Amanda Gorman, Walt Whitman, and Joy Harjo

Poetry’s Vital Role in Politics

Like Walt Whitman before them, Joy Harjo and Amanda Gorman are reimagining what it means to be a poet in this democratic republic.
From left to right: Langston Hughes, Robert Hayden, Emily Dickinson, and Beah Richards

Celebrating National Poetry Month

Our best stories about poetry and poems offer free links to poems from contemporary and classic American poets.
Phrenology head from The Household Physician, 1905

Walt Whitman, America’s Phrenologist

The pseudoscience of phrenology included a notion of body as text that Whitman loved. But the craze of "bumpology" also had a darker side.
Whitman at about fifty

Should Walt Whitman Be #Cancelled?

Black America talks back to "The Good Gray Poet" at 200.
Walt Whitman as photographed by Brian Handy

Walt Whitman: (Happy Birthday) Song of Himself

Happy Birthday, Walt Whitman, you old bard and…politician. Clearly you like to sing to yourself, but let us join ...
Black and white engraving of Walt Whitman

Walt Whitman the… Politician?

Before Walt Whitman was a famous poet, he was a scandalous poet, but before even all that he was in the thick of local and national politics.
Cover of North American Review

The North American Review Turns 200

Happy birthday to the North American Review!