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Notes on video lecture:
Walt Whitman and the City
Choose from these words to fill the blanks below:
cities, populated, leisure, streets, buskers, workers, ferry, carpenter, Lowell, transportation, Dostoevsky, commerce, completed
only in the 19th century do the              we now live in begin to be built
19th cities for the first time become larger and more                    than any person can easily know
vast grids of               
where many thousands of people live pressed in together
the first buildings with 4,5, and 6 stories were beginning to be constructed
how to fireproof them, make them accomodate unprecedented numbers of                and residents
so large that modes of mass                              have to be developed
Walt Whitman
son of                   
in his youth, he built these buildings
came of age during one of the building booms in New York
he watches a city come into being, his self-consciousness enhanced by the change he sees all around him
like Dickens and                     , describing people move from mode of transportation to mode of transportation daily
before the 19th century, no one took a            daily in order to go to work
                 is exploding, goods from all over the world
the explosion of print is making it possible for goods to be advertised
material objects for sale
city is crowded and colorful
the poets              and Longfellow still writing about mythological characters
reflections on objects of nature, trees, sunsets
Whitman wrote about ferries, omnibuses, horse carts, half-                   buildings
Whitman's city
work and leisure flow into each other on every block, something we are used to now
               entertaining, children playing
workmen return to work sites
the interpenetration of labor, commerce and               , no division between workplace and recreation place
very stimulating to him, turning every workday into an event
you are on your way to printing office and what a feast of images, what a concert of sounds
your world is a show with hundreds of extras on hand
fountains sparkle in sun, a mixture of spectacle and function

Vocabulary:

omnibus, n. a large horse-drawn vehicle with spring-suspension and obligatory ceiling where the driver sits on a separate, front-facing bench  "The earliest solution was a horse-drawn vehicle called an omnibus."
busker, n. a person who makes money by passing the hat to solicit donations while entertaining the public often by playing a musical instrument on the streets or in other public area such as a park or market.  "The man recorded several tunes without commercial success, worked at odd jobs, and took up busking along the piers and storefronts along the beach."

People:

######################### (1819-1891)
American Romantic poet who became involved in the movement to abolish slavery
  • one of the Fireside Poets
  • graduated from Harvard College in 1838
Walt Whitman and the City