Comparing Fireside Poems

The first poem I read was a poem by James Russell Lowell called War. I assume that this poem was written during the time of the civil war. He mentioned slaves and fighting against different races, "It's a grand gret cemetary Fer the barthrights of our race; They jest want this Californy So's to lug new slave-states in To abuse ye, an' scorn ye, An' to plunder ye like sin." (Lowell) He thought war was stupid and he did not want it going on. He said, "EZ fer war, I call it murder,-- There you hev it plain an' flat; I don't want to go no furder." (Lowell) That sentence is how he starts off the poem. He has really strong feelings about war and lets them show. This is a characteristic of the romanticism period, feelings over intuition. This poem pretty much focused only on the negative side of things and was pretty sad. I think this is a characteristic of the romanticism period. A characteristic of the romanticism period was innocence. Killing and being in war doesn't seem very innocent to me. The second poem I real was by Oliver Wendell Holmes called Departed Days. This poem was also a sad poem. I think it was about old times that Holmes wants back. He goes on to describe how much farther and farther away the past becomes and how he will never get it back, "We strive against the stream, Each moment farther from the shore Where life's young fountains gleam; Each moment fainter wave the fields, And wider rolls the sea; The mist grows dark, -- the sun goes down, -- Day breaks, -- and where are we?" (Holmes) It is really quite depressing. I think this poem shows the romanticism characteristics by using the ocean to explain what was going on. Holmes incorporated the waves of the ocean to prove how hard it would be to get back into the same spot again. Another characteristic of this period is looking in the past for wisdom and distrusting progress. I think this is what the poem is all about. Holmes is yearning for the past and does not want to move forward. This is a perfect example of the romanticism period. These two poems are very alike but very different at the same time. They both were about a sad story. Both of the authors wanted things to return back to "normal" or go back to the way things used to be. Lowell didn't want the war to go on and Holmes just straight up wanted the past back. So I think these poems are very alike. But, they have very different stories and incorporate different characteristics of the romanticism period. Lowell was described as, " are ardent abolitionists, may not have seemed so conservative in the nineteenth century." (Howard) I can see why Howard said this about Lowell. He went against what his country was doing and wasn't afraid to voice his opinion. I think that made him an individual.

Lowell, James Russell. War. The Early Poems Including the Biglow Papers.New York.web.

Holmes, Oliver Wendell. Departed Days. Boston. 1861. Web

Howard, Leon. "James Russell Lowell." A Study of Early Literary Careers. Web.

Journal # 20

I have just finished reading Henry Longfellow's poem Autumn. I think it is a good example of romanticism writing. Romanticism writing talks a lot about nature and that is basically what this poem is about. I really like this poem because autumn is probably my favorite season of the year. Autumn seems to give me a warm feeling and makes me think of all the warm colors that the leaves change to. When I think of autumn I think of apple cider and orange leaves. I think Longfellow may think the same thing as me when he thinks of autumn. Longfellow describes the changes that occur when summer turns to autumn. "THOU comest, Autumn, heralded by the rain" (Longfellow) The way I interpreted the poem was that Longfellow was describing what the farmers do when autumn comes. I could be way off but that is what I thought of. I think he was saying that the farmers have to gather their crops. Longfellow really described autumn and it made me feel like I was in that season. I liked how he used the word gold in this poem because when I think of autumn I think of those warms colors. Examples of this would be, "Upon thy bridge of gold; thy royal hand" (Longfellow) and "Thine almoner, the wind, scatters the golden leaves!" (Longfellow) He made the color seem like a feeling rather than just a color. But, he did describe the leaves as fading into the warm colors like red, gold, and orange. "Thy shield is the red harvest moon" (Longfellow) I think this quote also makes the color a feeling as well. Everyone knows the moon is not red but it gives you a certain feeling. It's like a personification. I like that about the romanticism period. The writers are very creative, more so than the other two styles we have already studied. They use more figurative language. It makes Longfellow seem more like a real person. He uses feeling over reasoning. The poem causes you to feel a certain way rather than think a certain way and I like that.

