Walt Whitman published the first edition of Leaves of Grass in 1855. It was a slim book of 12 poems, printed without the author’s name on the title page. By the end of his life the book held almost 400 poems. The ninth and last edition, called the “deathbed” edition, appeared in 1891–1892.
The Library of Congress describes how he worked. Whitman “continuously altered the contents.” He “added new poems, named or renamed old ones,” “reworded lines, and changed punctuation, making each edition unique.” He regarded each version “as its own distinct book.”