The Lily and The Bee: A Little-Read Stylistic Influence on Leaves of Grass
Samuel Warren’s small book "The Lily and the Bee" (1851) is argued by critic and biographer Bliss Perry to be a significant source of the style that Whitman cultivates in "Leaves of Grass." Similarities are often noted to the prose style of the King James version of the Bible and to the effusive, Orphic ecstasy of Ossian, but the influence of Warren on the text is not as frequently discussed. A comparatively rare text, Brandeis is fortunate to have come across this copy.
