Longfellow, Stephen (grandfather), 16, 29
Longfellow, Stephen (great-grandfather), 15–16
Longfellow, Stephen (great-great-grandfather), 15, 140
Longfellow, William, 15
Longfellow, Zilpah (mother), 11–15; in Portland house, 5–6; on HWL as child, 7, 20; and story of Peleg Wadsworth’s escape, 10; Guadeloupe as dream of, 26; on woods excursion, 27; on smallpox epidemic, 30; on son Stephen, 30, 31; and husband Stephen, 31; and HWL’s journey through Europe, 44, 60; on Elizabeth’s death, 68; on HWL’s marriage, 91, 92; on black servant, 92; and sacralization of Washington, 127; Fanny Appleton’s note to, 165
“Longfellow in the Aftermath of Modernism” (Gioia), 256
Longfellow: His Life and Work (Arvin), xii, 255–56
Longfellow Institute, xiv
“Longfellow: The Man Who Invented America” (exhibition), xiv
Longfellow Memorial Association, 251
Longfellow National Historic Site, ix, xiv–xv, 257
Longfellow’s Dream (commemorative production), 252
Longfellow Square(s), 251
“Longfellow War, The,” 158, 160, 162
Lönnrot, Elias, 205
Lowell, James Russell, 236, 250–51
Lowell, Sarah, 126
Mackintosh, Robert, 164
Mackintosh, Sir James, 164
Maine: industry and trade of, 26, 27; and Bowdoin, 33, 72; and Longfellow abroad, 50; and Swedish landscape, 108–9; as new vacationland, 171
Maine Historical Society, xiv, 19, 127, 251, 253, 258
Marienberg: Longfellow at, 152–55
“Martin Franc and the Monk of Saint Anthony,” 86
Masque of Pandora, The, 242
McClatchy, J. D., 256
McClellan, Isaac, 28
McKean v. Allen, 72
Means, Russell, 259
Medieval Revivalism, xi, 254
Mellen, Frederic, 24, 28
Mellen, Judge, 24
Mellen, Prentice, 28
Melville, Herman, 171
“Mezzo Cammin,” 154
Michael Angelo: A Fragment, 242
Michelangelo, 55, 244
“Midnight Mass for the Dying Year,” 158
“Midnight Ride of Paul Revere, The.” See “Paul Revere’s Ride”
Mill, John Stuart, 101
Miriam (Craigie House servant), 126
Miscellaneous Poems Selected from the United States Literary Gazette, 37, 38
Modernism, x, 253–54, 256
Monhegan Island, battle off, 21
Monti, Luigi, 232
“Morituri Salutamus,” 241
Mount Vernon, historical preservation of, 168
Mullins, Priscilla, 246
Multiculturalism: and Longfellow, xiv, 233, 242
My Book and Friend (Longfellow sketch), 61
“My Lost Youth,” 21, 23, 172, 199, 209
Nahant, as summer residence, 170, 199, 208, 218, 219, 226, 237
National identity or character: Longfellow’s role in, xv; and Longfellow on poetry, 81, 83; and Kalevala, 205; and Tales of a Wayside Inn, 232
Nationalism: in Longfellow’s poetry, 20, 203
National literature: Longfellow on, 197
Native Americans. See Indians, American
Neal, John, 28, 172
Nemerov, Howard, 256
Netherlands: Longfellow in, 114–18
New Criticism, xii, 256
New England: cultural hegemony of, xi; civilizing mission of, 27; village blacksmith as myth of, 140; in Longfellow’s vision of America, 246; Frost as icon of, 254
New England Literary Culture (Buell), 256
New England Magazine, 88
New England Tragedies, 93, 235, 256
Newman, Samuel, 73
Newport, Rhode Island, 199–200, 210
New York Weekly Mirror, 159–60
Nicander, Karl August, 106, 108
Nichols, Benjamin Ropes, 96
Nichols, Ichabod, 1, 68, 96, 172
Nietzsche, Friedrich, 129
Norse sagas, 95
North American Review, 38, 79–80, 81, 88–89, 160, 202
Norton, Andrews, 151
Norton, Catherine Eliot, 153
Norton, Charles Eliot, xiii, 236, 237, 254
Novalis, 79, 120
Old Cambridge (Higginson), 133
“Old Clock on the Stairs, The,” 170, 246
Old Dominion Zeitung, 61, 63–65
Omoo (Melville), 171
“On Mrs. Kemble’s Readings from Shakespeare,” 194
Opera-going by Longfellow, 46, 109, 209
“Origin and Progress of the French Language,” 80
