people

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Speaker 1: decide to listen to the show too, because how often

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Speaker 1: you're scrolling through you're like, oh my god, there's so

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Speaker 1: many podcasts. What are the people saying? That's what I

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Speaker 1: want to know. And we have recently gotten some really

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Speaker 1: nice reviews. I just want to share a couple here

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Speaker 1: real quick, because you put the time in sending us

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Speaker 1: your words, Let's let's send them back. This one just

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Speaker 1: came through from Naisi Maybe, and this person said, I

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Speaker 1: love this podcast so much. I wait patiently for new episodes.

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Speaker 1: I love Eli and Diana's witty banter and their way

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Speaker 1: of delving into difficult topics with grace and comedy. I

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Speaker 1: hope you to never stop making this podcast. Thank you.

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Speaker 1: I could tell you you we never stopped making this

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Speaker 1: podcast all day. Maybe their name is nice. That's a

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Speaker 1: very nice thing to say. Thank you so much for

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Speaker 1: sending that. Really like a lift to the day to

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Speaker 1: This one came from HEB Tink classic Heap Tank review here.

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Speaker 1: If you follow the heap Tank reviews, you know you're

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Speaker 1: going to get some truth. Absolutely, hep Tink says, the

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Speaker 1: hosts clearly have a background in performance. I don't know

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Speaker 1: what gave you. What do you mean, do I sound

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Speaker 1: like a thespian? Uh? They say? Because each episode is

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Speaker 1: so very engaging and entertaining. They are both hilarious. Oh

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Speaker 1: thank god, because sometimes people call one of us out

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Speaker 1: over the other and it's just too hard for the

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Speaker 1: other person. It's really tense at all. He Tink says.

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Speaker 1: We have a nice balance of wholesomeness, wit and cringe.

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Speaker 1: I appreciate how they approach each story with open minds.

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Speaker 1: I love listening to each episode and recommend it to

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Speaker 1: all my friends. Yeah, I tink doing it right. Hell yeah.

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Speaker 1: And finally, a fan among fans leaves this glowing five

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Speaker 1: star review hilarious. That's it. That's all I needed to hear. Listen.

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Speaker 1: Shakespeare once said brevity is the soul of what's right,

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Speaker 1: and Henry David Thorrow said, simplify, simplify. I always wonder

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Speaker 1: why didn't just say simplify. I'm probably gonna you're making

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Speaker 1: fun of my stammer. There's that Brooklyn quote I was

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Speaker 1: waiting for. It almost had been twenty minutes. It's always fun. Well,

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Speaker 1: let's get to Walt Whitman, because I'm very excited to

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Speaker 1: talk about this guy is one of my favorite, personal

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Speaker 1: favorite poets. I didn't read all of Leaves of Grass

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Speaker 1: by any means, but I definitely read some of it

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Speaker 1: and felt incredibly smart. In high school and early college

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Speaker 1: we had we read some selections and ap Litz and

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Speaker 1: remember that was really cool, like I'm going to check

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Speaker 1: this out. And then I found the book. I was like,

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Speaker 1: oh god, it's extremely that's a lot of poems. It's

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Speaker 1: quite a tome. But yeah, so when I say, well, women, though,

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Speaker 1: what do you think of what what comes to your mind? Um,

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Speaker 1: leaves of grass, the story I just told, that's what

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Speaker 1: comes to my Mind's like any of his famous lines

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Speaker 1: perhaps spring to mind. I would say, like, uh oh oh,

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Speaker 1: obviously do I contradict myself? Very well? I contradict myself.

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Speaker 1: I am large multit love it isn't that just says

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Speaker 1: so much? And people do. We've talked about We've come

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Speaker 1: across that in many episodes where I'm like, they're saying

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Speaker 1: one can do it another, what's going on? It's like

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Speaker 1: human behavior. Yeah, people are a lot too. It's yeah,

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Speaker 1: that's what Walt Whitman was saying in excessive words. People

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Speaker 1: are a lot. If only you could just read your

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Speaker 1: thorough simplify. One of my favorites was always I too

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Speaker 1: am not a bit tamed. I too am untranslatable. I

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Speaker 1: sound my barbaric yea over the roofs of the world.

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Speaker 1: You did not make you want to go sound a

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Speaker 1: barbaric yea over the roofs of the world. Well, both

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Speaker 1: of those famous lines were from his poems Song of Myself,

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Speaker 1: of course, one of his most famous poems. You might

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Speaker 1: recall Oh Captain, My Captain, Robin Williams jumping up on

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Speaker 1: the desk, inspiring the youth. If you're really into Walt,

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Speaker 1: you might know that the night movie Fame has a

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Speaker 1: song and it called I Sing the Body of Electric

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Speaker 1: Does that was inspired by Leaves of Grass, was taken

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Speaker 1: from Leaves of Ye. And if you don't mind a

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Speaker 1: fun fame fact, who doesn't love a good musical theater fact?

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Speaker 1: Give it to us. This is just funny for me.

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Speaker 1: But originally the movie was supposed to be called Hot Lunch. What. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: there's a there's a line in it where it's like, oh,

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Speaker 1: you want guarantees, Well all you get here is seven

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Speaker 1: classes and a hot lunch. The rest is up to you.

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Speaker 1: You know. It's like some inspiring speech or whatever. And

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Speaker 1: they they're going to call the movie Hot Lunch. They

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Speaker 1: combed through the script, looked at all their lines and said,

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Speaker 1: which one really speaks? Which one tells the story of

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Speaker 1: this movie in a single sentence? Yeah? What is everyone

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Speaker 1: going to say? Hey, did you see the new movie? Blank?

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Speaker 1: I know Hot Lunch? Well, apparently the reason it's not

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Speaker 1: called Hot Lunch. It's not just because it's terrible. No,

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Speaker 1: it's because the director Alan Parker was walking by. I

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Speaker 1: walked down the street one day pass an adult movie theater. Okay,

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Speaker 1: so they were showing a pornography called Hot Lunch starring

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Speaker 1: Al Parker, and he was like, too close for comfort?

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Speaker 1: Did I make a porn without remembering that I had

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Speaker 1: done it? Oh my god? Okay, Well, thank goodness for

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Speaker 1: Al Parker in the porn Hot Lunch for stopping the

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Speaker 1: movie fame from being called Hot Lunch. Oh my god,

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Speaker 1: that's terrible. What a terrible title movie. That's the worst

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Speaker 1: title of a movie I've heard since Needle in a

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Speaker 1: Time Stack. So bad that did that movie ever come out?

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Speaker 1: We saw a trailer like last year. Yeah, I think

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Speaker 1: we said we would actually watch. It was just a

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Speaker 1: terrible title, but it looked like it might be actually

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Speaker 1: okay anyway, Well, anyway, there's so many things inspired by

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Speaker 1: Walt Whitman's Leaves of Grass. He's just got such an

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Speaker 1: echoing legacy in in literature. But did you know that

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Speaker 1: Walt was gay? He would cruise for cuties in the

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Speaker 1: streets of the work. He frequented the first gay bar

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Speaker 1: in America. He even did a little cross dress. So

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Speaker 1: I want to talk all about Walt's love life and

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Speaker 1: how he revealed himself and his poetry and how it

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Speaker 1: caused problems throughout his lifetime, and of course the man

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Speaker 1: that he eventually fell in love with. Yes, let's hear

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Speaker 1: all about Walt's multitudes. Let's go, hey their French come listen, well,

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Speaker 1: Elia and Diana got some stories to tell. There's no matchmaking,

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Speaker 1: a romantic tips. It's just about ridiculous relationships, a lover.

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Speaker 1: It might be any type of person at all, and

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Speaker 1: abstract concept, don't a concrete wall. But if there's a story,

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Speaker 1: were the Second Clans Ridiculous Roles a production of iHeart Radio.

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Speaker 1: Waltz started out his life in Long Island, and he

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Speaker 1: was the second of nine children. And he left school

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Speaker 1: at only eleven years old. How many geniuses literary and

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Speaker 1: scientific out there like dropped out of school real early,

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Speaker 1: and here I stayed the whole time. And I'm an

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Speaker 1: idiot drop out of school. Boys and girls. He learned

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Speaker 1: from the streets. Okay, he got life. He went to

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Speaker 1: the college. I learned my poetry on the streets, I

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Speaker 1: mean kind of now. He worked as a type setter

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Speaker 1: and an errand boy. He taught at various schools. He

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Speaker 1: did some editorial writing before he started reviewing music, particularly opera,

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Speaker 1: from newspapers. He once said, quote much for the opera,

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Speaker 1: I could not have written leaves of grass. And for

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Speaker 1: much of his youth he was a teetotaler who advocated

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Speaker 1: for temperance. And this is pretty funny because later on

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Speaker 1: he became a big fan of wine. He even wrote

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Speaker 1: a temperance novel called Franklin Evans or the Inebriate in

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Speaker 1: eighteen forty two, and he later dismissed it as quote

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Speaker 1: complete rot. And he was like, I wrote that in

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Speaker 1: three days, just for the money. And by the way,

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Speaker 1: I was drunk at the time, when oh so not

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Speaker 1: much of a teetotaler after all. So I gotta say

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Speaker 1: this is you wrote down the word teetotal here teetotaler,

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Speaker 1: and I really always thought it was t e a,

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Speaker 1: and that teetotaler meant I totally only drink tea. That's

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Speaker 1: what I thought teetotaler came from. I totally only drink tea.

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Speaker 1: That is amazing. I guess that's not it. I don't

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Speaker 1: know why it isn't, because that is much more delightful,

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Speaker 1: I say, I moved to change it. I guess teetotalers

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Speaker 1: were just like straight edge, the straight edge of their time.

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Speaker 1: All right, where's the word come from? We don't have time? Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I didn't look it up. So in eight Walt was

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Speaker 1: a delegate for the Free Soil Party, which basically meant

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Speaker 1: that Walt did not necessarily believe in abolition, where the

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Speaker 1: government would come in and tell you you can't own

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Speaker 1: slaves anymore. Um. But like the others in the Free

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Speaker 1: Soil Party, he believed that expanding slavery into the new

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Speaker 1: Western territories would be a threat to free white labor. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: that's why we we need to make money out there

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Speaker 1: at all. And that was a position that William Lloyd

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Speaker 1: Garrison hilariously called quote white man ism and just white

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Speaker 1: man is um and should be you know, probably used

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Speaker 1: more often today. I'm a certified white man iss oh.

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Speaker 1: By eighteen fifty, Walt was starting to work on Leaves

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Speaker 1: of Grass, after being inspired by Ralph Waldo Emerson's eighty

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Speaker 1: four essay The Poet. He wanted to write something distinctly American,

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Speaker 1: something that captured the American spirit and culture, something about

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Speaker 1: real life. So he wrote in free verse, with themes

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Speaker 1: of nature and democracy and the self, striving for a

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Speaker 1: cadence similar to the King James Bible. This is a

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Speaker 1: Walt Whitman episode, y'all. You know where we've got to

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Speaker 1: spend a lot of our time. We're gonna go on

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Speaker 1: down the poetry corner and hear a little bit of

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Speaker 1: his poem Song of Myself, from the edition Walt Whitman.

