Henry Wadsworth Longfellow: The Fireside Poet

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Henry Wadsworth LongfellowThe Fireside Poet

• If we could read the secret history of our
  enemies we should find in each man's life sorrow
  and suffering enough to disarm all hostility.
• In character, in manner, in style, in all things,
  the supreme excellence is simplicity.
• Look not mournfully into the past, it comes not
  back again. Wisely improve the present, it is
  thine. Go forth to meet the shadowy future
  without fear and with a manly heart.
• Men of genius are often dull and inert in
  society as the blazing meteor, when it descends
  to earth, is only a stone.

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Promising Start

• Henry Wadsworth Longfellow was born in Portland,
  Mainethen still part of Massachusettson
  February 27, 1807, the second son in a family of
  eight children.
• His mother, Zilpah Wadsworth, was the daughter of
  a Revolutionary War hero. His father, Stephen
  Longfellow, was a prominent Portland lawyer and
  later a member of Congress.
• Henry was a dreamy boy who loved to read. He
  heard sailors speaking Spanish, French and German
  in the Portland streets and liked stories set in
  foreign places The Arabian Nights, Robinson
  Crusoe, and the plays of Shakespeare.

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A Tragedy

• After graduating from Bowdoin College, Longfellow
  studied modern languages in Europe for three
  years, then returned to Bowdoin to teach them.
• In 1831 he married Mary Storer Potter of
  Portland, a former classmate, and soon published
  his first book, a description of his travels
  called Outre Mer ("Overseas").
• Longfellow's life was shaken when his wife died
  during a miscarriage in 1835.
• The young teacher spent a grief-stricken year in
  Germany and Switzerland.

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New Beginnings

• Longfellow took a position at Harvard in 1836.
  Three years later, at the age of 32, he published
  his first collection of poems, Voices of the
  Night, followed in 1841 by Ballads and Other
  Poems.
• Many of these poems ("A Psalm of Life," for
  example) showed people triumphing over adversity,
  and in a struggling young nation that theme was
  inspiring.
• Both books were very popular, but Longfellow's
  growing duties as a professor left him little
  time to write more. In addition, Frances
  Appleton, a young woman from Boston, had refused
  his proposal of marriage.

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Happy

• Frances finally accepted his proposal the
  following spring, ushering in the happiest 18
  years of Longfellow's life. The couple had six
  children, five of whom lived to adulthood, and
  the marriage gave him new confidence.
• In 1847, he published Evangeline, a book-length
  poem about what would now be called "ethnic
  cleansing." The poem takes place as the British
  drive the French from Nova Scotia, and two lovers
  are parted, only to find each other years later
  when the man is about to die.

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Midnight Rider

• In 1854, Longfellow decided to quit teaching to
  devote all his time to poetry. He published
  Hiawatha, a long poem about Native American life,
  and The Courtship of Miles Standish and Other
  Poems.
• In 1854, Longfellow decided to quit teaching to
  devote all his time to poetry. He published
  Hiawatha, a long poem about Native American life,
  and The Courtship of Miles Standish and Other
  Poems.
• Both books were immensely successful, but
  Longfellow was now preoccupied with national
  events. With the country moving towards civil
  war, he wrote "Paul Revere's Ride," a call for
  courage in the coming conflict.

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Divine Comedy

• A few months after the war began in 1861, Frances
  Longfellow was sealing an envelope with wax when
  her dress caught fire. Despite her husband's
  desperate attempts to save her, she died the next
  day.
• Profoundly saddened, Longfellow published nothing
  for the next two years. He found comfort in his
  family and in reading Dante's Divine Comedy.
  (Later he produced its first American
  translation.)
• Tales of a Wayside Inn, largely written before
  his wife's death, was published in 1863.

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Americas Poet

• When the Civil War ended in 1865, the poet was
  58. His most important work was finished, but his
  fame kept growing.
• In London alone, 24 different companies were
  publishing his work. His poems were popular
  throughout the English-speaking world, and they
  were widely translated, making him the most
  famous American of his day.
• His admirers included Lincoln, Dickens, and
  Baudelaire.

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ROCK STAR

• From 1866 to 1880, Longfellow published seven
  more books of poetry, and his seventy-fifth
  birthday in 1882 was celebrated across the
  country. Died on March 24, 1882
• When Walt Whitman heard of the poet's death, he
  wrote that, while Longfellow's work "brings
  nothing offensive or new, does not deal hard
  blows," he was the sort of bard most needed in a
  materialistic age "He comes as the poet of
  melancholy, courtesy, deferencepoet of all
  sympathetic gentlenessand universal poet of
  women and young people. I should have to think
  long if I were ask'd to name the man who has done
  more and in more valuable directions, for
  America."

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Interesting...