Orr, Benjamin, 40, 41
Outre-Mer, A Pilgrimage Beyond the Sea, 53, 83–89, 104–5; British edition of, 112; Woodside on, 113–14; Fanny Appleton on, 120; and Widow Craigie, 124; earnings from (1857), 199
Oxford University, degree from, 238
Oxnard, Thomas, 48
Packard, Alpheus, 241
Paine, Thomas, 65
Paris: Longfellow’s visit to, 40, 42–43, 46, 54; in Longfellow’s travel sketches, 88
Parkman, Francis, 214
Parody: of “Excelsior,” 142; of Hiawatha, 211
Parsons, Thomas W., 232
Pasta, Giuditta, 46
Paul, Jean, 79, 120, 145, 197
“Paul Revere’s Ride,” 221, 230–31; and Kennedy children, ix
Pearl, Matthew, 258
Pedro (emperor of Brazil), 245
“Pegasus in Pound,” 184
Penobscot Expedition, 7–8, 231
Perfect Storm (Junger): “Wreck of the Hesperus” compared with, 139
“Peter Quince” drawings, 227
Peucinian Society, 37
Pierce, Anne Longfellow, 165, 220, 253
Pierce, Franklin, 36, 37
Pierce, George Washington, 78
Pinsky, Robert, ix–x, xi
Pittsfield, Massachusetts, 170, 171, 189, 246
Plagiarism: Longfellow charged with, 86, 158–59, 159–60, 161; and Poe, 160
Poe, Edgar Allan, 150, 157–60, 161, 162
Poems (1845), 161, 175
Poems of Henry W. Longfellow, The (1846), 138
Poems of Places, 242
Poems on Slavery, 156–58
Poets’ Corner, Westminster Abbey, 99, 250–51
Poets and Poetry of Europe, The (anthology), 179
Politics: Longfellow’s avoidance of, 157, 196; and Longfellow before Civil War, 200; and Longfellow’s vision of America, 246. See also Federalist Party and Federalism; Jacksonian democracy
“Politics and Poetry of New England, The” (photograph of Longfellow and Sumner), 229
Portland, Maine, 13, 17–18, 26–29; Longfellow’s boyhood home in, xii–xiii; Longfellow’s childhood in, 5–6; British shelling of, 16; house of Longfellow’s birth in, 18; Longfellow and Fanny’s visits to, 170; Longfellow Square in, 251; as tourist attraction, 260
Portland Gazette: Longfellow’s childhood poem in, 24
Potter, Barrett, 19, 90
Potter, Mary Storer. See Longfellow, Mary Potter
Pound, Ezra, 254
Preble (Commodore), 62
Preble, Barrett (Judge), 19, 90
Preble, Edward Deering, 11, 49, 58, 61–63, 65, 137
Preble, Marianne, 90, 91
Preble, William Pitt, 59, 90
Prince of Wales, 251
“Psalm of Life, A,” ix, 137, 259
Public speaking: Longfellow’s avoidance of, 196, 240–41
Pushmataha (Choctaw chief), 202–3
“Quadroon Girl, The,” 156, 158
Quentin Durward (Scott), 47
Radcliffe College: Alice Longfellow in founding of, 248
“Rainy Day, The,” 138, 255
Rand, George, 224
“Raven, The” (Poe), 160
Reeve, Tapping, 71
Religion: and Longfellow’s father, 17; and Bowdoin Colleg
e, 35–36, 41, 59; and examination of Biblical texts at Göttingen, 60; and Fanny Appleton, 164–65; and anesthesia in childbirth, 189; and Longfellow’s view on death, 192, 193; and “The Birds of Killingworth,” 233; in Longfellow’s vision of America, 246. See also Catholicism
“Resignation,” 192
“Revenge of Rain-in-the-Face,” 242–43
Revere, Paul, xi, 8, 231, 261. See also “Paul Revere’s Ride”
Reynal, Abbé de, 181
Rich, Obadiah, 51, 104–5
“Rip Van Winkle” (Irving), 73, 85
Rohl, Maria Christina, 109
Romanticism, 79; Longfellow as conduit for, xi; and Göttingen, 60; and Longfellow’s vision of university, 70; and Carlyle’s Life of Schiller, 102; Longfellow’s fascination with, 120; and originality, 159; on native languages, 203
Roosevelt, Theodore, 251
“Ropewalk, The,” 199
Russell, Lord John, 238
“Saga of King Olaf, The,” 233
Saintsbury, George, 253
Salem witch scare, 93, 235
Sartor Resartus (Carlyle), 144
Saturday Club, 198, 261
Scherb (friend), 209, 235
Schiller, Johann von, 103, 196, 255
Schmidt, Michael, 204