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Speaker 1: A cosmos of Manhattan, the sun, turbulent, fleshy, sensual, eating,

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Speaker 1: drinking and breeding. No sentimentalist, no standard above men and

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Speaker 1: women or apart from them, no more modest than a modest.

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Speaker 1: Unscrew the locks from the doors. Unscrew the doors themselves

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Speaker 1: from their jams. Whoever degrades another degrades me, And whatever

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Speaker 1: is done or said returns at last to me. Through me,

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Speaker 1: the afflattists surging and surging through me the current and index.

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Speaker 1: I speak the password primeval, I give the song of democracy.

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Speaker 1: By God. I will accept nothing which all cannot have

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Speaker 1: their counterpart of on the same terms. Through me, many long,

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Speaker 1: dumb voices, voices of the interminable generations of prisoners and slaves,

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Speaker 1: voices of the diseased and despairing, and of thieves and dwarfs,

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Speaker 1: voices of cycles of preparation and accretion, and of the

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Speaker 1: threads that connects the stars, and of wounds, and of

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Speaker 1: the father stuff, and of the rights of them. The

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Speaker 1: others are down upon of the deformed, trivial, flat, foolish, despised,

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Speaker 1: fog in the air, beatles rolling balls of dung through me,

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Speaker 1: forbidden voices, voices of sexes, and lust's voices veiled, And

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Speaker 1: I remove the veil, voices indecent by me, clarified and transfigured.

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Speaker 1: I do not press my fingers across my mouth. I

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Speaker 1: keep as delicate around the bowels as around the head

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Speaker 1: and heart. Copulation is no more rank to me than

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Speaker 1: death is. I believe in the flesh and the appetites, Seeing, hearing,

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Speaker 1: feeling are miracles, And each part and tag of me

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Speaker 1: is a miracle. Divine am I inside and out, And

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Speaker 1: I make holy whatever I touch or am touched from

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Speaker 1: the scent of these armpits aroma finer than prayer, this head,

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Speaker 1: more than church's bibles and all the creeds uh this

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Speaker 1: guy's going places. So I feel like this guy is

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Speaker 1: gonna be a successful poet. I mean, I love it.

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Speaker 1: It's so evocative and fresh and real and right in

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Speaker 1: your face. Yeah, I just love it. It's really beautiful,

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Speaker 1: and I love some of this stuff like, um, like,

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Speaker 1: whoever degrades another degrades me, and whatever is done or

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Speaker 1: said returns at last to me. That's just philosophically something

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Speaker 1: I very much believe that you you can't uh, just

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Speaker 1: in the grand scale of eternity. You will suffer the

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Speaker 1: bad things you do to other people and vice versa,

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Speaker 1: and the good things too. So it's best to put

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Speaker 1: as much good out there as you can. You have

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Speaker 1: to are literally building our own paradise, Spike by doing

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Speaker 1: better things for other people anyway, without getting to into it. Well,

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Speaker 1: he presented the very first edition, which he self published

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Speaker 1: in eighteen fifty five, to his brother George, who said

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Speaker 1: it quote wasn't worth reading. I brought your leaves of grass,

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Speaker 1: George is like, you know, walts grass comes in blades,

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Speaker 1: not leaves, So again I'm throwing this in the fire. Well,

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Speaker 1: George was not the only one who felt that way.

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Speaker 1: The collection was not popular. UM sales were minimal Again,

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Speaker 1: he was breaking all the rules of poetry. He was

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Speaker 1: doing this rhyming thing. He wasn't talking about the same

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Speaker 1: themes that people were talking about, and they were just like,

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Speaker 1: what the hell am I like? An app roses are red?

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Speaker 1: Violence of blue? Hey, Walt Whitman learned to write a poem. Wow,

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Speaker 1: I could break convention too. But things changed a little

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Speaker 1: after he received a very complimentary letter from Ralph Waldo

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Speaker 1: Emerson himself, saying quote, Dear Sir, I am not blind

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Speaker 1: to the worth of the wonderful gift of leaves of grass.

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Speaker 1: I find it the most extraordinary piece of wit and

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Speaker 1: wisdom America has yet contributed. I rubbed my eyes a

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Speaker 1: little to see if this sunbeam were no illusion. Damn.

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Speaker 1: I mean you liked this ship into it? Yeah, for real.

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Speaker 1: I was a big Emerson fan in school, totally. I

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Speaker 1: really liked Transcendentalism back in high school. Couldn't define it

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Speaker 1: for you today, but I know at the time I

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Speaker 1: was very into like, this is it. Yeah, this is

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Speaker 1: all I'll ever care about from no one. Give my

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Speaker 1: little poetry journal, and the first page was like, it's

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Speaker 1: time to start journaling. And I still have that notebook

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Speaker 1: with that unsentenced written in it and nothing else and

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Speaker 1: six more just like it. I saw some tweet the

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Speaker 1: other day it was like, this is my emotional support

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Speaker 1: pile of unfilled notebooks. Exactly stop now. Of course, once

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Speaker 1: people like myself knew that Ralph Waldo Emerson, the literary

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Speaker 1: taste maker himself liked the book Leaves of Grass, it

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Speaker 1: became more widely distributed and read. But the reviews started

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Speaker 1: to focus more on the obscene nature of the poetry,

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Speaker 1: as they called it, the breeding and the fleshy sensual stuff.

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Speaker 1: They were like, right, too much. So Walt took a

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Speaker 1: quote from Emerson's letter that said, I greet you at

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Speaker 1: the beginning of a great career, and he embossed that

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Speaker 1: in gold leaf on the second edition of Leaves of Grass,

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Speaker 1: essentially inventing the book blurb, with a foreword by Ralph

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Speaker 1: Waldo Emerson, it's once she really is the defining America.

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Speaker 1: It was like, I need a marketing hook now. But

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Speaker 1: this was almost not published because of all the bad

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Speaker 1: reviews that had come out before. But it did come

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Speaker 1: out in eighteen fifty six with an additional twenty poems,

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Speaker 1: and it continued to be added to and revised. Throughout

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Speaker 1: Walt's life. He would just keep, but not a new edition.

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Speaker 1: It was like, you know, a video game, he just kept.

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Speaker 1: It was a new update, new update. You thought you

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Speaker 1: bought it, but it's not done yet, still going. People

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Speaker 1: were probably like, I already paid for this book once.

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Speaker 1: You can't keep changing it because there's so much news.

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Speaker 1: Have you got the DLC yet for leaves of Grass?

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Speaker 1: The Snyder cut? No, I don't want the Snyder cut

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Speaker 1: of Leaves of Grass. You have to read ity slow.

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Speaker 1: Waltz is probably more like released the butt hole cuts accurate.

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Speaker 1: So all these new editions and revisions we're often very revealing.

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Speaker 1: For example, in eighteen forty eight, Walt went to New

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Speaker 1: Orleans and he had a little bit of a love affair,

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Speaker 1: and he wrote about that in a poem called once

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Speaker 1: I passed through a populous city and surely describes all

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Speaker 1: the things he passed through. The story at the time

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Speaker 1: was that he had had an affair with this aristocratic

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Speaker 1: creole woman and caused a total scandal, and he did

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Speaker 1: abruptly leave both his journalism job and the entire city

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Speaker 1: of New Orleans only three months after he got there.

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Speaker 1: So was something of a scandal. But, as Richter Norton

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Speaker 1: writes in his article Walt Whitman Profit of Gay Liberation,

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Speaker 1: the original handwritten poem was found in nineteen twenty five,

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Speaker 1: and then they discovered that Walt had changed the gender

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Speaker 1: in the poem to make it more palatable for publishers.

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Speaker 1: Richter writes, quote such a subterfuge, of course, suggests that Whitman,

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Speaker 1: far from being an innocent, was aware of the queer

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Speaker 1: nature of his passions. So literally is like in the

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Speaker 1: in Leaves of Grass, the new addition that came out,

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00:22:14,720 --> 00:22:18,080
Speaker 1: it was about him and a lady. But when they

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Speaker 1: found the original letter, they were like, oh ship, oh

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Speaker 1: he crossed out he and him and man and boy

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Speaker 1: and all this stuff. He was like, oh, they're not

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Speaker 1: going to print this right, So I want to put

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Speaker 1: us back in poetry corner so we can hear a

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Speaker 1: little bit of Once I passed through a populous city.

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Speaker 1: Once I passed through a populous city, imprinting my brain

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Speaker 1: for future use with its shows, architecture, customs, tradition. Yet now,

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Speaker 1: of all that city, I remember only a man I

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Speaker 1: casually met there who detained me for love of me.

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Speaker 1: Day by day and night by night. We worked together.

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Speaker 1: All else has long been forgotten by me. I remember,

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Speaker 1: I saw only that man who passionately clung to me. Again,

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Speaker 1: we wander, we love, We separate again. Again he holds

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Speaker 1: me by the hand. I must not go. I see

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Speaker 1: him close beside me, with silent lips, sad and tremulous.

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Speaker 1: M hmm, lovely, that's nice. I saw a lot of

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Speaker 1: ship in New Orleans, and I do not remember a

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Speaker 1: thing about it. Yeah. Um, interesting romantic than that, right,

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Speaker 1: Interesting that so much of this poem. He uses me

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Speaker 1: so much in this poem. It's all like his love

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Speaker 1: of me. This is not forgotten by me. He clung

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Speaker 1: to me. Um, It's just it puts you in his place, right, Like,

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Speaker 1: That's what it feels like to me, is I'm me,

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Speaker 1: I'm here, like I don't know, just feeling what he's feeling.

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Speaker 1: It's it's a very personalizing way to write it. Yeah, well,

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Speaker 1: and he was so concerned with personality and self and stuff.

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Speaker 1: He probably really wanted that to feel like you were

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Speaker 1: seeing through his eyes and feeling what he was feeling

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Speaker 1: at the time that he was seeing those things. They

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Speaker 1: certainly degree you can look at some of his poems

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Speaker 1: and be like, well, this guy was very excited about

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Speaker 1: himself and was like, y'all would be lucky to be me.

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Speaker 1: I contain multitudes. You're just you're just a single tude.

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Speaker 1: But what's great and get in on my multitudes? Well,

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Speaker 1: what's great is like his line about I'm I'm no

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Speaker 1: standard above man or woman, no more modest than a

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Speaker 1: modest because he's saying that's me, So that's also usual.

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Speaker 1: It's not just me. Everyone has this heavenliness about them

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Speaker 1: simply and solely because you exist in this miraculous world.

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Speaker 1: And I think that's really beautiful. Except for Kevin Down.

