Historical Background
1807 Portland, Maine, then part of Massachusetts, grandfather Revolutionary war hero, described as a dreamy child, liked to read esp. stories set in faraway places (Arabian Nights). Sailors would come to town speaking different languages. He became a linguist, knowing 8 languages and able to read 4 others. Published poetry at age 13 as name “Henry”. Father said it was a “lousy” poem, not knowing it was his son’s work. Went to Bowdoin College in Brunswick, Maine. Franklin Pierce and Nathaniel Hawthorne were in his graduating class. Hawthorne and Longfellow not friends in college, but their paths crossed later in life.
They wanted him to teach at the college but first he traveled in Europe for 3 years getting to know languages better (learning 7 languages). Kept a journal, later publishing this.
1829 taught at Bowdoin, teaching languages, librarian. Married and publishing literary criticism, textbooks, invited to teach at Harvard after going again to Europe, wife dies from complications during miscarriage. Sends he body to Mass. and stays in Europe, grief-stricken. Travels a few more years and in Swiss Alps meets Appletons from Mass., likes daughter Fanny but it’s not reciprocated.
Department head at Harvard, not much time for writing. Hawthorne writes “Twice Told Tales” and sends it to Longfellow, starts their friendship. (Wrote a poem on Hawthorne’s death, 1864.)
1839 publishes collection of poems. Good at marketing them, reputation grew. Continues to woo Fanny Appleton though she refuses. Several years later she decided to marry him. He describes it as best 18 years of his life, has several kids, happy marriage, become a well-known family because of his reputation as a poet. They become a national symbol of tranquility. Fanny’s family is wealthy, buy them a home. Visitors include Emerson, Oliver Wendell Holmes, etc.
1854 Resigns post at Harvard, first self-sustaining poet in America. Fireside poets popular at this time, publishing in literary magazines such as the Atlantic Monthly, around 1850s.
Publishes lots of work: Hiawatha (30,000 copies in 6 months),
Whittman self-publishes “Leaves of Grass” 1855.
1860 Paul Revere’s Midnight Ride is published, the nation on the verge of Civil War, an attempt to unite the nation.
1861 wife Fanny is putting together packets of children’s hair, going to seal them with wax and her dress is on fire, he tries to help her and it burns her and him. She died the next day. He grew the beard to cover the scars. He wrote a poem about her 18 year later. Wrote letter to Fanny’s sister how hard it was for him, and how he loved her. Wrote a poem “The Cross of Snow” referencing Mountain of the Cross.
Fireside Poets included him and 4 others, all known for long life, memorizable poems, abolitionists, and celebrated.
Honored as a kind of father of American poetry, appreciated by public and scholars alike. But now, has fallen out of favor. Why is this? (because it’s too simple, not intellectual enough).
Themes
He wrote about family, faith, freedom, home life. He write about the patriotic themes by glossing over truth and romanticizing it.
What’s he doing? Dipping into the American past, using language skills to immortalize, to give America it’s themes.
Dickinson
1830 b. 1 brother (married, lived nearby), 1 sister (never married either). Train was expanding America, people could be more connected. No longer was the West a lifetime away.
Emily read widely, her father frowned on reading all but a few books. 1849 Longfellow published Cavanaugh about a small town. When her father left the house they would read this contraband.
Compared to Poe, connected to Walt Whitman, admired the Bronte’s and Shakespeare. Wrote lots of letters to friends and family. Went to school a few years. May have had a personality disorder, not having lots of face-to-face relationships. Her behavior was progressively odd, wearing only white.
Wrote lots of poems, only a few published during her life, taking out her odd grammatical ways, which bothered her. It was common to burn your correspondence after your death, and many of her poems in her letters were burned. The maid saved a lot of her poems in her trunk, an act of disobedience. She died of kidney disease at age 56.
Came from Puritan heritage, strong work ethic, piety, brought up to be honest, obedient, and pleasant. Learn to rule your passion with reason. Virtue in self-denial.
Words to describe her: unique writing style, one of America’s best poets, emotionally complex, unconventional, reclusive, fun imaginative.
Poetic devices: personification (by capitalizing the words, giving them personality), alliteration, symbolism. Almost 150 poems begin with “I” but are not necessarily autobiographical, which she wrote that it’s not really her. She imagines herself as another.
Looking at her original writing on envelopes and scraps of paper. Used dashes, strange punctuation. She would cut the envelopes apart out of frugality. She was an influencer in the idea that poetry was visual. She experimented with slant rhyme. Or sight rhymes (like “word” and “lord”). A wordsmith, crafting complex ideas into short sentences. She would read the dictionary for fun. Some of her poems begin as dictionary definitions.
Themes
Nature, balancing imagination and observation,
A Bird Comes Down the Walk, tune to Blessed Be the Tide that Binds, she didn’t intend for it to be sung, but it was the same meter as in these familiar hymns.