This American Experience tells Whitman's life story, from his working-class childhood in Long Island, to his years as a newspaper reporter in Brooklyn when he struggled to support his impoverished family, then to his reckless pursuit of the attention and affection he craved for his work, to his death in 1892.

Genres

Cast

J.K. Simmons

Narrator (voice)

Chris Cooper

Walt Whitman (voice)

Walt Whitman

Self (archive footage)