Schoolcraft, Henry Rowe, 206–7
Schoolmaster, The (Longfellow sketches), 88
Scott, Sir Walter, 47
Sealfield, 185
Seaside and the Fireside, The, 162, 192, 194, 195, 199
“Seaweed,” 195
Segretain Moine, Le (Norman fabliau), 86
Sentimentality: in Longfellow’s poetry, 192–93; Victorian appeal to, 253; new
scholarship on, 258
Sewall family, 15
Shakespeare, William, in Poets’ Corner, 250
“Ships that pass in the night,” xi, 187, 259
Shipton, Clifford, 16
Shirley, William, 181
Sidney, Sir Philip, 81, 202
Silverman, Kenneth, 160
Simms, William Gilmore, 161
“Skeleton in Armor, The,” 112, 139, 200
Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent., The (Irving), 52, 84–85
Skinner, Mary, 99
“Slave in the Dismal Swamp, The,” 156, 158
Slavery: colonizationists vs. abolitionists on, 92; and Sumner, 135; and Dickens, 155; and Longfellow, 155–58, 175, 201, 213, 255; and Acadians, 182
“Slave’s Dream, The,” 156
“Slave Singing at Midnight, The,” 156–57
Slidell, Alexander, 51–54, 55, 56, 73, 85
Smith, Elizabeth Oakes, 28
Smith, John Adams, 51
Smith, Seba, 28, 76
“Snow-Flakes,” 199
“Song of the Bell” (Lied von der Glocke) (Schiller), 195, 255
Song of Hiawatha, The, 202, 212–14; and Dvorák’s Ninth (From the New World), x, 252; and Longfellow’s maturing, 83; and Finnish language, 108; and Poe, 161; earnings from (1857), 199; controversies over, 203–5; Longfellow’s sources for, 205–8; illustration for, 206; writing of, 208–11; popular success of, 211; open-endedness of, 233
Sontag, Henrietta, 46
Southern Literary Messenger, 162
Southey, Robert, 179
Spain: Longfellow in, 50–55
“Spanish Devotional and Moral Poetry,” 80
Spanish Student, The, 160, 179, 184, 199
Sparks, Jared, 126
Staël, Madame de, 47
Standish, Miles, xi, 198, 246
Stearns, Professor, 124
Stephens, Ann, 28
Stephenson, Samuel and Abigail, 6
Sterne, Lawrence, 65
Stevens, Wallace, 254
Storer, Ebenezer, 43
Story, Joseph, 17, 49
Stowe, Harriet Beecher, 241
Stuart, Lady Dudley, 99
Studies in Poetry, 38
Sumner, Charles, 104, 135–36, 200–201; Longfellow letters to, 134, 152, 153; as Dickens’ guide, 151; urges Longfellow to write on slavery, 155; and Poe’s criticism, 158; on Longfellows’ wedding journey, 175; and Evangeline, 189; and Appletons’ slavery connections, 196; as abolitionist, 200, 213; Hiawatha reading by, 211; and accounts of Fanny’s fatal accident, 216, 218, 219; as Civil War news source, 221; and Charley in army, 225, 226; and Longfellow in Washington, 229; in portrait with Longfellow, 229; death of, 246; in Longfellow’s extended family, 247; and Dickens at Copps Hill, 262
Sumner, Harriet Coffin, 164
Sweden, Longfellow’s visit to, 106, 107–11
Switzerland: Longfellow in, 119, 120–22
Symonds, Franklin, 251
“Tailor’s Drawer,” 87–88
Tales of a Traveller by Geoffrey Crayon, Gent. (Irving), 85
Tales of a Wayside Inn, 221, 230–35; and Poe, 161; “ships that pass in the night” from, 187, 259; second series of, 242
Tate, Alan, 254
Taylor, Edward, 151
Tegnér, Bishop, 108
Tennyson, Alfred Lord, 2, 97, 158–59, 210, 238, 254
Thackeray, William Makepeace, 2
Thoreau, Henry David, 132–33
Thorp, Erica, 251
Thorp, Mrs. Joseph (Annie Longfellow), 217
“The thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts,” 209
Three Books of Song, 242
Thurber, James, 142
Ticknor, George, 49, 81, 94, 95, 124, 129, 130
Ticknor, William D. & Co., 189
Ticknor & Fields, 210, 211, 247
“Tide Rises, the Tide Falls, The,” xiv, 174
“Torquemada,” 233
Toussaint L’Ouverture, 93
Trachtenberg, Alan, 204
Translation by Longfellow: of Dante, xi, 55, 229, 236, 237; in verse anthologies, 179, 242
Trap (Longfellow’s terrier), 237