• Henrys father wanted him to be a lawyer
  however, Henry felt otherwise. Being a trustee
  at Bowdoin College, it is quite possible his
  father secured him his professorship.
• Edgar Allen Poe once accused Longfellow of
  plagiarism.
• Knew 10 languages
• Suffered a suicidal depression after the death of
  his first wife.
• His Bowdoin classmate, Nathaniel Hawthorne, was a
  life-long friend.
• A great influence on artistic and popular
  culture, Longfellow had everything from schools
  to cigars to board games named after him.
• In the 1870s, schoolchildren celebrated his
  birthday as if it were a national holiday.
• Some of his lines and phrases - "A boy's will is
  the wind's will," "Ships that pass in the night,"
  "Footprints on the sands of time" - are so well
  known that they have entered the American
  language. Today they are often quoted without the
  speaker even knowing Longfellow penned the words.

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RIDE ON

• Journal 5 (150 word minimum)
• We live in a world obsessed with celebrities
  much as Longfellows world was, except in his
  time, writers and revolutionaries were the
  famous. Do you feel that knowing a certain
  celebritys background and personal life takes
  away from their crafts effect on you? Why or why
  not? Be thoreau in your explanation.

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Paul Revere's Rideby Henry Wadsworth
LongfellowBackground Information

• One of Longfellows most famous poems
• Made Paul Revere, a relatively minor figure from
  the Revolutionary War, a national hero
• Paul Revere was a blacksmith and devoted patriot
  who was a part of the Boston Tea Party and later,
  The Boston Massacre, which he in part created
• Had 8 children with his first wife and 8 more
  with his second
• Served with the poet's maternal grandfather,
  Peleg Wadsworth, in the failed Penobscot
  expedition.
• The basic premise of the poem is historically
  accurate, but Reveres role is exaggerated
• Revere was not the only rider that night, nor did
  he make it all the way to Concord, but was
  captured and then let go (without his horse) in
  Lexington, where he had stopped to warn Samuel
  Adams and John Hancock of the impending attack.

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Paul Revere's Rideby Henry Wadsworth
LongfellowBackground Information

• Longfellow's intention was not to write a
  history it was to create a national hero and he
  was successful at doing so
• Paul Revere served as a symbol of our nations
  noble past
• Longfellow wrote the poem to inspire a country on
  the verge of Civil War

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Joseph Campbells Stages of the Hero

• The Call to Adventure The Hero begins the
  adventure in some way or another
• Options
• A) Lured
• B) Forced
• C) Volunteers

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Joseph Campbells Stages of the Hero

• Tests/Obstacles to Overcome The Hero must go
  through a series of tests, ordeals, or obstacles
  during the adventure.
• Options
• A) Monster/Enemy Battle
• B) Rescue
• C) Journey of Peril
• D) Puzzle/Riddle
• E) Death/Descent into Underworld (death of
  innocence)

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Joseph Campbells Stages of the Hero

• The Return/Reward The last part is a return home
  or a re-emergence into the living world by the
  hero. The hero usually gains a reward of some
  type either before returning or upon his return.
• Options (The Return)
• A) Fleeing opposing Forces
• B) Safe return in which higher powers favor the
  hero
• C) A rescue of some sort
• D) Resurrection/Ascent into the living world
  (with new wisdom/knowledge and maturity)

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Joseph Campbells Stages of the Hero

• Options (Reward)
• A) Elixir
• B) Medal
• C) Treasure
• D) Artifact
• Please note that this is the heros journey in
  its most primitive form.

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Annotating Poetry

• 1. Read the title. What meanings does it hold?
  What can we predict the poem will be about?
• 2. Identify the narrative voice and point of
  view the poem is told from. Write it at the top
  of the page.
• 3. Read the poem once through for general
  comprehension. Identify the rhyme scheme and
  meter. Circle any words you do not know and
  define them.
• 4. Read the poem through again. Paraphrase any
  lines you do not comprehend in the margin.

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Annotating Poetry

• 5. Read the poem through again. Underline any
  metaphors or similes along the way. Briefly
  explain them underneath the text.
• 6. Read the poem through once again. Circle any
  imagery you find along the way, and provide
  modifiers that explain the mood they create
  underneath.

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Annotating Poetry

• 7. Read the poem through once again, commenting
  on any lines that reveal the tone of the poem in
  the left hand margin.
• 8. Read the poem through once again. Identify any
  assonance or consonance along the way,
  underlining the letters that create it.
• 9. Read the poem through once again. Identify,
  bracket, and define any allusions made that
  enrich the text. Briefly notate them underneath
  the text.

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Annotating Poetry

• 10. Read the poem again and highlight any
  repeated words. Explain why you believe the
  author uses this repetition at the end of the
  poem.
• 11. Read the poem again. Identify and explain any
  symbols you believe function within the poem.
  This may be explained during or after reading the
  poem.
• 12. After annotating the poem, read the title
  once again. Does it mean something different than
  you thought? You should be able to identify the
  theme of the poem by now.