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00:25:02,160 --> 00:25:05,679
Speaker 1: That guy sucks. He always leaves a cart in the

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Speaker 1: middle of parking lot. Now more editions came in the

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Speaker 1: eighteen sixty third edition, and these were called the Calamus

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Speaker 1: Cluster of Poems. Rictor Norton says that in eighteen fifty

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Speaker 1: eight or eighteen fifty nine, Walt wrote in his personal

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Speaker 1: journals about an affair with a man that he just

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00:25:22,000 --> 00:25:26,400
Speaker 1: preferred to as M. The letter M M is race

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Speaker 1: Fiends in the New Bond movies. Maybe it was race Fiends.

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Speaker 1: It wasn't look Walt Whitman would totally fall for Race,

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Speaker 1: absolutely too. Honestly, they make a great couple. Let's assume

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00:25:36,359 --> 00:25:41,720
Speaker 1: that was a race Fiends type, the speculations station Beens type.

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00:25:42,359 --> 00:25:46,600
Speaker 1: Rictor writes, quote, this affair apparently involved a completely frank

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Speaker 1: acceptance of himself as homosexual, but that Walt's love was

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00:25:51,040 --> 00:25:56,400
Speaker 1: not reciprocated. Walt wrote, quote, I loved a certain person ardently,

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00:25:56,560 --> 00:25:59,280
Speaker 1: and my love was not returned yet. Out of that,

402
00:25:59,440 --> 00:26:02,640
Speaker 1: I have written these songs. And when they broke up,

403
00:26:02,640 --> 00:26:05,560
Speaker 1: what was almost driven to suicide. He was so upset,

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00:26:05,920 --> 00:26:08,800
Speaker 1: but instead it led to the Calumus poems. Fortunately, I

405
00:26:08,840 --> 00:26:12,040
Speaker 1: guess he had a better way to express his dispandum.

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00:26:12,200 --> 00:26:16,760
Speaker 1: And Richter says that Whitman quote in effect, came out

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Speaker 1: with the lines I will therefore let flame from me

408
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Speaker 1: the burning fires that were threatening to consume me. Okay.

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Speaker 1: He also points out that calamus itself has a special significance.

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00:26:29,480 --> 00:26:32,159
Speaker 1: Um it's a plant that mostly grows by ponds, and

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00:26:32,200 --> 00:26:36,520
Speaker 1: it's capped by tubers that look like penises. They kind of, oh, yeah,

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00:26:36,560 --> 00:26:39,840
Speaker 1: I'm familiar with the penis plans. The penis than Yeah,

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00:26:40,000 --> 00:26:44,959
Speaker 1: everyone's favorite that goes around. There's always memes the penis.

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00:26:45,000 --> 00:26:48,760
Speaker 1: Then it's also was named for a river god, Calamus,

415
00:26:49,280 --> 00:26:51,840
Speaker 1: who grieved the death of his boy lover who drowned.

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00:26:52,320 --> 00:26:54,720
Speaker 1: That's why he's always next to a body of water

417
00:26:57,160 --> 00:27:01,600
Speaker 1: like this. Yeah, exactly, And in Calumus, I'm talking about Dick.

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00:27:01,720 --> 00:27:07,160
Speaker 1: These are my poems poems, I mean, Richter says, quote,

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00:27:07,200 --> 00:27:09,560
Speaker 1: it's not likely that Whitman would have called these Calumus

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Speaker 1: poems without being fully aware of the plants homeo erotic coating. Yeah. Um.

421
00:27:14,240 --> 00:27:17,240
Speaker 1: But funnily enough, when he did receive a letter in

422
00:27:17,320 --> 00:27:21,200
Speaker 1: eighteen ninety from a stranger named John Simmons asking him

423
00:27:21,200 --> 00:27:23,800
Speaker 1: point blank if the Calumus poems were about gay love,

424
00:27:24,400 --> 00:27:28,120
Speaker 1: Won't wrote back a letter that was basically like, uh, no,

425
00:27:28,400 --> 00:27:30,679
Speaker 1: I don't know what you're talking about. I have six

426
00:27:30,760 --> 00:27:35,600
Speaker 1: illegitimate children out there. I stay fucking so explain yourself.

427
00:27:35,640 --> 00:27:39,160
Speaker 1: So it just was very defensive. My girlfriends in Canada.

428
00:27:39,240 --> 00:27:43,480
Speaker 1: You can't meet her, you've never met her, but beautiful

429
00:27:43,560 --> 00:27:48,120
Speaker 1: children together. But actually no historian has ever been able

430
00:27:48,119 --> 00:27:52,480
Speaker 1: to trace any of these alleged children. Probably just said

431
00:27:52,520 --> 00:27:54,680
Speaker 1: that in a France. I mean, this is a stranger,

432
00:27:54,720 --> 00:27:59,720
Speaker 1: so you don't just be like, don't asking me, Yeah, right,

433
00:27:59,760 --> 00:28:01,719
Speaker 1: I can you. I don't know. You ain't gonna tell

434
00:28:01,720 --> 00:28:04,200
Speaker 1: you who I sleep with. Okay, so I can understand

435
00:28:04,200 --> 00:28:06,800
Speaker 1: why he might either not respond to that letter or

436
00:28:06,920 --> 00:28:09,480
Speaker 1: respond with a lie. But I think it's so funny.

437
00:28:09,480 --> 00:28:14,159
Speaker 1: He was like, oh whatever, He's like, Look, I already

438
00:28:14,359 --> 00:28:17,360
Speaker 1: told you I called him the dick poems, the dick

439
00:28:17,400 --> 00:28:21,240
Speaker 1: plant poems. So with no, I'm not going to answer

440
00:28:21,280 --> 00:28:23,520
Speaker 1: your very dumb letter. All you told me is you

441
00:28:23,560 --> 00:28:26,359
Speaker 1: have no literacy, sir, and no respect for botany. M

442
00:28:28,080 --> 00:28:31,600
Speaker 1: You don't know the language of flowers. But now Walt

443
00:28:31,720 --> 00:28:34,679
Speaker 1: might have been feeling more free to be me, you

444
00:28:34,680 --> 00:28:37,560
Speaker 1: know what I mean, because in eighteen fifty nine he

445
00:28:37,640 --> 00:28:41,280
Speaker 1: started frequenting a bar called Facts that might very well

446
00:28:41,400 --> 00:28:45,160
Speaker 1: be the very first gay bar in America. And we

447
00:28:45,240 --> 00:28:48,720
Speaker 1: will hear much more about that right after these messages.

448
00:28:54,680 --> 00:29:01,320
Speaker 1: Welcome back to Walt Whitman. Welcome, welcome back, Hold back Whitman. Wow,

449
00:29:01,760 --> 00:29:07,400
Speaker 1: so proper, Okay, we're talking about Fafts quite possibly the

450
00:29:07,440 --> 00:29:11,400
Speaker 1: first gay bar in America. And look, Fafts is a

451
00:29:11,440 --> 00:29:13,880
Speaker 1: great name for a gay bar. Quite frankly, I don't

452
00:29:13,920 --> 00:29:18,600
Speaker 1: care what decade it is, what century, who opened it.

453
00:29:19,000 --> 00:29:21,280
Speaker 1: One day, Babe, let's open a gay bar called FAPs.

454
00:29:21,320 --> 00:29:26,200
Speaker 1: Absolutely great. Look, if there were a bar in town

455
00:29:26,280 --> 00:29:29,520
Speaker 1: called Fabs, I would assumed that it was a gable.

456
00:29:30,680 --> 00:29:32,960
Speaker 1: It's got to be better than the recently closed gay

457
00:29:33,000 --> 00:29:37,600
Speaker 1: bar down the street from us, the cockpit. Come on,

458
00:29:38,200 --> 00:29:42,040
Speaker 1: it's a little on the nose. I guess. Fafts owner

459
00:29:42,280 --> 00:29:45,600
Speaker 1: was a German guy named Charles Faff, who modeled the

460
00:29:45,600 --> 00:29:48,360
Speaker 1: bar on the beer sellers that were popular in Germany

461
00:29:48,360 --> 00:29:52,680
Speaker 1: at the time. Now Walt, the former teetotaler who used

462
00:29:52,680 --> 00:29:55,960
Speaker 1: to totally only drink tea but now drinks a lot

463
00:29:55,960 --> 00:29:59,040
Speaker 1: more than that. He once said he was quote the

464
00:29:59,080 --> 00:30:04,560
Speaker 1: best selector of champagne in America. Again Walt, he very

465
00:30:04,600 --> 00:30:06,280
Speaker 1: short of himself in a lot of ways because he

466
00:30:06,400 --> 00:30:08,440
Speaker 1: was like, I have listen, I've drank a lot of

467
00:30:08,520 --> 00:30:13,520
Speaker 1: champagne at this point. This man has the finest. But

468
00:30:13,760 --> 00:30:17,320
Speaker 1: it was the company that really made fast special right,

469
00:30:17,360 --> 00:30:22,000
Speaker 1: and it was frequented by Bohemians led by Henry Clapp Jr.

470
00:30:22,600 --> 00:30:26,760
Speaker 1: Henry was this notable anti slavery and temperance advocate. But

471
00:30:27,120 --> 00:30:30,360
Speaker 1: then he went to free Will in France. You know

472
00:30:30,400 --> 00:30:32,920
Speaker 1: what happens when any of our subjects go off to France,

473
00:30:32,960 --> 00:30:37,880
Speaker 1: they come back just ready. For he returned to America

474
00:30:38,400 --> 00:30:42,560
Speaker 1: one hundred pent done with social reform, and he fully

475
00:30:42,560 --> 00:30:46,880
Speaker 1: committed to Bohemian values of free love, poverty, and the

476
00:30:46,880 --> 00:30:52,280
Speaker 1: appreciation of beauty and art. Full on rent vibes. Absolutely,

477
00:30:52,760 --> 00:30:56,160
Speaker 1: he definitely light my candle. He definitely jumped on a

478
00:30:56,200 --> 00:30:59,239
Speaker 1: table full of food, kicked plates off as he was

479
00:30:59,560 --> 00:31:05,960
Speaker 1: dancing around talking about life or whatever. Exactly really obnoxious

480
00:31:05,960 --> 00:31:11,360
Speaker 1: stuff probably, But this is the guy who gathered together

481
00:31:11,440 --> 00:31:15,280
Speaker 1: all these notable poets and writers and actors and actresses, artists,

482
00:31:15,280 --> 00:31:17,960
Speaker 1: all these folks to hang out at fafts. This is

483
00:31:17,960 --> 00:31:20,800
Speaker 1: not just Walt Whitman, but also Thomas Nast, who was

484
00:31:20,840 --> 00:31:24,320
Speaker 1: the cartoonist who gave us the modern version of Santa

485
00:31:24,400 --> 00:31:31,720
Speaker 1: Claus gay Icon, m gay Icon. We also had the

486
00:31:31,800 --> 00:31:35,880
Speaker 1: humorist Artemis Ward, who was considered the first stand up

