Walter White’s edition of Leaves of Grass is lacking
So it turns out that Walter White owns David Reynolds’s 150th anniversary edition of the 1855 Leaves of Grass—the one with the green, leafy cover. Apparently, Gale Boetticher gave the book to Walt, inscribing it to him. From seasons 3 and 4 of Breaking Bad, we know that Gale likes “When I heard the learn’d astronomer” so much that he can recite it:
Boetticher even inscribes a quotation from “When I heard” in his notebook:
Here’s the irony: “When I heard the learn’d astronomer” wasn’t included in Leaves of Grass until 1867 (Whitman first published it in 1865 in Drum-Taps). In other words, Gale Boetticher gave Walter White an edition of Leaves of Grass without his favorite poem.
Comments
June 30, 2013
JoeThePimpernel / Jun 30, 05:23 PM
Season 3, Episode 6 at approximately the 25 minute mark shows Walt reading a copy of Leaves of Grass.
http://i.imgur.com/PLo2Ilr.png
This is the episode in which Walt meets Gale Boetticher for the first time, and in which Gale recites “When I Heard the Learned Astronomer” and calls himself a nerd. Gale gives a copy of Leaves of Grass to Walt in a later episode.
Walt is sitting in his condo reading Leaves of Grass when Hank calls him at Marie’s suggestion to ask about Jesse Pinkman. Walt realizes that Jesse is about to be busted and that Hank is on the trail of The Krystal Ship. He drives the Bounder RV to the demolition yard. Jesse gets word and goes straight to the demolition yard with Hank on his tail.
You remember the rest. I was just trying to give some context.
Bottom line: Walt had a copy of Leaves of Grass that he owned before Gale gave him a copy.
July 01, 2013
greg / Jul 1, 07:38 AM
That’s Reynold’s anniversary edition; you can tell by the cover. It doesn’t have “Learn’d Astronomer” in it.
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