The Chambered Nautilus

When I first read The Chambered Nautilus it made me think of a hermit crab. I guess I'm kind of weird but every time I reread this poem I just thought of this little animal. I thought of a crab out growing his shell and having to move out and find a bigger and better shell to live in. "Year after year beheld the silent toil" (Holmes) This is saying that someone is working hard quietly. I think this is saying that the crab year after year grows bigger and has to work to find a new shell to live in. The crab silently looks around for a new shell and doesn't disturb anyone while it is doing it, I think that is what Holmes means by the silent toil. "Build thee more stately mansions, O my soul," (Holmes) This I think is talking about the new shell the hermit crab gets to live in. It thinks of the shell as a mansion and gets rid of his old home. " Let each new temple, nobler than the last," (Holmes) is saying that each new shell the crab moves into will be bigger and better than the last one it had lived in. "He left the past year’s dwelling for the new," (Holmes) obviously this is saying it is moving out of it's old house into something new. I don't know if this was actually what Holmes was going for when he wrote this poem. I thought the title, The Chambered Nautilus, even relates to the way I viewed the poem. A hermit crab is an animal that lives near the ocean and everything in the poem relates to how I viewed the poem. Call me crazy but this poem is about a crab I just know that is what Holmes was thinking of, obviously! "The poet then turns to the animal's natural history, which he apparently likens to that of a snail or other less spectacular animal because he focuses on its years of silent toil devoted to building its lustrous spiraling coil." (Huff) According to this literary criticism Huff believes that this too is about an animal. This poem of course has a lot of romanticism characteristics. Holmes is discussing an animal the whole time which is apart of nature. He also used detail to describe what the animal in this poem was doing and was giving reasons why the the animal was doing what it was doing. "The moral is to keep growing spiritually (the soul's building of ever more stately mansions, line 29), leaving the "low-vaulted past" (line 31) for ever loftier temples until finally free from the outgrown shell (the physical body after death) by "life's unresting sea" (line 35)." (Huff) This is the poetic meaning of the poem rather than taking it literally. So if you view the poem this way it means basically to keep growing spiritually or forget about past set backs. This is also an example of the romanticism period. During this period they believed in using feeling over reasoning.

Holmes, Oliver Wendell. "The chambered Nautilus"1858. Web.

Huff, Randall. "'The Chambered Nautilus'." The Facts On File Companion to American Poetry, vol. 1. New York: Facts On File, Inc., 2007.Bloom's Literary Reference Online. Facts On File, Inc.

Washington Irving

I would just like to say right off the bat that in both "Rip Van Winkle" and "The Devil and Tom Walker" the main character has an awful wife. That just seems a bit curious to me. Possibly this could relate to his real life? Hmm... Anyways the main character of " The Devil and Tom Walker" is of course Tom Walker. Some other important characters are the devil and Tom Walker's wife. Tom Walker does show the characteristics of romanticism. He uses his feelings over his intuition. I mean obviously it is not a smart idea to sell your soul to the devil but Tom did it anyways. But, Tom wanted to be rich so bad and wanted to stop struggling so he thought that it was a smart idea to become rich to help himself out. He was just thinking of his own feelings and wasn't really thinking of the smart thing to do. "There was one condition which need not be mentioned, being generally understood in all cases where the devil grants favours; but there were others about which, though of less importance, he was inflexibly obstinate. He insisted that the money found through his means should be employed in his service." (Irving) This is discussing the devil's bargain with Tom and it sounds a little sketchy to me. I would use my reasoning and think that, that was a bad idea. Both stories, Rip Van Winkle and The Devil and Tom Walker are very descriptive. They describe many things but mostly nature. The romanticism period is known for being descriptive and discussing nature. "In fact, he declared it was of no use to work on his farm; it was the most pestilent little piece of ground in the whole country; everything about it went wrong, and would go wrong, in spite of him. His fences were continually falling to pieces; his cow would either go astray or get among the cabbages; weeds were sure to grow quicker in his fields than anywhere else; the rain always made a point of setting in just as he had some outdoor work to do; so that though his patrimonial estate had dwindled away under his management, acre by acre, until there was little more left than a mere patch of Indian corn and potatoes, yet it was the worst-conditioned farm in the neighborhood." (Irving) This is an extremely descriptive paragraph about nature. It is a big part of the romanticism period.

Lombardi, Esther. "'The Devil and Tom Walker' Short Story." Books & Literature Classics. About.com. Web. 05 Dec. 2011. .

Matthews, Washington Irving. "4. Rip Van Winkle By Washington Irving. Matthews, Brander. 1907. The Short-Story." Bartleby.com: Great Books Online -- Quotes, Poems, Novels, Classics and Hundreds More. Bartleby. Web. 05 Dec. 2011. .