Warning: Use of undefined constant referer - assumed 'referer' (this will throw an Error in a future version of PHP) in /usr/home/essaywo/public_html/essays on line 102

Warning: Use of undefined constant host - assumed 'host' (this will throw an Error in a future version of PHP) in /usr/home/essaywo/public_html/essays on line 105

Warning: Cannot modify header information - headers already sent by (output started at /usr/home/essaywo/public_html/essays:102) in /usr/home/essaywo/public_html/essays on line 106

Warning: Cannot modify header information - headers already sent by (output started at /usr/home/essaywo/public_html/essays:102) in /usr/home/essaywo/public_html/essays on line 109
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow - College Essay

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

was born on February 27, 1807. He was a widely read and highly regarded poet of the nineteenth century. Longfellow was successful in both lyric and narrative poetry and later wrote incredible sonnets. He was not a poet of extremes, intense passion, or tragedy. He was gentle and optimistic and felt the purpose of poetry was to “embellish and sweeten life,” He generally wrote of normal life, and attempted to show the beauty of it, that seems to escape us.
In the early part of the twentieth century, Longfellow’s work fell into disfavor with the academic crowd because it was an age when everything traditional was held in low regard. Longfellow’s works were often criticized for being ...

Want to read the rest of this paper?
Join Essayworld today to view this entire essay
and over 50,000 other term papers

and Puritan New England in “The Courtship of Miles Standish.” These three poems mentioned above are his most famous long poems.
Longfellow received wide public recognition with his volume of verse “Voices of the Night” (1839), which contained the poem “A Psalm of Life,” which was written in quatrain stanza format.

"Tell me not in mournful numbers,
Life is but an empty dream!
For the soul is dead that slumbers,
And things are not what they seem."

This poem revolves around the idea of life’s pursuits. It is an optimistic view toward dealing with life’s purpose. Longfellow suggests a major purpose of life is learning more and advancing yourself through time, and that life is not to enjoy yourself, or to feel remorse, pain or sorrow, but to keep getting further with that knowledge you have obtained through life. He also stresses individuality, that we should strive to be different, to be our own person, and to not follow the crowd, or as he says, “Be not like dumb ...

Get instant access to over 50,000 essays.
Write better papers. Get better grades.

Already a member? Login

CITE THIS PAGE:

APA
MLA
Chicago
Turabian

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. (2006, November 16). Retrieved January 23, 2025, from http://www.essayworld.com/essays/Henry-Wadsworth-Longfellow/55683

"Henry Wadsworth Longfellow." Essayworld.com. Essayworld.com, 16 Nov. 2006. Web. 23 Jan. 2025. <http://www.essayworld.com/essays/Henry-Wadsworth-Longfellow/55683>

"Henry Wadsworth Longfellow." Essayworld.com. November 16, 2006. Accessed January 23, 2025. http://www.essayworld.com/essays/Henry-Wadsworth-Longfellow/55683.

JOIN NOW

Join today and get instant access to this and 50,000+ other essays

PAPER DETAILS

Added: 11/16/2006 08:37:29 PM
Category: Biographies
Type: Premium Paper
Words: 665
Pages: 3

Save |

Report

SHARE THIS PAPER

SAVED ESSAYS

Save and find your favorite essays easier