Professor Stefan Schöberlein’s role in the discovery of new writings by Walt Whitman has the literary world abuzz.
Sitting in his office at Corbly Hall, Dr. Stefan Schöberlein is surrounded by books and images of literary greats. As assistant professor in the Department of English and director of digital humanities, Schöberlein’s passion for one particular American poet is palpable, and he is eager to talk all things Walt Whitman (1819-1892).
To say that Schöberlein is a Walt Whitman enthusiast is an understatement. In addition to teaching a course on Whitman and Emily Dickinson during the fall semester, he has spent years as a Whitman scholar, including being involved with the Transatlantic Whitman Association that organizes the annual Whitman Week and the attendant symposium and the Whitman Studies Association that runs panels at scholarly conferences. He is also working as contributing editor for the Walt Whitman Archive, one of the oldest and most prestigious online archives in the country dedicated to digitizing and annotating all writings and historical documents relating to Walt Whitman.
Born and raised in Bochum, Germany, Schöberlein is a first-generation college student who developed a love for reading at a young age. After spending a year of high school in Minnesota as an exchange student, he later attended the University of Iowa during an academic exchange year of college while studying to become a special education teacher. Two years later, he returned to Iowa and earned his Ph.D. in American literature.
Fast forward to September 2021. That’s when the literary world learned that Schöberlein and his colleague, Dr. Zachary Turpin from the University of Idaho, had discovered two previously unknown sets of Walt Whitman writings. They first reported their findings in the Walt Whitman Quarterly Review, and since then the discovery has been picked up by mainstream news outlets around the world.
The writings include a collection of letters to the editor of the New Orleans Daily Crescent, a newspaper that Whitman helped establish during a three-month stay there. It was widely believed by literary scholars that Whitman only contributed to the Crescent while physically living in New Orleans, but research by Schöberlein and Turpin proves otherwise.
“These writings give insight into a period of time in Whitman’s life that we knew very little about until now,” Schöberlein explained. “Everything from his interest in the republican revolutions in Europe to his thoughts on race and politics — it’s very exciting stuff.”
Regarded as America’s first democratic poet, Whitman adopted poetic free verse that reflects the themes of the individual, body, soul, the nation and everyday life. Some scholars suggest his works mirror the founding values of America itself.
“He is certainly the most well-remembered poet from the period that avoided rhyme; embraced long, free-flowing lines; and relished in slang and innuendo,” said Schöberlein.
Efforts by Schöberlein and Turpin to authenticate the writings began in the summer of 2019 and required plenty of patience and research to verify the writings as belonging to Whitman. Penned under the name “Manhattan” as a likely nod to Whitman’s upbringing in Long Island and his life in New York, the letters were published in the Crescent seven years prior to Whitman’s well-known Leaves of Grass collection of poems (published in 1855) and continued for months after Whitman returned to New York from New Orleans.
Commonly referred to as a computational authorship assessment method, specific words and stylistic overlaps from Whitman’s known works were mapped by Schöberlein against these unknown writings to compare and statistically measure the similarities. Additionally, several humorous sketches by Whitman and biographical evidence support the result of the computational assessment — confirmation of 50 unknown texts representing more than 40,000 words attributed to Whitman.
According to Schöberlein, one of the major benefits of teamwork on a project like this discovery is the shared knowledge and resources among professional colleagues.
“My work while at Marshall has been all collaborative. It would take years or decades to do these projects by yourself. Collaboration allows you to brainstorm about things and test out theories you have with another expert, even before an official peer review gets underway. Also, this kind of evidence-based writing makes it easier to write as a team,” he said.
This spring, Schöberlein will publish an edited collection of Whitman’s writings. Titled Walt Whitman’s New Orleans: Sidewalk Sketches and Newspaper Rambles, it includes some of the newly discovered writings. Once the project is complete, all new Whitman discoveries will be added to the Walt Whitman Archive. His collaboration with Turpin will continue, as well.
In his second role as director of digital humanities, Schöberlein said the use of technology is another way to engage students and get them excited about learning new things about old literature.
“They get over their presentism and realize there are commonalities. It is a pathway to embrace writings from the 19th century and see their relevancy to today,” he explained.
With Marshall now offering a minor track of study in digital humanities, there is also potential for a whole new appreciation of the humanities.
“The goal is to introduce students to digital humanities. It fits nicely between humanities and computer science, from leveraging computational text to thinking critically about code, producing 3D printing projects or perhaps encoding a Whitman letter for digital publication.”
As word spreads about his work with the Whitman texts, Schöberlein is uniquely positioned in a new era of literary discovery that has a far-reaching impact.
“It helps to get Marshall University’s name out there with national exposure. It also strengthens the digital humanities internally for faculty who may be skeptical of bringing in computational tools. And finally, it gets students excited to create and do things differently.”
Through his classroom teachings, Schöberlein is inspiring a new generation of students to explore Whitman’s work.
“It was a lucky coincidence that I was teaching a graduate class on Whitman and Dickinson this year, so I had a chance to bring some of my findings into the classroom,” Schöberlein said. “One of my students ended up meaningfully incorporating some of these new findings into her excellent final paper.”
Schöberlein is steadfast in his belief that it’s never too late to discover literary works and encourages beginners to take the first step in finding meaning within them.
“I think poetry pushes language to, and at times beyond, the breaking point and allows us to see and feel connections that we cannot otherwise perceive.” 
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About the Author: Shelly Ridgeway is a freelance writer living in Huntington, West Virginia.