“O Captain! My Captain” – Plan détaillé

“O Captain! My Captain” – Plan détaillé

“O Captain! My Captain” is one of Walt Whitman’s most famous poems, being learned by schoolchildren throughout the United States. The poem’s fame is rather paradoxical since it is not representative of Whitman’s poetry, being much more conventional than his other poems, both in form and content. The reason for this might be Whitman’s aim in this poem which is to reach a wide and popular audience in order to celebrate his hero, none other than late president Abraham Lincoln (whom he has also celebrated in his elegiac poem “When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom'd”).

I will therefore wonder how the speaker is poised in between two stances in this poem, mourning his dead captain while celebrating the victory of the Union troops.  

I will first analyze the poem as a funeral oration. My second part will focus on the celebratory undertone. I will finally study the poem as political incentive.

1. The poem as funeral oration

a) A corpse aboard

Death sometimes explicitly alluded to: “bleeding drops” l.6, adjective “dead” l.8 repeated thrice, at the end of each stanza,

Sometimes euphemism: “lies” l.7 then “cold” l.8 (corpse) and lips “pale and still” l.17, “no pulse nor will” l.18

+ the speaker does not address his captain anymore in the last stanza

b) Personal grief

Individual homage = four short lines at the end of each stanza

Epizeuxis “heart” l.5. Interjection “o”

c) National grief

Four long lines at the beginning of each stanza

Flag flung: patriotic emblem, alliteration

→ Yet sthg is celebrated at the same time as the captain is mourned:

2. The celebratory undertone

a) A sense of achievement

Sthg has been achieved: “done” l.1, “won” l.2. Hence use of present perfect = assessment

Ship almost anchored: “port is near” l.3 to being anchored l.19, “closed and done” l.19: somehting has been completed (i.e. war has been won).

b) A festive atmosphere

Something is celebrated indeed, hence cries, sounds: “bells I hear” l.3, “hear the bells” l.9

People rejoicing: “exulting” l.3, bugle “trills” l.10, they “call” l.12 + movement: “swaying mass” l.12

3. The poem as political incentive: addressing the American people

a) Constant use of metaphor

Even though it is obvious to everyone what the poem is about: for the reader to construct meaning (l.20).

b) The formal structure

An ode that needs to be understood by all the American people

c) A united nation

First addresses the captain then the people: assimilating the American people and their presidents, in fact addressed as “shores” l.21 (personification). The American nation is one with nature? One with the boat as well, hence the masses swaying as the sail/mast might be swaying. Hence captain as father: father of the poet, father of the American nation.

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