Overview

The reception of the American poet Walt Whitman has been a global phenomenon. It is central to the history of modern poetry, but it goes beyond literary stakes: Whitman’s proclaimed heirs often saw him as a prophet of a new world. This book focuses on the Russian and Soviet uses of the poet, showing how they contributed to his transformation into a revolutionary and communist icon, especially in the US and in Latin America. It illuminates circuitous routes of translations and interpretations between the Soviet Union, Europe and the Americas. It covers a vast linguistic scope, including Yiddish and various languages of the Russian and Soviet empires.

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Reviews

"“Delphine Rumeau’s Comrade Whitman is a powerful contribution to global literary studies. Her detailed, incisive account of Whitman’s Russian and Soviet reception not only transforms our knowledge of Whitman and his legacy, but it also gives a new account of literary internationalism itself.” — Rebecca Beasley, University of Oxford ""Although the innovative focus on Whitman in Russia and the Soviet Union may suggest otherwise, this is the first study that establishes Whitman as a truly global poet. A  landmark in Whitman research proving that some poetry can break all bounds."" — Walter Grünzweig, TU Dortmund University and Andrássy Universität Budapest; author of Constructing The German Walt Whitman “Just as Walt Whitman’s poetry collection Leaves of Grass became a paradigmatic work of world literature, so, too, Delphine Rumeau’s study of its reception in Russia and among the international left over the century between the 1880s and the 1980s embodies the very best of contemporary world literature studies. Erudite and multilingual, profoundly historic and featuring excellent close readings, Comrade Whitman is a pleasure to read.” — Rossen Djagalov, New York University; author of From Internationalism to Postcolonialism: Literature and Cinema between the Second and the Third World (2020) “Whitman was a communist internationalist avant la lettre. His verse took the socialist world by storm at a time when the nascent Soviet Union was at the center of an internationalist utopian drive. In this superb book about translation, form, and the politics of the transnational left, Delphine Rumeau shows how the author of Leaves of Grass transforms the way that writers around the world, from Moscow to Madrid, thought about poetry.”  — Amelia Glaser, University of California San Diego"

Author Information

Delphine Rumeau is Professor of Comparative Literature at the University of Grenoble, France. 

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