487
00:31:35,920 --> 00:31:40,040
Speaker 1: comedian icon truly the philosopher of his time, I'm sure

488
00:31:40,280 --> 00:31:44,000
Speaker 1: sure really was staying some show that really mattered. And

489
00:31:44,160 --> 00:31:48,400
Speaker 1: also Ada Claire, who was an actress who shocked the

490
00:31:48,440 --> 00:31:55,000
Speaker 1: world by living unapologetically as a single mother to an

491
00:31:55,040 --> 00:32:05,000
Speaker 1: illegitimate child. Oh woman, bring me my fainting couch, living alone, Wow,

492
00:32:05,920 --> 00:32:07,680
Speaker 1: fasts just you never know what you're gonna get at

493
00:32:07,720 --> 00:32:13,080
Speaker 1: Fafts Types Types Now for over ten years, Fafts became

494
00:32:13,160 --> 00:32:17,920
Speaker 1: as writer Alan Gerganis wrote, quote the Andy Warhol Factory,

495
00:32:18,040 --> 00:32:21,840
Speaker 1: Studio fifty four and the Algonquin Round Table all rolled

496
00:32:21,880 --> 00:32:25,200
Speaker 1: into one. Hell, yes, I would go to fasts. Henry

497
00:32:25,200 --> 00:32:28,760
Speaker 1: Clapp also started this little zine called The Saturday Press,

498
00:32:29,240 --> 00:32:32,200
Speaker 1: which was one of the few publications to champion Leaves

499
00:32:32,240 --> 00:32:36,040
Speaker 1: of Grass, and it contributed to the much greater success

500
00:32:36,120 --> 00:32:39,200
Speaker 1: of the third edition with all those Dick poems, right, yeah,

501
00:32:39,360 --> 00:32:42,440
Speaker 1: which I hope, I hope he when he would be like, hey,

502
00:32:42,520 --> 00:32:46,320
Speaker 1: all you reviewers that keep talking about Walt Whitman, I

503
00:32:46,360 --> 00:32:49,680
Speaker 1: got a clap back, right, I'm Henry Clapp and I

504
00:32:49,760 --> 00:32:52,720
Speaker 1: got a clap. But now the real draw for Wall

505
00:32:52,800 --> 00:32:54,840
Speaker 1: was that it fast, he could hang out with men

506
00:32:54,920 --> 00:32:58,480
Speaker 1: who loved men. Um. He met a man there named

507
00:32:58,480 --> 00:33:02,520
Speaker 1: Fred Gray who created the Red Gray Association. According to

508
00:33:02,600 --> 00:33:05,880
Speaker 1: Whitman biographers Ed Folsom and Ken Price, that was quote

509
00:33:05,920 --> 00:33:08,920
Speaker 1: a loose confederation of young men who seemed anxious to

510
00:33:08,960 --> 00:33:13,480
Speaker 1: explore new possibilities of male male affection, and in a

511
00:33:13,520 --> 00:33:18,520
Speaker 1: PPS documentary about Walt Witman, Literary scholar Karen Carbiner says

512
00:33:18,560 --> 00:33:21,760
Speaker 1: that Walt even did a little cross dressing during this time.

513
00:33:22,360 --> 00:33:26,240
Speaker 1: He would wear women's fluffy bloomers tucked into his boots,

514
00:33:27,000 --> 00:33:29,440
Speaker 1: so he was kind of like, hey, boys, how you doing.

515
00:33:30,160 --> 00:33:32,320
Speaker 1: And I think that's so funny because at the time,

516
00:33:32,440 --> 00:33:35,920
Speaker 1: all these orthodox clergy guys and dudes that didn't like

517
00:33:35,960 --> 00:33:40,320
Speaker 1: women's rights. Basically, we're like, bloomers will bring down society,

518
00:33:40,400 --> 00:33:44,040
Speaker 1: you know, women in pants everything, miss we'll be on fire,

519
00:33:45,160 --> 00:33:49,000
Speaker 1: you know, the downfall of masculinity exactly. Well, they called it,

520
00:33:49,120 --> 00:33:53,080
Speaker 1: quote a usurpation in male authority, So I think, look

521
00:33:53,120 --> 00:33:56,760
Speaker 1: what happened. Men were totally usurped do they were used, sir,

522
00:33:56,920 --> 00:34:00,560
Speaker 1: There was no male authority after you too. When a

523
00:34:00,560 --> 00:34:02,880
Speaker 1: woman put on a pair of pants, it's done. That

524
00:34:02,920 --> 00:34:07,320
Speaker 1: was the last time. But I found it kind of

525
00:34:07,360 --> 00:34:10,439
Speaker 1: a layered irony that they were pants were for men,

526
00:34:10,880 --> 00:34:13,440
Speaker 1: and then women made women's pants, and then Walt was

527
00:34:13,480 --> 00:34:16,359
Speaker 1: wearing women's pants to show that he was a man

528
00:34:16,400 --> 00:34:21,680
Speaker 1: who loved men like women. Cat wear pants. Alright, I'm

529
00:34:21,719 --> 00:34:26,160
Speaker 1: a man, I'll put them on pants. They're wrong, no

530
00:34:26,200 --> 00:34:30,000
Speaker 1: matter what to do. Yeah, boy pants can't get away

531
00:34:30,000 --> 00:34:33,239
Speaker 1: with anything. It's also at fasts that Walt met his

532
00:34:33,360 --> 00:34:38,040
Speaker 1: first long term boyfriend, a man two decades younger named

533
00:34:38,120 --> 00:34:42,040
Speaker 1: Fred Mona. Well, Walt was about forty and so Fred

534
00:34:42,120 --> 00:34:47,440
Speaker 1: was twenty. Um this. He lived with Fred for several years,

535
00:34:47,600 --> 00:34:50,080
Speaker 1: and they only broke up once Vawn reached an age

536
00:34:50,120 --> 00:34:52,880
Speaker 1: where he was expected to get married and start popping

537
00:34:52,880 --> 00:34:58,000
Speaker 1: out baby Oh yeah, yeah, so probably around Oh wait,

538
00:34:58,280 --> 00:35:01,840
Speaker 1: is that what Leo did? DiCaprio. He's like, you're supposed

539
00:35:01,840 --> 00:35:03,560
Speaker 1: to start having babies now, and I can't do that

540
00:35:03,600 --> 00:35:07,080
Speaker 1: for you. So that's not the man I'm breaking it

541
00:35:07,160 --> 00:35:13,879
Speaker 1: up with you. For you, is Walt another? Leo's five?

542
00:35:14,000 --> 00:35:18,200
Speaker 1: You gotta go for a drive away from me. No,

543
00:35:18,400 --> 00:35:22,839
Speaker 1: that's not what he does. Justin Martin, in his book

544
00:35:22,880 --> 00:35:26,040
Speaker 1: Rebel Souls, says that Fred ended up working as an

545
00:35:26,040 --> 00:35:31,080
Speaker 1: insurance salesman and elevator operator while his wife raised four sons.

546
00:35:31,120 --> 00:35:34,880
Speaker 1: Good for you, Fred, but he also became a terrible alcoholic,

547
00:35:35,520 --> 00:35:39,000
Speaker 1: Martin writes. Quote. In the early eighteen seventies, after roughly

548
00:35:39,040 --> 00:35:42,839
Speaker 1: a decade of silence, Vaughan reconnected with Whitman, writing him

549
00:35:42,880 --> 00:35:47,160
Speaker 1: several letters, one of which includes the following heartrending passage.

550
00:35:47,719 --> 00:35:52,239
Speaker 1: I never stole, robbed, cheated, nor defrauded any person out

551
00:35:52,239 --> 00:35:54,880
Speaker 1: of anything, and yet I feel that I have not

552
00:35:55,080 --> 00:35:59,439
Speaker 1: been honest to myself, my family, nor my friends. One

553
00:35:59,520 --> 00:36:03,839
Speaker 1: letter in lutes, my love, my Walt is with you always.

554
00:36:05,040 --> 00:36:08,279
Speaker 1: That's so sad. You know, he tried to do it

555
00:36:08,320 --> 00:36:11,439
Speaker 1: the way he was told and miserable. Yeah, I'm sure

556
00:36:11,440 --> 00:36:13,239
Speaker 1: he was happy with the kids and stuff, but like

557
00:36:13,280 --> 00:36:15,960
Speaker 1: he was so miserable, right right, well again, you know,

558
00:36:16,400 --> 00:36:18,080
Speaker 1: do you feel like he was lying to himself like

559
00:36:18,120 --> 00:36:20,759
Speaker 1: he did. I never defrauded anyone, but I feel like

560
00:36:20,760 --> 00:36:25,120
Speaker 1: I did fraud it myself. Yeah. Ah, summer, really bummer,

561
00:36:25,560 --> 00:36:30,200
Speaker 1: speaking of bummers. Speaking of bummers. The Civil War was looming,

562
00:36:31,239 --> 00:36:36,400
Speaker 1: one of America's biggest bummers, and when it came, Waltz

563
00:36:36,440 --> 00:36:39,000
Speaker 1: carefree nights at fasts would be over for a while

564
00:36:39,719 --> 00:36:42,719
Speaker 1: because Walt's brother, George, volunteered for the Union Army, but

565
00:36:43,000 --> 00:36:45,520
Speaker 1: Walt did not. He was forty two years old and

566
00:36:45,560 --> 00:36:48,959
Speaker 1: he'd grown up with Quaker values. Didn't stop his brother,

567
00:36:49,200 --> 00:36:53,120
Speaker 1: but Walt adhered to this. He wanted to do his part, though,

568
00:36:53,200 --> 00:36:56,800
Speaker 1: so he became a nurse and he wrote poems about

569
00:36:56,840 --> 00:37:00,360
Speaker 1: the sacrifice of the soldiers and the horrors of warhaw spitals,

570
00:37:00,360 --> 00:37:04,760
Speaker 1: where he would walk by baskets of amputated legs, arms

571
00:37:04,960 --> 00:37:07,760
Speaker 1: and hands and feet just waiting to be carted away.

572
00:37:08,920 --> 00:37:12,239
Speaker 1: His work consisted of bringing tobacco and oranges to the soldiers,

573
00:37:12,520 --> 00:37:15,560
Speaker 1: writing letters that they dictated their loved ones, and dressing

574
00:37:15,600 --> 00:37:18,640
Speaker 1: their wounds. Which I gotta say. If I had someone

575
00:37:18,680 --> 00:37:20,960
Speaker 1: writing my letters home and it was Walt Whitman, oh

576
00:37:20,960 --> 00:37:24,480
Speaker 1: my god, why don't you just say, however you think,

577
00:37:26,480 --> 00:37:28,160
Speaker 1: tell my wife I love her and miss her, but

578
00:37:28,200 --> 00:37:30,000
Speaker 1: do it in like a Walt Whitman kind of way.