Traveller, The (Goldsmith), 85
Treadwell, Daniel, 232
Trollope, Anthony, 245
Trumball, John, 125
Uhland, Johann, 120
Ultima Thule, 242
Ulysses: and Evangeline, 187
United States Literary Gazette, The, 37, 79
University(ies): Longfellow’s ideas about, 69–72; classical languages as orthodoxy of, 130
University of Virginia, 78
Upham, Thomas C., 24, 25, 73–74
Vassall, John, 124–25
Verandah Hotel, 170–74, 189
Vergil, and Evangeline, 185
Vico, Giambattista, 203
Victoria (queen of England), 3, 252
Victorian American culture, xi
Victorianism, 253–54, 256
“Village Blacksmith, The,” xi, 15, 138, 140, 259
Vita Nuova (Dante), 237 in Longfellow’s
journal on Fanny’s acceptance, 164
Vogelweide, Walther von der, 175
Voices of the Night, 133, 137, 150; Poe’s review of, 158; earnings from (1857), 199
Wadsworth (wife of Peleg and mother of Zilpah), 10, 11, 12
Wadsworth, Alexander Scammell, 21
Wadsworth, Betsy, 12, 13–14
Wadsworth, Charles, 7, 8, 12
Wadsworth, Eliza, 127
Wadsworth, George Alexander, 12
Wadsworth, Henry (Harry), 11, 12, 26
Wadsworth, John, 12
Wadsworth, Lucia, 12, 14–15, 20, 28, 29, 57–58, 67
Wadsworth, Peleg, 6–10, 231; and Lafayette, 47
Wadsworth, Peleg (younger), 12, 27
Wadsworth, Sam, 12
Wadsworth, S. L. and Son, 26
Wadsworth Hall, 6, 9
Wadsworth-Longfellow House, 28
Wagenknecht, Edward, xii
Waif, The (anthology), 159, 179
Walden (Thoreau), 208
Wales, Henry Ware, 232
Ward, Sam, 1, 2, 242
War of 1812, 19, 20–21
“Warning, The,” 156, 157, 255
Washington, George: and Cr
aigie House, ix, xv, 125, 127, 167, 168, 169; sacralization of, 127
Washington, Martha, 125, 127
Waste Land, The (Eliot), 177
Waterville College (now Colby), 70, 79
Webster, Daniel: and male friendships, 136; and Fugitive Slave Act, 195; and “Building of the Ship,” 255
Welles, Samuel, 48
Wesselhoeft, Robert, 170
Westminster Abbey, Poets’ Corner in, 99, 250–51
Whigs and Whig Party: and Bowdoin, 72; and Longfellow, 157, 196, 200; in Longfellow’s vision of America, 246
Whipple, John Adams, 169
Whitman, Walt, 204, 229
Whittier, John Greenleaf, 157, 190, 196
Wilcox, Ella Wheeler, 255
Wilde, Oscar, 1–3
Wilhelm Meister (Goethe), 172
Williams, Reuel, 59
William Wetmore Story and His Friends (James), 244
Willis, Nathaniel Parker, 28, 83, 84, 98, 99, 103, 138, 159, 160
Willis, William, 17
“Witnesses, The,” 157
“Wondrous Tale of a Little Man in Gosling Green,” 75, 93
Woodside, Jonathan, 113
“Woods in Winter,” 37–38
Worcester, Joseph E., 167
Wordsworth, William, 64
“Wreck of the Hesperus, The,” xi, 138, 139, 259; illustration for, 138
Year in Spain, by a Young American, A (Slidell), 53, 85
“Young Italian, The” (Irving), 73
Young Longfellow (Thompson), xii
Beacon Press
Boston, Massachusetts
www.beacon.org
Beacon Press books
are published under the auspices of
the Unitarian Universalist Association of Congregations.
© 2004 by Charles C. Calhoun
All rights reserved
Frontispiece: M. August Edouart, silhouette of Henry
Wadsworth Longfellow, 1841. Courtesy National Park
Service, Longfellow National Historic Site.
Grateful acknowledgment for production assistance to Furthermore: a program of the J. M. Kaplan Fund.
Composition by Wilsted & Taylor Publishing Services
Text design by Dean Bornstein
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Calhoun, Charles C.
Longfellow : a rediscovered life / Charles C. Calhoun.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references (p.) and index.
eISBN 978-0-8070-7041-3
ISBN 0-8070-7026-2 (cloth)
ISBN 0-8070-7039-4 (pbk.)
1. Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth, 1807–1882.
Longfellow Page 36