. The visitor then asked if he had died here. In the first, he arrived in Cambridge in 1837, fresh from a six-year professorship at Bowdoin College. Longfellows imitativeness differed significantly from that of many contemporaries, however, in that he early outgrew his tendency to echo Bryants style or that of English Romantic poets and turned instead to German Romanticism, which he virtually introduced into American poetry, and to traditions of European verse from many countries and eras. The Tales of a Wayside Inn, modeled roughly on Geoffrey Chaucers The Canterbury Tales and published in 1863, reveals his narrative gift. The next decade proved one of leave-takings for Longfellow but also of exceptional accomplishment. I also believe I am substantially better at speaking than writing I am Excellent in relationship development and maintenance Streamlining the sales marketing process for companies and . It represented the medieval phase of Christianity and the virtue of faith (mixed, inevitably, with superstition) by dramatizing the story of a peasant girls willingness to die so that a prince might be healed of his illness. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow - whose 200th birthday bicentennial is this month - has had four. That same year Longfellow published Hyperion, a romantic novel idealizing his European travels. "[138] Twentieth-century poet Lewis Putnam Turco concluded that "Longfellow was minor and derivative in every way throughout his career nothing more than a hack imitator of the English Romantics. "[113], Longfellow's early collections Voices of the Night and Ballads and Other Poems made him instantly popular. He retired from teaching in 1854 to focus on his writing, and he lived the remainder of his life in the Revolutionary War headquarters of George Washington in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Life and Fame. . [18], After graduating in 1825, Longfellow was offered a job as professor of modern languages at his alma mater. Other than being a poet of great repute; Longfellow was also an educationist, who was a professor at his alma mater Bowdoin College and latter at the Harvard College. 1860. She married Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (poet, buried at this cem.) 25K. 'Farewell! [148], "Henry Wadsworth" redirects here. Now that he had discovered his voice and his audience as a poet, Longfellow achieved personal happiness as well. Whereas 19th-century readers had savored the sentimental charms of The Childrens Hour, readers of today look for personal confessions of a sort Longfellow held in reserve; two sonnets particularly admired today for their courageous yet artistically controlled revelations of personal pain, Mezzo Cammin and The Cross of Snow (composed 1879), both appeared posthumously. He wrote in his journal in 1878: "I have only one desire; and that is for harmony, and a frank and honest understanding between North and South". Again, he sought solace by flinging himself into his work. [134], Longfellow was the most popular poet of his day. Longfellow and Mary Potter were married in September 1831. He possessed great metrical skill, but he failed to capture the American spirit like his great contemporary Walt Whitman, and his work generally lacked emotional depth and imaginative power. [88] In March 1882, Longfellow went to bed with severe stomach pain. Paul Revere's Ride, for example, was first published in 1860, a time of dread and fear of the oncoming storm. [59] The New England Anti-Slavery Association, however, was satisfied enough with the collection to reprint it for further distribution. was offered a professorship at Bowdoin College with the condition that he first spend some time in Europe for further language study. Just like Henry Wadsworth Longfellow did I believe that EVERY interaction with customers, employees, stakeholders or stockholders, matters. It was probably the most celebrated American poem of the century. He once attended a ball without her and noted, "The lights seemed dimmer, the music sadder, the flowers fewer, and the women less fair. Written for the 15th reunion of his Bowdoin College class, it is a memorable reflection on aging and is Longfellows most admired ode. [96], As a very private man, Longfellow did not often add autobiographical elements to his poetry. New Critics looked for ironies, ambiguities, and complexities not discoverable in Longfellows work and rejected the didactic conclusions he typically tacked onto his poems. [119] He was such an admired figure in the United States during his life that his 70th birthday in 1877 took on the air of a national holiday, with parades, speeches, and the reading of his poetry. Though its account of Reveres ride is historically inaccurate, the poem created an American legend. Poet. The professorship was not created and Longfellow agreed to continue teaching at Bowdoin. Longfellow attended a dame school at the age of three and was enrolled by age six at the private Portland Academy. For immediate publication, in three months beginning late in 1857 he composed the title poem for The Courtship of Miles Standish and Other Poems (1858). A monument featuring a bas relief of Miles Standish, Sadalphon, the Village Blacksmith, the Spanish Student, Evangeline, and Hiawatha, characters from Longfellows works, was dedicated in October 1914. Most of us only get one life. Hundreds of editions, translations, and imitations followed, and Evangeline won admiration in Europe (from which Longfellow drew some of his sources) as well as the United States. The world, he concluded with characteristic serenity, belongs to those who come the last, / They will find hope and