579
00:37:32,360 --> 00:37:35,200
Speaker 1: But do it like good you know what. Although at

580
00:37:35,239 --> 00:37:37,160
Speaker 1: the time they might have been like, yeah, you can

581
00:37:37,160 --> 00:37:39,319
Speaker 1: write my letter to my mom, don't include any dick

582
00:37:39,400 --> 00:37:48,800
Speaker 1: steps that the calumus letters home to my mother, I

583
00:37:49,239 --> 00:37:54,839
Speaker 1: would read that you got like, dear mother, it's been

584
00:37:54,960 --> 00:37:58,480
Speaker 1: eighteen days since I've seen a warm bed and a

585
00:37:58,520 --> 00:38:02,040
Speaker 1: hot meal, but it's only been two days since I've

586
00:38:02,080 --> 00:38:10,319
Speaker 1: seen a long, turgid flower down by the pond. This

587
00:38:10,440 --> 00:38:13,560
Speaker 1: mother gets it. She's like, what is happening to poor

588
00:38:14,600 --> 00:38:17,480
Speaker 1: what's his name? What's a civil war name? What's happening

589
00:38:17,480 --> 00:38:22,319
Speaker 1: to poor Josiah. He's like, ps, my letters are being

590
00:38:22,360 --> 00:38:26,200
Speaker 1: dictated to Walt Whitman, who is putting his own spin

591
00:38:26,239 --> 00:38:32,040
Speaker 1: a problem, which is like, oh, that's that nasty poet. Now.

592
00:38:32,080 --> 00:38:35,680
Speaker 1: The National Endowment for the Humanity says that Walt cared

593
00:38:35,800 --> 00:38:39,360
Speaker 1: for tens of thousands of soldiers around Washington, d c.

594
00:38:39,840 --> 00:38:42,960
Speaker 1: And this earned him the nickname the good Gray poet.

595
00:38:44,000 --> 00:38:48,400
Speaker 1: He's like a like a Gandalf given them magic words.

596
00:38:48,800 --> 00:38:51,719
Speaker 1: They did actually say that he kind of had a

597
00:38:51,800 --> 00:38:55,719
Speaker 1: preternatural ability for feeling like he would come along and

598
00:38:57,000 --> 00:38:59,640
Speaker 1: somehow it would help in a way that the other

599
00:38:59,680 --> 00:39:03,080
Speaker 1: doctor or nurses were able to do. It's really interesting

600
00:39:03,160 --> 00:39:06,280
Speaker 1: the power of words right right there. Like he said,

601
00:39:06,440 --> 00:39:09,080
Speaker 1: I am holy, All that is me is holy. Everything

602
00:39:09,080 --> 00:39:11,279
Speaker 1: I touched becomes holy. That was like in his in

603
00:39:11,400 --> 00:39:14,000
Speaker 1: leaves of grass. And they were like, it's kind of true.

604
00:39:14,719 --> 00:39:17,360
Speaker 1: The pen and the sword, like that's not that's not

605
00:39:17,440 --> 00:39:20,719
Speaker 1: from nothing. No, they don't say that for nothing. Richter

606
00:39:20,800 --> 00:39:23,400
Speaker 1: Norton says that Walt fell in love with several soldiers

607
00:39:23,520 --> 00:39:27,759
Speaker 1: during this time, including a fellow by the name of

608
00:39:28,000 --> 00:39:32,280
Speaker 1: Tom Sawyer. Now, this likely could be the actual Tom

609
00:39:32,320 --> 00:39:34,720
Speaker 1: Sawyer who was a real person. He was a fireman

610
00:39:34,760 --> 00:39:38,080
Speaker 1: who rescued ninety people from a ship fire once, and

611
00:39:38,160 --> 00:39:40,839
Speaker 1: he was good friends with Mark Twain and the inspiration

612
00:39:40,880 --> 00:39:44,200
Speaker 1: for his character of the same name. Wow, the real

613
00:39:44,280 --> 00:39:46,759
Speaker 1: Tom Sawyer, I'm madam made out with Walt Whitman. Real

614
00:39:46,800 --> 00:39:50,160
Speaker 1: Tom Sawyer led a much more fascinating life than the

615
00:39:50,160 --> 00:39:52,960
Speaker 1: fictional Tom Sawyer. Oh my god, it's insane because I

616
00:39:53,040 --> 00:39:55,080
Speaker 1: read a whole thing about and it doesn't even this night.

617
00:39:55,239 --> 00:39:58,799
Speaker 1: This nine person rescue is not even the least of

618
00:39:58,800 --> 00:40:01,279
Speaker 1: the ship that he did. He is amazing. Does he

619
00:40:01,360 --> 00:40:03,600
Speaker 1: have much of a love life? I mean they got

620
00:40:03,600 --> 00:40:06,160
Speaker 1: married and open to bar Okay, that's enough for me

621
00:40:06,200 --> 00:40:08,880
Speaker 1: to do an episode on Tom Sawyer for like y'all know,

622
00:40:08,960 --> 00:40:12,560
Speaker 1: we'll stretch it to tell a good story. Walt also

623
00:40:12,680 --> 00:40:15,920
Speaker 1: likely fell in love with a man named Lou Brown,

624
00:40:16,160 --> 00:40:19,520
Speaker 1: which is very funny here in the house because that's

625
00:40:19,560 --> 00:40:26,080
Speaker 1: Diana's dad's name. I know he but surely your father

626
00:40:26,120 --> 00:40:28,640
Speaker 1: appreciates Walt Whitman, but probably would not have fallen in

627
00:40:28,640 --> 00:40:33,000
Speaker 1: love with him, doubtful. Walt even suggested that he and

628
00:40:33,040 --> 00:40:37,319
Speaker 1: all these guys go live together. Um, it's just a

629
00:40:37,360 --> 00:40:41,359
Speaker 1: big party. Full of firemen and writers and soldiers and

630
00:40:41,640 --> 00:40:44,360
Speaker 1: me right in the middle. Give me a sexy threesome

631
00:40:44,480 --> 00:40:48,520
Speaker 1: to manage to live in rerst of my life. You there, fireman,

632
00:40:48,640 --> 00:40:51,399
Speaker 1: you there, soldier. Come over to my place, and I'm

633
00:40:51,400 --> 00:40:54,920
Speaker 1: just gonna write about all these incredible things that are happening.

634
00:40:55,760 --> 00:40:58,120
Speaker 1: Another man that Walt wanted to live with after the

635
00:40:58,160 --> 00:41:01,360
Speaker 1: war was over was a man named Elijah Fox, but

636
00:41:01,440 --> 00:41:05,200
Speaker 1: Elijah ended up getting married instead, so then it was

637
00:41:05,280 --> 00:41:08,760
Speaker 1: time for Walt to fill out his little black book

638
00:41:09,400 --> 00:41:11,680
Speaker 1: get a few notches on his belts. He was like,

639
00:41:11,800 --> 00:41:15,120
Speaker 1: I'm done falling in love. I'm just gonna go get

640
00:41:15,120 --> 00:41:19,120
Speaker 1: me some I'm a man my prime, I'm forty four

641
00:41:19,200 --> 00:41:22,279
Speaker 1: years old. It's time to go sleep around all over

642
00:41:22,400 --> 00:41:26,279
Speaker 1: New York City, Washington, d C. Wherever we are. Let's

643
00:41:26,320 --> 00:41:29,720
Speaker 1: hear about walt special little book, literally a little diary

644
00:41:29,760 --> 00:41:32,120
Speaker 1: that he kept him all the all the fellows he

645
00:41:32,239 --> 00:41:40,960
Speaker 1: hung out with. Right after this commercial break, All right, everybody,

646
00:41:41,080 --> 00:41:46,120
Speaker 1: welcome back to Walt's Specialist of special friends, the o

647
00:41:46,280 --> 00:41:50,920
Speaker 1: G Facebook. He's like he's hot or not? Oh no, no,

648
00:41:51,080 --> 00:41:54,319
Speaker 1: I'm just kidding. So yeah, this is when Waltz was

649
00:41:54,400 --> 00:41:58,799
Speaker 1: like on the prowl. He's cruising for Cutie's almost obsessively.

650
00:41:59,640 --> 00:42:02,480
Speaker 1: He was going out every night and picking up bus

651
00:42:02,560 --> 00:42:06,799
Speaker 1: drivers and ferry boatmen, like working class types, because he

652
00:42:06,920 --> 00:42:09,840
Speaker 1: was like a lot of bohemians in that he felt that,

653
00:42:09,920 --> 00:42:12,800
Speaker 1: like the poor roughs of the world, had more wisdom

654
00:42:12,880 --> 00:42:16,440
Speaker 1: to offer than the most educated man um, which is

655
00:42:16,440 --> 00:42:20,439
Speaker 1: not untrue. I would say different wisdom. Well, yeah, sure, sure,

656
00:42:20,440 --> 00:42:22,000
Speaker 1: but you go down to the shipyards and you're like,

657
00:42:22,120 --> 00:42:25,520
Speaker 1: tell me about life, right, and you're gonna get some philosophy.

658
00:42:25,719 --> 00:42:28,120
Speaker 1: Very true, And I mean again, he's like, I'm writing

659
00:42:28,160 --> 00:42:30,920
Speaker 1: about America. I want to tell people about America. That

660
00:42:31,000 --> 00:42:35,400
Speaker 1: doesn't mean you stick with the rich literary salams or anything.

661
00:42:35,400 --> 00:42:36,920
Speaker 1: You gotta be out here in the peat, in the

662
00:42:36,920 --> 00:42:40,520
Speaker 1: streets with the folks doing the work, getting dirty. And

663
00:42:40,600 --> 00:42:44,920
Speaker 1: he sure did get dirty and do the work. Charles

664
00:42:44,920 --> 00:42:49,560
Speaker 1: Shiveley's book Calumus Lovers details some of the around one

665
00:42:49,680 --> 00:42:53,600
Speaker 1: hundred and fifty entries in waltz journals from this time.

666
00:42:53,840 --> 00:42:57,080
Speaker 1: But these are actual entries from Walt Whitman. These are

667
00:42:57,120 --> 00:43:00,160
Speaker 1: literally things he wrote down in a book, yes, to

668
00:43:00,360 --> 00:43:03,440
Speaker 1: save for later, to save for another totey can remember

669
00:43:04,360 --> 00:43:09,000
Speaker 1: Peter large, strong boned young fellow driver. I liked his

670
00:43:09,080 --> 00:43:12,160
Speaker 1: refreshing wickedness, as it would be called by the orthodox.

671
00:43:12,400 --> 00:43:17,760
Speaker 1: George Fitch Yankee boy driver, good looking, tall, curly haired,

672
00:43:18,000 --> 00:43:21,239
Speaker 1: black eyed fellow. Saturday night Mike Ellis, wandering at the

673
00:43:21,280 --> 00:43:24,200
Speaker 1: corner of Lexington Ave in thirty second Street. Took him

674
00:43:24,239 --> 00:43:27,840
Speaker 1: home to one Fit seven Street, fourth story, back room,

675
00:43:28,000 --> 00:43:33,959
Speaker 1: bitter cold night. William Culver, boy in bath, aged eighteen.

