Description
Book SynopsisLongfellow's Imaginative Engagement is a first-of-its-kind study of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s late-career poems and biography from 1861 until 1882, covering the poet’s posthumous publications and the handling of his literary estate. Using never-before-discussed archival materials from Harvard’s Houghton Library and Longfellow House-Washington’s Headquarters National Historic Site, including unpublished poems and poem fragments, this literary biography presents Longfellow’s vibrant and complex final two decades. After the tragic death of his beloved second wife, Frances (Fanny) Elizabeth Appleton, Longfellow reinvented himself as a creative artist, transforming his loss and the nation’s suffering in the Civil War and post-war period into compelling art. In the book, Jeffrey Hotz interprets the late career’s distinct phases, exploring his narrative poetry, translations, personal lyrics, religious poetry, aesthetic verse, and end-of-life vision of mortality as a journey. The book considers Longfellow’s friendships and family life, publication strategies and literary reputation, and the recurrent theme of longing for an ideal female figure in his poems and private life. Interweaving unpublished poems and poem fragments with interpretations of published collections, the book examines Longfellow’s complex voice, which captured the public’s imagination, making him America’s most famous poet in the nineteenth century.
Table of ContentsIntroduction: “Out of the shadows of night / The world rolls into light”
Part One: The Beginning of the Late Career, 1861-1863
Chapter 1 – Pursuing Successful Publication Because of Personal and National Tragedy
Chapter 2 – Narratives of Recuperation and Loss in Tales of a Wayside Inn, the Second Day, and Part Third
Part Two: Commitments through the End of the 1860s
Chapter 3 – The Divine Comedy Translation: Art as Macrocosm and Microcosm
Chapter 4 – Flower-de-Luce as Symbol and Search: Ideals of Completion and Unity
Chapter 5 – The New England Tragedies and the Restless Yearning for Feminist Ideals
Part Three: Grand Projects of the Early 1870s
Chapter 6 – Anxiety about Personal Faith in Public Art: Solving the Problem of The Divine Tragedy
Chapter 7 – Christianity as an Incomplete Project: Belief and Unbelief in The Divine Tragedy and Christus: A Mystery
Chapter 8 – Three Books of Song and The Poets of Poetry of Europe: Continuities and Collisions of Faith
Part Four: Solace and Aesthetics in the Mid-1870s
Chapter 9 – New Directions: An Aesthetic Amalgam for Transcendence in the 1870s
Chapter 10 – Aftermath and the Arts of Personal Disclosure and Desire
Chapter 11 – The Imperatives of Love and the Beautiful in The Masque of Pandora and Other Poems
Part Five: Looking Inward and Outward, The Final Years, 1875-1882
Chapter 12 – Preparing for Charted and Uncharted Journeys
Chapter 13 – Kéramos and Other Poems: The Aesthetic World and the Inner Self
Chapter 14 – Ultima Thule as the Final Spiritual and Artistic Journey
Part Six: The Posthumous Collections
Chapter 15 – After March 24, 1882: Longfellow’s Posthumous Career
Chapter 16 – Visions of the Multiverse: In the Harbor—Ultima Thule, Part II and Michael Angelo: A Fragment
Epilogue – Posthumously Published Poems, Unpublished Verse, and the Archival Records
