From Lincoln’s famous love of quoting Shakespeare to George Bush’s prodigious reading habits, American politics have always mingled with the literary pantheon. Now that Sarah Palin is back in the news for her endorsement of Donald Trump, Jeet Heer traces her literary roots to Walt Whitman:
This is democratic verse, that tries to encompass the world in a bear hug. Palin’s achieves her Whitmaneque effects through heightened language: alliteration, habitual gerunding, and marathon-long sentences.