676
00:43:36,440 --> 00:43:41,680
Speaker 1: Daniel Spencer, somewhat feminine, slept with me September three. Theodore M.

677
00:43:41,920 --> 00:43:45,640
Speaker 1: Carr came to the house with me. James Sloan night

678
00:43:45,680 --> 00:43:51,000
Speaker 1: of September eighteen, twenty third year of age, plain homely American.

679
00:43:51,360 --> 00:43:57,279
Speaker 1: John McNelly night October seven, young man drunk walked up

680
00:43:57,320 --> 00:44:00,960
Speaker 1: Fulton and High Street home. David Wilson night of October

681
00:44:00,960 --> 00:44:04,319
Speaker 1: eleven sixty two, walking up from mid off, slept with me.

682
00:44:04,640 --> 00:44:09,440
Speaker 1: Chorus Ostrander October twenty second, sixty two, about twenty eight

683
00:44:09,480 --> 00:44:12,799
Speaker 1: years of age, slept with him. December four at sixty two.

684
00:44:12,960 --> 00:44:16,960
Speaker 1: October nine, eighteen sixty three. Jerry Taylor, New Jersey, of

685
00:44:17,040 --> 00:44:20,280
Speaker 1: Second District Regiment slept with me last night. Whether soft,

686
00:44:20,600 --> 00:44:31,400
Speaker 1: cool enough, warm enough heavenly Wow, Festrol Walt Whitman just

687
00:44:31,480 --> 00:44:33,760
Speaker 1: got this. It's kind of creepy. He's got this little

688
00:44:33,800 --> 00:44:36,120
Speaker 1: book like this. When I slept an eighteen year old,

689
00:44:36,239 --> 00:44:37,759
Speaker 1: is when I slept with the twenty four year old.

690
00:44:37,760 --> 00:44:40,120
Speaker 1: This is when I slept with a driver, when I

691
00:44:40,160 --> 00:44:42,320
Speaker 1: slept with the soldier, This is when I slept with

692
00:44:42,360 --> 00:44:46,520
Speaker 1: a drunk guy. Hi. Yeah, basically yeah. Well, Rick to

693
00:44:46,600 --> 00:44:50,000
Speaker 1: Norton was like, these are at the very least masturbatory aids,

694
00:44:50,320 --> 00:44:52,040
Speaker 1: you know, for him to go back and be like, m,

695
00:44:52,080 --> 00:44:54,959
Speaker 1: who do you want to think about tonight or something? Okay, um,

696
00:44:55,000 --> 00:44:58,439
Speaker 1: which I think is probably true. I guess who knows

697
00:44:58,480 --> 00:45:01,840
Speaker 1: what they actually they're doing. Well, Bitman's actual spank bank,

698
00:45:02,520 --> 00:45:07,759
Speaker 1: that's what we've got here. And of course, yeah, I

699
00:45:07,800 --> 00:45:13,000
Speaker 1: guess he wrote everything down. Kind of thing. But eighteen

700
00:45:13,040 --> 00:45:15,840
Speaker 1: sixty four would be a year of tragedy for Walt Whitman.

701
00:45:16,320 --> 00:45:19,239
Speaker 1: His brother George was captured by the Confederate Army and

702
00:45:19,280 --> 00:45:22,960
Speaker 1: he was held for five months. Another brother of his died,

703
00:45:23,600 --> 00:45:25,880
Speaker 1: and Walt had to commit a third brother to a

704
00:45:25,960 --> 00:45:29,799
Speaker 1: lunatic asylum. So he was barely over this series of

705
00:45:29,920 --> 00:45:34,040
Speaker 1: family tragedies When Abraham Lincoln was assassinated in April of

706
00:45:34,080 --> 00:45:37,320
Speaker 1: eighteen sixty five, and you had, of course the entire

707
00:45:37,400 --> 00:45:40,720
Speaker 1: country in a period of morning after this, and Walt

708
00:45:40,800 --> 00:45:44,160
Speaker 1: himself was deeply affected because he was a great admirer

709
00:45:44,280 --> 00:45:48,279
Speaker 1: of President Lincoln. He once wrote quote, I love the

710
00:45:48,320 --> 00:45:53,240
Speaker 1: President personally. He wrote a lot about him, one selected quote.

711
00:45:53,760 --> 00:45:57,080
Speaker 1: As an elegy to Abraham Lincoln, Walt penned four poems,

712
00:45:57,120 --> 00:46:01,640
Speaker 1: including when Lilacs Last in the Dooryard loomed, and Oh Captain,

713
00:46:01,719 --> 00:46:05,080
Speaker 1: My Captain. These were more conventional than the sort of

714
00:46:05,080 --> 00:46:07,240
Speaker 1: free verse poems that he'd written in Leaves of Grass,

715
00:46:07,640 --> 00:46:10,320
Speaker 1: so that, combined with the topic, made them more popular

716
00:46:10,360 --> 00:46:12,520
Speaker 1: than anything else he ever wrote. Really, right, he was

717
00:46:12,560 --> 00:46:16,120
Speaker 1: really working with the zeitgeist. Yeah, I mean again, he's

718
00:46:16,120 --> 00:46:19,680
Speaker 1: so good at emotions. Yes, and we didn't need that expression,

719
00:46:20,040 --> 00:46:23,799
Speaker 1: yeah exactly. It must have been nice to read his

720
00:46:23,920 --> 00:46:27,360
Speaker 1: outpouring of emotion and feel like, finally someone saying everything

721
00:46:27,400 --> 00:46:30,520
Speaker 1: that I can't how to put words to. You're reading

722
00:46:30,520 --> 00:46:32,600
Speaker 1: Walt Women's poem and you're like, yeah, that's that's what

723
00:46:32,719 --> 00:46:36,239
Speaker 1: I was gonna say. Yeah, remember how last night I

724
00:46:36,280 --> 00:46:41,760
Speaker 1: was like, oh suxy that that happened. This is captain,

725
00:46:41,800 --> 00:46:47,080
Speaker 1: my captain. We've all got different skills. I'm gifted in

726
00:46:47,160 --> 00:46:51,319
Speaker 1: other ways. Also, Okay, before we get off Lincoln here,

727
00:46:51,680 --> 00:46:56,320
Speaker 1: I love the I love the president personally. Lincoln famously

728
00:46:56,680 --> 00:47:00,839
Speaker 1: probably could be had some had some fellows. Wellow do

729
00:47:00,880 --> 00:47:04,000
Speaker 1: you think do you think? All right? Speculations station? What

730
00:47:04,120 --> 00:47:06,480
Speaker 1: women in Abraham Lincoln totally did it if they met,

731
00:47:06,600 --> 00:47:08,800
Speaker 1: which I don't know for sure if they did, because

732
00:47:08,840 --> 00:47:12,480
Speaker 1: they well they wouldn't say something, but they wouldn't tell

733
00:47:12,560 --> 00:47:15,440
Speaker 1: He wouldn't tell you he did read leaves of grass.

734
00:47:15,640 --> 00:47:18,120
Speaker 1: The legend has it that Abraham Lincoln did read leaves

735
00:47:18,120 --> 00:47:20,960
Speaker 1: of grass. Okay, so while while the trains parked here,

736
00:47:21,560 --> 00:47:24,560
Speaker 1: Abraham Lincoln read leaves of grass, picked up the Oval

737
00:47:24,600 --> 00:47:29,680
Speaker 1: Office phone and was like, hey, get Whitman right now.

738
00:47:30,560 --> 00:47:31,839
Speaker 1: And I was like, do you want me to put

739
00:47:31,840 --> 00:47:34,319
Speaker 1: it in your schedule? No? No, no, no, don't write

740
00:47:34,360 --> 00:47:37,640
Speaker 1: it down, not making your poet laureat, nothing like that.

741
00:47:38,560 --> 00:47:42,920
Speaker 1: We're going to, Yes, go build a log cabin, if

742
00:47:42,960 --> 00:47:46,840
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. Go examine the calamus plants

743
00:47:46,880 --> 00:47:50,440
Speaker 1: down by the pond. I've got a couple of calumus

744
00:47:50,480 --> 00:47:53,799
Speaker 1: plants I'd like to show him by my pond. I

745
00:47:53,800 --> 00:47:58,920
Speaker 1: would like to score four times with Whitman. I love

746
00:47:59,000 --> 00:48:02,919
Speaker 1: this speculations station, and I hope they did score four times. Yeah,

747
00:48:03,080 --> 00:48:06,080
Speaker 1: so oh Captain. My Captain was the only poem of

748
00:48:06,080 --> 00:48:09,560
Speaker 1: what Whitman's to be anthologized in his own lifetime, and

749
00:48:09,640 --> 00:48:12,160
Speaker 1: also won him finally the literary acclaim that he'd been

750
00:48:12,200 --> 00:48:16,880
Speaker 1: working towards since eighteen fifty five. Even so, the Calumus

751
00:48:16,880 --> 00:48:20,120
Speaker 1: cluster of poems continued to cause him problems. Later, he

752
00:48:20,160 --> 00:48:22,680
Speaker 1: got a job at the Bureau of Indian Affairs, but

753
00:48:22,920 --> 00:48:25,759
Speaker 1: he got fired very soon after. According to the National

754
00:48:25,840 --> 00:48:29,000
Speaker 1: Endowment of Humanities, the story was that James Harlan, the

755
00:48:29,040 --> 00:48:33,200
Speaker 1: Secretary of the Interior, quote objected to having the author

756
00:48:33,520 --> 00:48:38,200
Speaker 1: of a dirty book on staff. A dirty book, you know,

757
00:48:38,600 --> 00:48:44,399
Speaker 1: leaves of Grass that's smut. Well, fortunately, the very next

758
00:48:44,480 --> 00:48:46,680
Speaker 1: day he got another job, and he even had some

759
00:48:46,760 --> 00:48:49,120
Speaker 1: writers take up the pen in his defense, and that

760
00:48:49,200 --> 00:48:51,920
Speaker 1: helped his popularity too. It wasn't the worst thing that

761
00:48:51,960 --> 00:48:57,720
Speaker 1: happened to me. But love was still eluding him until

762
00:48:57,840 --> 00:49:01,399
Speaker 1: eighteen sixty six. Went on a stormy night he met

763
00:49:01,640 --> 00:49:05,279
Speaker 1: nineteen year old Peter Doyle. Peter Doyle wasn't he the

764
00:49:05,840 --> 00:49:12,560
Speaker 1: monster in Young Frankie Stone. That's Peter Boyle, Ray Romano's dad,

765
00:49:12,600 --> 00:49:16,000
Speaker 1: and everybody loves Raymond. That's right. I always forget that

766
00:49:16,040 --> 00:49:18,560
Speaker 1: he played Yeah, that's so funny. Well, yeah, because how

767
00:49:18,640 --> 00:49:22,560
Speaker 1: much everybody loves Raymond. Did you watch I think I

768
00:49:22,600 --> 00:49:25,160
Speaker 1: think just the one scene with Batton Oswald not doing

769
00:49:25,160 --> 00:49:30,160
Speaker 1: anything because he talked about Twitter. Now, Peter Doyle was irish.