strength as we have done.. The family occupied the first brick house in Portland, built by the general and still maintained as a literary shrine to its most famous occupant. [53] In July 1839, he wrote to a friend: "Victory hangs doubtful. The trustees raised his salary to $800 with an additional $100 to serve as the college's librarian, a post which required one hour of work per day. About Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. (L.M.) Bowdoin offers Longfellow a professorship of modern languages, provided that he prepare himself for the position with a period of European travel, a proposition he . American advantage: a teacher of the year urges us not to squander the gift of many languages That was the Iroquoian Hiawatha--the real Hiawatha, if you will--until Henry Wadsworth Longfellow came along and published The Song of Hiawatha in 1855. But the death in 1861 of his second wife, after she accidentally set her dress on fire, plunged him into melancholy. Longfellow had become one of the first American celebrities and was popular in Europe. The mansion was the poet's home until he entered Bowdoin College in 1821. [61] They were soon married; Nathan Appleton bought the Craigie House as a wedding present, and Longfellow lived there for the rest of his life. Evangeline A Tale of Acadie Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) Henry began his schooling at age three, when he and his older brother, Stephen, enrolled in the first of several private schools in which they prepared for entrance to Bowdoin College. Both seaside and fireside come together in The Fire of Drift-Wood, a mood piece employing imagery of light and warmth drawn from shipwreck as a metaphor for intuited estrangement among friends. Longfellows goal in this second European journey was to acquaint himself with Scandinavian languages while strengthening his command of German language and literature. On this trip he visited England, Sweden, and the Netherlands. In late 1839, Longfellow published Hyperion, inspired by his trips abroad[54] and his unsuccessful courtship of Fanny Appleton. This article was most recently revised and updated by, https://www.britannica.com/biography/Henry-Wadsworth-Longfellow, Academy of American Poets - Biography of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, National Park Service - Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Official Site of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Maine: An Encyclopedia - Biography of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Poetry Foundation - Biography of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow - Children's Encyclopedia (Ages 8-11), Henry Wadsworth Longfellow - Student Encyclopedia (Ages 11 and up). [30] During his years teaching at the college, he translated textbooks from French, Italian, and Spanish;[31] his first published book was a translation of the poetry of medieval Spanish poet Jorge Manrique in 1833. [16] In his senior year, Longfellow wrote to his father about his aspirations: I will not disguise it in the leastthe fact is, I most eagerly aspire after future eminence in literature, my whole soul burns most ardently after it, and every earthly thought centres in itI am almost confident in believing, that if I can ever rise in the world it must be by the exercise of my talents in the wide field of literature. It did not hurt that Longfellow had also experienced the kind of . [83] He is buried with both of his wives at Mount Auburn Cemetery in Cambridge, Massachusetts. [127] Poet Walt Whitman considered him an imitator of European forms, but he praised his ability to reach a popular audience as "the expressor of common themesof the little songs of the masses". Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, (born February 27, 1807, Portland, Massachusetts [now in Maine], U.S.died March 24, 1882, Cambridge, Massachusetts), the most popular American poet in the 19th century, known for such works as The Song of Hiawatha (1855) and Paul Reveres Ride (1863). His travel sketches, Outre-Mer (1835), did not succeed. [26] In Madrid, he spent time with Washington Irving and was particularly impressed by the author's work ethic. Hiawatha introduces his tribe to agriculture through his encounter with the corn god Mondamin, to transportation by inventing the birch canoe, and to picture-writing. English Literature - Jamie Handitye "Fair is foul and foul is fair" In the quote above, we are introduced to the witches in the very first scene of Macbeth. The volume In the Harbor, Ultima ThulePart 2 came out just after his death in 1882 and included his final composition, The Bells of San Blas (1882). An apocryphal story claims that college trustee Benjamin Orr had been impressed by Longfellow's translation of Horace and hired him under the condition that he travel to Europe to study French, Spanish, and Italian. The Building of the Ship combines a tribute to the master builder who designed the ship with a love story linking the masters daughter to the fiery youth employed in its construction while making clear that the Union stood allegorically for the United States on the eve of secession. He spent much of his summers as a child at his grandfather Peleg's farm in Hiram, Maine. All day I am weary and sad". Henry Wadsworth Longfellow is born on 27 February in Portland, Maine, the second of eight children of the lawyer Stephen Longfellow and his wife, Zilpah Wadsworth Longfellow. Many, especially Torquemada and The Saga of King Olaf, were surprisingly violent. [110] In preparing the volume, Longfellow hired Katherine Sherwood Bonner as an amanuensis. 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