O Captain, My Captain! Essays - Assassination Of Abraham Lincoln

O Captain, My Captain! Chapter seven Today's poem is O Captain, My Captain. This poem is written by Walt Whitman, Whitman is one of America's greatest poets. His works have been quoted from the time he has been writing. Walt Whitman has written this poem; O Captain, My captain in the memory of Abraham Lincoln. Abraham was America's 16th president and he brought an end to the civil war. the civil was a war that was been fought between the northern and southern states of America. Abraham was credited for bringing peace between both sides. This poem was written in a form that is called an elegy. An elegy is a poem written in the memory of some body to commemorate their passing. O Captain, My Captain was an elegy written by Whitman in the memory of Abraham Lincoln. In the poem he is comparing Abraham's journey as a journey of a captain who takes his ship on a voyage and after the voyage is done the ship comes back victorious. There are a lot of symbolism is this poetry, America was being symbolized by the ship, the civil war was being symbolized the voyage and the president of America was being symbolized by the captain of the ship. The first stanza talks about the captain, of captain of the ship which is Lincoln, fought a battle and had won the battle and now the people were celebrating their victory. There is a change in mood after each four lines, in every stanza, the first two lines are happy lines and the last two lines are sad. The 'but'' in the second stanza represent the change in mood after so much of celebration and joyful moment, the captain who was leading the ship has died. He was in disbelieve after realizing that the captain wouldn't wake up, and now he is accepting the fact that the captain died but the ship was victorious this symbolizes that the purpose of the civil war had been achieved and people were celebrating. This poem was a blend of reality and fiction to commemorate a great leader that brought an end to a war.