770
00:49:30,239 --> 00:49:33,120
Speaker 1: He was an illiterate bus conductor. This is the exact

771
00:49:33,200 --> 00:49:38,440
Speaker 1: kind of guy while it's looking for him. All right,

772
00:49:39,040 --> 00:49:42,960
Speaker 1: it's a little creepy, but um Peter described their meeting

773
00:49:43,040 --> 00:49:47,600
Speaker 1: best in an interview. He gave quote, he was the

774
00:49:47,680 --> 00:49:50,799
Speaker 1: only passenger. It was a lonely night, so I thought

775
00:49:50,800 --> 00:49:53,200
Speaker 1: he would go in and talk with him. Anyway, I

776
00:49:53,239 --> 00:49:56,719
Speaker 1: went into the car. We were familiar at once. I

777
00:49:56,800 --> 00:50:00,279
Speaker 1: put my hand on his knee. We understood. He did

778
00:50:00,360 --> 00:50:02,480
Speaker 1: not get out at the end of the trip. In fact,

779
00:50:02,800 --> 00:50:05,640
Speaker 1: went all the way back with me. From that time on,

780
00:50:06,000 --> 00:50:10,200
Speaker 1: we were the biggest sort of friends, biggest sort of friends,

781
00:50:10,000 --> 00:50:15,960
Speaker 1: the biggest sort of friends. Woh, He's like, oh, this,

782
00:50:15,960 --> 00:50:17,560
Speaker 1: this guy is the only man on the bus. I'm

783
00:50:17,560 --> 00:50:20,239
Speaker 1: going to go back and put my hand on his knee. Okay,

784
00:50:20,280 --> 00:50:24,239
Speaker 1: I mean I think he just knew. Yeah, maybe he

785
00:50:24,280 --> 00:50:25,440
Speaker 1: was just like I don't know, I get it. I

786
00:50:25,480 --> 00:50:29,319
Speaker 1: get the sense that this person might be willing to

787
00:50:29,360 --> 00:50:32,200
Speaker 1: accept in advance from me. They had gaydar in the

788
00:50:32,200 --> 00:50:35,520
Speaker 1: eighteen sixties. Sure, well, probably better because you had to

789
00:50:35,560 --> 00:50:39,080
Speaker 1: be so careful. Yeah, you know, you can touch the

790
00:50:39,080 --> 00:50:41,719
Speaker 1: wrong person, you could. It could be real bad. Yeah

791
00:50:41,760 --> 00:50:44,399
Speaker 1: that's true. Do you think you know who Walt Whitman was.

792
00:50:45,360 --> 00:50:50,080
Speaker 1: I guess he was illiterate a lot of poets, yeah,

793
00:50:50,160 --> 00:50:52,000
Speaker 1: unless someone read it to him. I mean, but how

794
00:50:52,000 --> 00:50:53,799
Speaker 1: would he know, Like he would be like, that's that,

795
00:50:54,000 --> 00:50:56,920
Speaker 1: that's that guy over there. Oh my god, an illiterate

796
00:50:56,960 --> 00:50:59,359
Speaker 1: man falling in love with a poet. That's like such

797
00:50:59,400 --> 00:51:02,000
Speaker 1: a gift of the magi set up, you know, like

798
00:51:03,840 --> 00:51:07,719
Speaker 1: I wrote you this book. Oh no, I don't know

799
00:51:07,760 --> 00:51:09,839
Speaker 1: what he would do. I bought you this bus, you know,

800
00:51:10,520 --> 00:51:20,479
Speaker 1: like I don't drive. Whatever it was. Well, Walt taught

801
00:51:20,520 --> 00:51:23,360
Speaker 1: Peter how to read and write. He taught him geography

802
00:51:23,400 --> 00:51:26,520
Speaker 1: and arithmetic. Um. He would meet him most nights and

803
00:51:26,600 --> 00:51:30,120
Speaker 1: hang out during Peter's last rides of the night. Um.

804
00:51:30,160 --> 00:51:32,839
Speaker 1: Afterward they would go and have a drink together. They

805
00:51:32,880 --> 00:51:36,320
Speaker 1: took long walks under the moonlight. They strolled the banks

806
00:51:36,320 --> 00:51:39,680
Speaker 1: of the Potomac. They slept together under the stars. Walt

807
00:51:39,800 --> 00:51:44,480
Speaker 1: sometimes bought Peter flowers, and this was a full romantic relationship. Um.

808
00:51:44,520 --> 00:51:49,200
Speaker 1: They never lived together, but they shared their lives every day. Now,

809
00:51:49,280 --> 00:51:52,080
Speaker 1: Richter Norton does point out that we don't know for

810
00:51:52,200 --> 00:51:56,200
Speaker 1: sure if Walton Peter ever like did it did it?

811
00:51:56,280 --> 00:51:58,719
Speaker 1: We don't know if they had penetrative sex. We don't

812
00:51:58,719 --> 00:52:03,160
Speaker 1: know if they ever experienced orgasm together. Um, but really

813
00:52:03,160 --> 00:52:06,719
Speaker 1: with any of his other right, but quote, we do

814
00:52:06,880 --> 00:52:10,920
Speaker 1: know that they often kissed and embraced and sometimes slept

815
00:52:11,000 --> 00:52:15,120
Speaker 1: together naked. It's just sometimes called a carets, which is

816
00:52:15,120 --> 00:52:18,759
Speaker 1: a kind of naked chastity that Socrates seem to advocate

817
00:52:18,800 --> 00:52:22,160
Speaker 1: in the Symposium, which in the religious practices of India

818
00:52:22,239 --> 00:52:29,520
Speaker 1: amounts to prolonged erection without ejaculation. Guy would be like, yes,

819
00:52:30,040 --> 00:52:33,319
Speaker 1: you can't actually have an orgasm, but you can do

820
00:52:33,360 --> 00:52:37,920
Speaker 1: all kinds of sexy stuff anyway. It interesting. So Walt

821
00:52:38,200 --> 00:52:41,560
Speaker 1: and this boy that he loved would lie naked next

822
00:52:41,600 --> 00:52:46,920
Speaker 1: to each other with presumably raging heart on and just

823
00:52:47,040 --> 00:52:55,839
Speaker 1: not and kiss. That'll be all thank you. I mean,

824
00:52:56,840 --> 00:52:59,600
Speaker 1: you know, we don't know that's truth. And it's likely

825
00:52:59,719 --> 00:53:02,439
Speaker 1: that with sometimes they might have gone a little further

826
00:53:02,520 --> 00:53:04,600
Speaker 1: than that, right, because we know they did that much.

827
00:53:04,719 --> 00:53:08,880
Speaker 1: We just don't know any further. Yeah, but um, but

828
00:53:09,239 --> 00:53:11,440
Speaker 1: I think that Walt did write sometimes that like just

829
00:53:11,520 --> 00:53:14,239
Speaker 1: to kisses enough, just to touch the hand, you know, Like,

830
00:53:14,520 --> 00:53:18,200
Speaker 1: so it makes me think if you're so like, I

831
00:53:18,239 --> 00:53:22,239
Speaker 1: don't know, cut off the love that you crave, that

832
00:53:22,400 --> 00:53:25,080
Speaker 1: even a tiny little bit of it, it seems like

833
00:53:25,800 --> 00:53:27,960
Speaker 1: your cup overfloweth, you know what I mean. So he's like,

834
00:53:28,000 --> 00:53:31,360
Speaker 1: I'm not trying to go too far or something. It

835
00:53:31,360 --> 00:53:35,439
Speaker 1: could be romantic a sexual that's true too, or yeah,

836
00:53:35,560 --> 00:53:37,560
Speaker 1: or just that just put it on a higher plane,

837
00:53:37,600 --> 00:53:41,719
Speaker 1: like it's not about that. That's that's breeding procreative ship,

838
00:53:41,800 --> 00:53:44,920
Speaker 1: like a beautiful high beauty you know type thing maybe

839
00:53:45,200 --> 00:53:46,919
Speaker 1: or the the shame of the era. You know, it's

840
00:53:46,960 --> 00:53:48,560
Speaker 1: like this is as close as I can get. And

841
00:53:48,560 --> 00:53:51,279
Speaker 1: then again we had to stop. I don't feel good

842
00:53:51,280 --> 00:53:54,640
Speaker 1: about this. Hard to say. We cannot know. Now. Walt

843
00:53:54,680 --> 00:53:57,200
Speaker 1: did spend a lot of time talking about the importance

844
00:53:57,239 --> 00:54:02,279
Speaker 1: of romantic friendship between men without necessarily having sex. He

845
00:54:02,400 --> 00:54:05,600
Speaker 1: thought that it was actually essential for men's health and wellness.

846
00:54:06,040 --> 00:54:08,920
Speaker 1: He even attributed his love and affection towards men as

847
00:54:08,960 --> 00:54:10,680
Speaker 1: the reason that he was such a good nurse when

848
00:54:10,719 --> 00:54:14,120
Speaker 1: he worked with the army, right that preternatural healing ability.

849
00:54:14,400 --> 00:54:16,399
Speaker 1: He was just like, well, I come in just full

850
00:54:16,440 --> 00:54:19,680
Speaker 1: of love and affection, and there I hold them close

851
00:54:19,719 --> 00:54:21,839
Speaker 1: if they want to hug me, and I have many

852
00:54:22,040 --> 00:54:25,400
Speaker 1: soldiers kiss on my lips and all this stuff. So

853
00:54:25,440 --> 00:54:27,719
Speaker 1: he's like, I give them this love. That that's what

854
00:54:27,760 --> 00:54:30,520
Speaker 1: they really need. That's that's more than anything. It's very

855
00:54:30,560 --> 00:54:33,759
Speaker 1: healing and that kind of affection instead of like whoa, no,

856
00:54:33,920 --> 00:54:38,640
Speaker 1: homo right, which I'm kind of like he might be

857
00:54:38,719 --> 00:54:41,440
Speaker 1: onto something. And I think, you know, America's men are

858
00:54:41,520 --> 00:54:45,239
Speaker 1: very lonely. It said in some studies. I don't have

859
00:54:45,360 --> 00:54:48,840
Speaker 1: right in front of me, but I feel like it

860
00:54:49,000 --> 00:54:51,080
Speaker 1: like it is said had this paper in the in

861
00:54:51,080 --> 00:54:59,120
Speaker 1: the journal Nature just written, man are very lonely citation myself. Um,

862
00:54:59,160 --> 00:55:02,040
Speaker 1: but yeah, it's a you know, maybe yeah, and that

863
00:55:02,040 --> 00:55:05,520
Speaker 1: that men don't necessarily hug very much, you know, or

864
00:55:05,560 --> 00:55:07,800
Speaker 1: spend much time together or something like that, and that

865
00:55:08,040 --> 00:55:11,239
Speaker 1: you know, rely on their significant other for a lot

866
00:55:11,280 --> 00:55:13,839
Speaker 1: of that kind of right, right, so maybe he's got

867
00:55:13,880 --> 00:55:16,920
Speaker 1: something now. Also, at the time, though, the terms homosexual

868
00:55:16,920 --> 00:55:20,920
Speaker 1: and heterosexual just didn't exist yet, so Walt described it

869
00:55:21,000 --> 00:55:24,600
Speaker 1: as adhesive love, and this was as supposed to amative

870
00:55:24,680 --> 00:55:27,880
Speaker 1: love between a man and a woman. He thought adhesive

871
00:55:27,960 --> 00:55:31,719
Speaker 1: love was just as important for health as food and water. Now.

