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avalinda's review
challenging
inspiring
reflective
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? N/A
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.0
newaccount123's review
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
funny
hopeful
informative
inspiring
lighthearted
mysterious
reflective
relaxing
sad
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
5.0
Longfellow's Complete Poems is one of the greatest accomplishments of American Victorian literature. Wadsworth's opus contains such masterworks of popular fiction as The Courtship of Miles Standish, The Song of Hiawatha, and Evangeline. In addition, his shorter poems are often of top quality.
In some of his work, he shows a marked racism. In Hiawatha, for example, Longfellow ends the poem with an injunction that the Indian must follow the white man--or, in other words, to bend the knee to the invader. Now, it is possibly not arguable that Longfellow enjoyed the folk stories he adapted, and that, although he may have held rather abhorrent political views, that, in essence, the work is not made reprehensible by his more tactless inclusions. Further, the writing style, although mocked and easily replicated, was not to be bad; it mimicked Icelandic formulations, and at times really captured the emotion portrayed. But this is neither here nor there.
Longfellow was a master of myth-making. His history is often false or entirely fabricated. A case-in-point is the Midnight Ride of Paul Revere, which gives a very different account of Revere's ride, and was meant, in a sense, to give hope or a message to Northerners at the eve before the Civil War. Evangeline's portrayal of the Acadian people is certainly incorrect.
I have not read Christus or The Spanish Student.
In some of his work, he shows a marked racism. In Hiawatha, for example, Longfellow ends the poem with an injunction that the Indian must follow the white man--or, in other words, to bend the knee to the invader. Now, it is possibly not arguable that Longfellow enjoyed the folk stories he adapted, and that, although he may have held rather abhorrent political views, that, in essence, the work is not made reprehensible by his more tactless inclusions. Further, the writing style, although mocked and easily replicated, was not to be bad; it mimicked Icelandic formulations, and at times really captured the emotion portrayed. But this is neither here nor there.
Longfellow was a master of myth-making. His history is often false or entirely fabricated. A case-in-point is the Midnight Ride of Paul Revere, which gives a very different account of Revere's ride, and was meant, in a sense, to give hope or a message to Northerners at the eve before the Civil War. Evangeline's portrayal of the Acadian people is certainly incorrect.
I have not read Christus or The Spanish Student.
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