Audiobook · read by volunteers
Miracles
Walt Whitman (1819–1892)
Read by Alan Davis Drake (1945-2010), Amalor Myrnnyx, Ancilla, Annie Coleman Rothenberg, Claire Goget, Dianne, Jennette Selig, Catherine Fitz, Karen Savage, Lucy Burgoyne (1950-2014) · 15 chapters · 29 min
About the book
Walt Whitman asks what could be more miraculous than the everyday world: a walk through the streets, a stretch of beach, a stranger sitting opposite you, the sky at night. In Miracles, a poem from Leaves of Grass, he lists wonders one after another in long, flowing lines that turn the ordinary into something astonishing. LibriVox volunteers recorded it fifteen times for a weekly poetry project in March 2007, and each version brings a different voice and pace to the text. Together they offer a small study in how a single poem changes with every reading. It lasts only half an hour, so you can hear all fifteen versions in one sitting, or simply choose the voice you like best. It is an easy and uplifting program, ideal for a moment of calm in the middle of the day.
Introduction
Walt Whitman (1819 to 1892) is one of the great voices of American poetry, a writer who broke with the formal rhyme and meter of his time and wrote in long, free lines that follow the rhythm of speech. His book Leaves of Grass, which he revised and expanded throughout his life, celebrates the body, the democracy of ordinary people and the beauty of everyday experience. Miracles is one of the shorter poems of that book.
The poem is simple in its design. It begins with a challenge to the idea that a miracle must be something rare, and then it offers a series of examples taken from daily life, ending in the conclusion that everything is miraculous. That is a very Whitmanian thought, and it is expressed in a style that is plain and exact, with just enough rhythm to carry the voice along.
This recording belongs to the weekly poetry project of LibriVox, in which volunteers each record the same poem. Fifteen versions are included, with a total running time of about half an hour. You can listen to them in order, or move around to compare how different readers handle the pauses and the build-up of the list. It is a short and cheerful introduction to Whitman for anyone who has never read him, and a pleasant refresher for those who know him well. Hearing so many readings together also shows how a poem lives in performance, and how the breath of a reader can turn a list into a song. The text is short and quickly learned, so you may well find yourself repeating a line long after the recording has ended.
Public domain
Walt Whitman died in 1892: the work is in the public domain in Switzerland, more than 70 years after the author’s death.
The LibriVox volunteers dedicated this recording to the public domain.
Sources : LibriVox page · Files at the Internet Archive · Original text