872
00:55:31,760 --> 00:55:34,920
Speaker 1: In eighteen sixty eight, an addition of Leaves of Grass

873
00:55:35,080 --> 00:55:37,799
Speaker 1: was published in the UK for the very first time,

874
00:55:38,040 --> 00:55:41,560
Speaker 1: thanks to the publisher William Rosetti, and it won the

875
00:55:41,640 --> 00:55:45,160
Speaker 1: heart of more than one writer across the pond goodness,

876
00:55:45,200 --> 00:55:48,080
Speaker 1: and they sent quite a lot of letters about it.

877
00:55:48,920 --> 00:55:51,719
Speaker 1: Um But we will talk about those heart burnings and

878
00:55:51,800 --> 00:55:56,279
Speaker 1: heart yearnings in our next episodes. Yeah, we've got some

879
00:55:56,440 --> 00:56:00,520
Speaker 1: friend zoning and some fanboy behavior that will just delight.

880
00:56:01,880 --> 00:56:03,799
Speaker 1: We just had to talk, you know, we had we

881
00:56:03,840 --> 00:56:06,880
Speaker 1: decided we had to do a whole second episode um

882
00:56:07,320 --> 00:56:09,839
Speaker 1: on on this story because so much more going on,

883
00:56:09,960 --> 00:56:12,680
Speaker 1: and a lot of famous names start popping up from

884
00:56:12,680 --> 00:56:18,560
Speaker 1: the time authors. You'll recognize, very exciting stuff. So that's

885
00:56:18,640 --> 00:56:24,439
Speaker 1: super cool. But what a sweet story. Him and Peter

886
00:56:24,480 --> 00:56:26,520
Speaker 1: and him and everyone just his whole life is just like,

887
00:56:27,360 --> 00:56:29,520
Speaker 1: I don't know, just such a projection of love. I

888
00:56:29,560 --> 00:56:32,319
Speaker 1: feel like he had so much. He had a lot

889
00:56:32,400 --> 00:56:36,320
Speaker 1: of um self love, which we spent a lot of

890
00:56:36,360 --> 00:56:38,560
Speaker 1: time today talking about. You'll hear that episode coming up

891
00:56:38,600 --> 00:56:41,359
Speaker 1: soon as well, about the the idea that you know,

892
00:56:41,440 --> 00:56:46,279
Speaker 1: really admiring yourself can just do so much for you

893
00:56:46,360 --> 00:56:48,759
Speaker 1: in terms of your relationship with other people, in terms

894
00:56:48,760 --> 00:56:51,280
Speaker 1: of your position in the world, and just your happiness

895
00:56:51,280 --> 00:56:54,759
Speaker 1: in life. And it seemed like, well, despite his uh

896
00:56:54,920 --> 00:56:57,719
Speaker 1: you know, frequent he certainly lived through some tragedies and

897
00:56:57,719 --> 00:57:02,120
Speaker 1: through some challenges, but he thrived through it all. And

898
00:57:02,160 --> 00:57:06,439
Speaker 1: I think, uh, really recognizing this love that he had

899
00:57:06,520 --> 00:57:10,439
Speaker 1: for himself and for the people he met, really really

900
00:57:10,440 --> 00:57:12,520
Speaker 1: affected that in a positive way. I think we can

901
00:57:12,560 --> 00:57:15,160
Speaker 1: all learn from that. Yeah, And I think I think

902
00:57:15,160 --> 00:57:17,080
Speaker 1: the word that kept coming to my mind when I

903
00:57:17,120 --> 00:57:19,120
Speaker 1: was learning about him, searching him and stuff was the

904
00:57:19,160 --> 00:57:21,760
Speaker 1: word generous. He seems like a generous person and he's

905
00:57:21,800 --> 00:57:24,920
Speaker 1: just very like giving of his energy and he went

906
00:57:25,080 --> 00:57:27,720
Speaker 1: to like flow so much, you know what I mean,

907
00:57:27,760 --> 00:57:30,000
Speaker 1: with everything going on and I want He's like, I

908
00:57:30,040 --> 00:57:31,800
Speaker 1: want a lot, so I want to give a lot.

909
00:57:31,920 --> 00:57:34,200
Speaker 1: You know. He was just very and he was so

910
00:57:34,280 --> 00:57:37,800
Speaker 1: engaged in everything going on around him, and he wanted

911
00:57:37,840 --> 00:57:40,160
Speaker 1: to be out in the streets walking around and seeing

912
00:57:40,200 --> 00:57:44,240
Speaker 1: things and witnessing the world. He found it all so fascinating,

913
00:57:44,240 --> 00:57:46,920
Speaker 1: and he was literally like a blade of grass is

914
00:57:46,960 --> 00:57:50,160
Speaker 1: as holy to me as a church, you know, like

915
00:57:50,240 --> 00:57:53,760
Speaker 1: it's all so amazing. Are you looking at this ship?

916
00:57:54,480 --> 00:57:58,480
Speaker 1: You know, it's really awesome. I mean reading some of it,

917
00:57:58,520 --> 00:58:00,640
Speaker 1: but I was like, I need to go outside immediately.

918
00:58:01,160 --> 00:58:02,800
Speaker 1: So we all, I mean, I feel like we all

919
00:58:02,840 --> 00:58:04,960
Speaker 1: have those moments, you know, where they break through where

920
00:58:04,960 --> 00:58:09,320
Speaker 1: you're like, oh my god, this is outrageous, Like the

921
00:58:09,360 --> 00:58:13,480
Speaker 1: fact that I exist is unbelievable, and that and that

922
00:58:13,680 --> 00:58:17,120
Speaker 1: grass is here, this little thing is a whole thing, right,

923
00:58:17,400 --> 00:58:19,680
Speaker 1: that's wild. Oh shot, I gotta get to work. Let

924
00:58:19,680 --> 00:58:21,480
Speaker 1: me stop thinking about that, right you know, like that's

925
00:58:21,520 --> 00:58:24,720
Speaker 1: the problem. Yeah, But he's like, there's a whole ecosystem

926
00:58:24,760 --> 00:58:27,120
Speaker 1: around this grass. It's got a root that's doing things,

927
00:58:27,440 --> 00:58:29,520
Speaker 1: it's contributing. I mean, what the funk If you think

928
00:58:29,560 --> 00:58:32,440
Speaker 1: about everything, it's all so amazing, you know. And I

929
00:58:32,520 --> 00:58:37,160
Speaker 1: just like I like that energy, love it generous. Yeah,

930
00:58:37,320 --> 00:58:39,960
Speaker 1: except when it came to orgasm and he was like, no, no, no,

931
00:58:40,000 --> 00:58:44,120
Speaker 1: we didn't do that I may touch your calumus and

932
00:58:44,200 --> 00:58:47,720
Speaker 1: I might touch my. But near the trade Twain shall

933
00:58:47,800 --> 00:58:53,800
Speaker 1: meet Mark Twain. Also published in Henry Clap Saturday Evening

934
00:58:53,800 --> 00:59:01,080
Speaker 1: Post Clap Clap them on the the the pulse, Oh,

935
00:59:01,160 --> 00:59:02,880
Speaker 1: the pulse. Oh thank god. I wasn't sure what you

936
00:59:02,920 --> 00:59:05,400
Speaker 1: were going to say there. I hung out at fasts

937
00:59:05,400 --> 00:59:11,200
Speaker 1: and I had my thumb on the pulse Society. What

938
00:59:11,320 --> 00:59:17,920
Speaker 1: a suggestive pause. Amazing. Well, I hope you loved this

939
00:59:17,960 --> 00:59:21,160
Speaker 1: story about Walt Whitman. I love him. I'm gonna go

940
00:59:21,520 --> 00:59:24,560
Speaker 1: try to read more Leaves of Grassy, even though I

941
00:59:24,600 --> 00:59:27,919
Speaker 1: probably won't get through that much of it because it's long.

942
00:59:28,360 --> 00:59:30,560
Speaker 1: But I hope you loved it. Please let us know

943
00:59:30,600 --> 00:59:33,600
Speaker 1: what you thought. Yeah, definitely to us. We love hearing

944
00:59:33,640 --> 00:59:37,760
Speaker 1: from you. Write us a little poem in free verse

945
00:59:38,280 --> 00:59:41,320
Speaker 1: when you see and feel every day, I'm as free

946
00:59:41,360 --> 00:59:46,959
Speaker 1: as a verse verse verse verse. But yeah, do please

947
00:59:47,000 --> 00:59:49,360
Speaker 1: send us an email at predict Romance at gmail dot

948
00:59:49,400 --> 00:59:51,640
Speaker 1: com right or we're on Twitter and Instagram. I'm at

949
00:59:51,680 --> 00:59:54,440
Speaker 1: Dianamite Boom and I'm at Oh great, it's Eli and

950
00:59:54,520 --> 00:59:57,240
Speaker 1: the show is at predict Romance. And please, like we

951
00:59:57,280 --> 00:59:59,360
Speaker 1: said at the top of the episode. There's nothing better

952
00:59:59,440 --> 01:00:01,920
Speaker 1: for us than you drop in a review on Apple Podcast.

953
01:00:02,600 --> 01:00:04,920
Speaker 1: We would love your five stars and your kind words,

954
01:00:04,960 --> 01:00:07,000
Speaker 1: and we'll even read some more on the show. Uh

955
01:00:07,200 --> 01:00:09,880
Speaker 1: Holly the best. We love having you, I love you.

956
01:00:10,000 --> 01:00:11,800
Speaker 1: Thank you for spending your time with us today, and

957
01:00:11,840 --> 01:00:13,920
Speaker 1: we'll see you in the next one. Al right, by bye,

958
01:00:13,960 --> 01:00:17,920
Speaker 1: so long Frances, time to go. Thanks so listening to

959
01:00:18,120 --> 01:00:21,800
Speaker 1: our show. Tell your friends name is Uncle Sandez. To

960
01:00:21,920 --> 01:00:24,080
Speaker 1: listen to a show Ridiculous roll Dance