“BUILDING AN AMERICAN IDENTITY WITH LANDSCAPE

IN LONGFELLOW’S THE SONG OF HIAWATHA”

A paper developed for “American Poets of the 19th Century”

Professor: Melissa RangeBy: Marie Jeruc

19th Century National Epic Poems

Finnish Kalevala (1849) The Song of Hiawatha (1855)

Trochaic Tetrameter

“Ye who love a nation’s legends,Love the ballads of a people,That like voices from afar offCall to us to pause and listen,Speak in tones so plain and childlike,Scarcely can the ear distinguishWhether they are sung or spoken;”

Problematic Content“Ye whose hearts are fresh and simple,Who have faith in God and Nature,Who believe that in all agesEvery human heart is human,That in even savage bosomsThere are longings, yearnings, strivingsFor the good they comprehend not,That the feeble hands and helpless,Groping blindly in the darkness,Touch God’s right hand in that darknessAnd are lifted up and strengthened;”

Major Findings from this Project:• 1: Longfellow defines an American experience and identity

with landscape

• 2: Longfellow justifies the white man’s claim to America with the American landscape

• 3: Longfellow provides his own vision for an American identity, which erases indigenous communities from the landscape

FAMILIARIZING THE AMERICAN LANDSCAPE

Emphasizing American Nature

Longfellow’s Version

From the Vale of Tawasentha,From the Valley of Wyoming,From the groves of Tuscaloosa,From the far-off Rocky Mountains,From the Northern lakes and rivers, All the tribes beheld the signal,Saw the distant smoke ascending,The Pukwana of the Peace-Pipe.

Original Legend“Listen to me by tribes. You (the Mohawks), who are sitting under the shadow of the Great Tree,…You (the Oneidas), who recline your bodies against the Everlasting Stone, that cannot be moved…You (the Senecas), whose dwelling is in the Dark Forest, and whose home is everywhere…Unite, you five nations, and have one common interest, and no foe shall disturb you.”

JUSTIFYING THE WHITE MAN’S EXISTENCE

Claiming American Nature

“Wheresoe’er they tread, beneath them / Springs a flower unknown among us, / Springs the White-man’s Foot in blossom.”

“Miskodeed” / Claytonia virginica

Original Version

“As the sun increased, [Peboan*] grew less and less in stature, and anon had melted completely away.

Nothing remained on the place of his lodge fire but the miskodeed, a small white flower, with a pink border,

which is one of the earliest species of Northern plants.”

*Winter

LONGFELLOW’S VISION FOR THE AMERICAN IDENTITY

“Solution” – Indigenous People Depart

“Thus departed Hiawatha,Hiawatha the Beloved,In the glory of the sunset,In the purple mists of evening,To the regions of the home-wind,Of the Northwest wind, Keewaydin,To the Islands of the Blessed,To the Kingdom of Ponemah,To the Land of the Hereafter!”

What should we do with The Song of Hiawatha?

Reject & Ignore

• Negative portrayal of American Indian population

• Long, campy, dated (rhyme scheme and form)

• Inappropriate “solution” for a diverse country

Accept & Critique

• Understand context of poem and America in 1855

• Critique the poem’s problems, acknowledge its accomplishments

• Compare to 2015: are we actually doing a better job than Longfellow?

Works Cited• Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth. The Song of Hiawatha.

Mineola: Dover Publications, 2006. Print.

• Osborn, Chase and Stellanova Osborn. “Hiawatha” With Its Original Indian Legends. Lancaster: The Science Press Printing Company, 1944. Print.

• Trachtenberg, Alan. Shades of Hiawatha: Staging Indians, Making Americans. New York: Hill and Wang, 2004. Print.