• biographical information: all names, dates, places, and events important to understanding Whitman's life and career
• Whitman's works: essays on all eight editions of "Leaves of Grass," major poems and poem clusters, principal essays and prose works, as well as his more than two dozen short stories and the novel, Franklin Evans
• prominent themes and concepts: essays on such major topics as democracy, slavery, the Civil War, immortality, sexuality, and the women's rights movement.
• significant forms and techniques: such as prosody, symbolism, free verse, and humour
• important trends and critical approaches in Whitman studies: including new historicist and cultural criticism, psychological explorations, and controversial issues of sexual identity
• surveys of Whitman's international impact as well as an assessment of his literary legacy.

Useful for students, researchers, librarians, teachers, and Whitman devotees, this volume features extensive cross-references, numerous photographs of the poet, a chronology, a special appendix section tracking the poet's genealogy, and a thorough index. Each entry includes a bibliography for further study.