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Walt Whitman (1819–1892) grew up on Long Island and in Brooklyn, left school at eleven and worked as a printer, teacher and newspaper editor. In 1855 he published the first Leaves of Grass himself, and spent the rest of his life revising and expanding it.

During the Civil War he went to Washington to look for his wounded brother and stayed for years, volunteering in the military hospitals, sitting with thousands of wounded soldiers. His elegies for Abraham Lincoln are among his most famous poems. The library also holds an Arabic selection of Leaves of Grass.