Whitman got a job as an office boy for a prominent group of lawyers, who rewarded him with a subscription to a circulating library, with which he could further his self-education. Wanting more in life than to be a laborer, Whitman continued to read, visit museums, and attend lectures; he even engaged his employers in debate when he had the chance. With these resources he forged a rough and unstructured, yet advanced curriculum that consisted of everything from the literary arts (poetry, theatre, and writing) to history to geography. In his early teen years Walt got an apprenticeship with a liberal, blue-collar newspaper called the Long Island Patriot. This was the first instance where he would understand the experience of communicating with thousands of readers via written word. No longer did Walt visit the countryside while he was on his own, so the urban setting contributed greatly to most of his early journalism, prose, and even some poetry. Contrarily, when he was twelve, Walt's first printed article in the Patriot was about New York City before its urbanization, and it chronicled the detailed accounts of early residents' descriptions of the city when it was first formed.
Whitman's writing career didn't take off until after a few half-hearted attempts at teaching school and being a journalist for several New York papers, including the Sunday Times. His journalism earned him enough respect to move onto other forms of expressive art. Whitman's work ranged in interpretation from democratic to metaphysicist to free spirit. In 1855, twelve of his works were published in a collection entitled "Leaves of Grass", which stands today as one of America's most popular literary works. His poetry was considered revolutionary to poetry as it didn't hinge on structure or meter, but rather had a smooth, "spoken word" flow to it. "Leaves of Grass" had a wide range of subject material, and therefore it incorporated many different themes.
