Author

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow(1807–1882)

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow is documented in Fuller’s letters, books, published essays, and manuscripts (1842–1846). 19 distinct works are named, most often in Poems. By Henry Wadsworth Longfellow . . ., and the most intensive engagement recorded is “excerpted”.

Engagement: ExcerptedAnalyzedQuotedReadMentioned
Present in: Letters · Books · Essays · Manuscripts
Documented: 1842–1846

Totals count documented engagements, once at the earliest witness. How we count →

Reprints, Memoirs passages, and repeat notes within a single manuscript are shown but never counted twice. Evidence for this author is selective, not exhaustive. Methodology →

Confirmed reading

Passages where the evidence goes beyond allusion to indicate that Fuller had Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s work in hand — an explicit statement of reading, sustained excerpting or translation, or a specific reading episode recorded by those who knew her.

Dated
1842Work not namedPossible
“S. Clarke to make up for you of Borrow, Longfellow, some more shreds of Dial”
Letters of Margaret Fuller ed. Hudspeth · 18 April 1842
Possible: Longfellow sent to Emerson in a parcel; transmission, not a reading statement. Additional dated evidence on an existing author. Fuller to Ralph Waldo Emerson; provenance per Harvey's extraction: letter to Emerson, printed in Higginson, Margaret Fuller Ossoli (1884).
1846The Spanish StudentDemonstrated
“The Spanish Student might also be acted, though with no great effect. All the means of action The shapeless masses, the materials.”
Papers on Literature and Art · now before me
142-line excerpt range with dramatic dialogue quoted at length from The Spanish Student.

In Fuller’s words

“(now before me) Longfellow's Spanish Student. [...] its chief merit is in the graceful expression of single thoughts or fancies; as here, / All the means of action / The shapeless masses, the materials, / Lie every where about us. [...] The son of genius comes, foot-sore with travel [...] It gleams a diamond. [also] I will forget her! / All dear recollections / Pressed in my heart, like flowers within a book [...] The style of the play is, throughout, elegant and simple.”

The Spanish Student: A Play in Three Acts · Papers on Literature and Art · 1846

When Fuller engaged with Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

I. Childhood

II. Adolescence

III. Self-Directed

IV. Transcendentalist2records

V. New York11records

VI. Europe11records

✦. Memoirs (1852)

1810

1820

1832

1836

1844

1846

1850

This page brings together documented engagements currently identified within the Fuller Reading Worlds catalog.

Longfellow in Fuller’s reading world

Documentary evidence

Selected passages from Fuller’s own writings, in chronological order.

1842—

Letter to Ralph Waldo Emerson

p57

read2 selected passages

“Longfellow sent us his poems, and if you have toleration for them, it would be well to have a short notice written by some one (not me)”

Inferred Hudspeth identified the book as Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's Ballads and Other Poems, published in late December 1841 and containing poems such as "The Wreck of the Hesperus" and "The Village Blacksmith." Fuller's cool tone in suggesting someone else review it suggests she has read the poems but harbors reservations about their quality for Dial standards.

“S. Clarke to make up for you of Borrow, Longfellow, some more shreds of Dial, including the wearifu' Napoleon, and the Prayer Book”

Fuller, Margaret. The Letters of Margaret Fuller. Edited by Robert N. Hudspeth. Vol. III. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1986.

1843—

Letter to Ralph Waldo Emerson

p159

analyzed · read

“She reviewed them, with John Sterling's Strafford and Henry Taylor's Philip Van Artevelde, in Dial 4 (1844):307-49 [Hudspeth fn.”

Fuller, Margaret. The Letters of Margaret Fuller. Edited by Robert N. Hudspeth. Vol. III. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1986.

Hudspeth identified the plays Emerson sent Fuller on 5 November as including Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's The Spanish Student, William Henry Smith's Athelwold, and J.W.

1845—

Letter to James Nathan

p114

analyzed · read

“We have had one interesting book, Longfellow's "Poets and Poetry of Europe." Look over it if you have a chance any time; it contains a good course in these charming studies, and there are some things, I wish I could read with you.”

Also reprinted in The Letters of Margaret Fuller, Vol. IV: 1845-1847. Counted once, at its first appearance.

Fuller, Margaret. Love-Letters of Margaret Fuller, 1845-1846. With an introduction by Julia Ward Howe. New York: D. Appleton and Company, 1903.

1845—

Anniversary of the Polish Revolution.

“Anniversary of the Polish Revolution.”

quoted · read

“Let us then, be up and doing With a heart for any fate, Still achieving, still pursuing, Learn to labor and to wait.”

Fuller, Margaret. "Anniversary of the Polish Revolution." New-York Daily Tribune, 1 December 1845. · 1 December 1845

1845—

Poems. By Henry Wadsworth Longfellow . . .

“Poems. By Henry Wadsworth Longfellow . . .”

analyzed · quoted · read7 selected passages

“In this class we place the writer at present before us. We must confess to a coolness toward Mr. Longfellow, in consequence of the exaggerated praises that have been bestowed upon him.”

“Beneath some patriarchal tree I lay upon the ground; His hoary arms uplifted be, And all the broad leaves over me Clapped their little hands in glee With one continuous sound.”

“As instances of his best manner we would mention “The Reaper and the Flowers,” “Lines to the Planet Mars,” “A Gleam of Sunshine,” and “The Village Blacksmith.”

“In the valley of the Pegnitz, where across broad meadow lands Rise the blue Franconian mountains, Nuremberg, the ancient, stands.”

“Wrapt in thy scarlet blanket I see thee stalk through the city’s Narrow and populous streets, as once by the margin of rivers Stalked those birds unknown, that have left us only their foot-prints”

“A feeling of sadness and longing, That is not akin to pain, And resembles sorrow only As the mist resembles rain.”

“I will forget her! All dear recollections, Pressed in my heart like flowers within a book, Shall be torn out and scattered in the winds.”

Fuller, Margaret. "Poems. By Henry Wadsworth Longfellow . . ." New-York Daily Tribune, 10 December 1845.

1845—

Review.

“Review.”

quoted · read4 selected passages

“The nature of this book is intimated by its motto, and fully explained by the graceful “Proem” of Mr. Longfellow who has collected and arranged the poems.”

“The day is done, and the darkness Falls from the wings of Night, As a feather is wafted downward From an eagle in its flight.”

“Just so in that called “The Gleam of Sunshine” in “The Gift” of this year which attracted us more, from its grace and tenderness, than almost any thing of Mr. Longfellow’s ever did.”

“The Past and Present reunite, Beneath Time’s floating tide, Like footprints, hidden by a brook, But seen on either side.”

Fuller, Margaret. "Review." New-York Daily Tribune, 16 January 1845.

1846—

Letter to Alexander Ireland

p231

read

“To the new fraternity I think we belong whose glory is service, whose motto Excelsior.”

Fuller, Margaret. The Letters of Margaret Fuller. Edited by Robert N. Hudspeth. Vol. IV. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1987.

Inferred Fuller writes "whose motto Excelsior," using this Latin word as a rallying cry for a progressive, service-oriented fraternity.

1846—

Papers on Literature and Art

p113

excerpted · analyzed · quoted · read3 selected passages

“(now before me) Longfellow's Spanish Student.”

“POEMS. By Henry Wadsworth Longfellow; with Illustrations by D. Huntington. Philadelphia; Carey & Hart, Chesnut-st. 1845.”

“the Prelude to the Voices of the Night ... Beneath some patriarchal tree / I lay upon the ground ...”

Fuller, Margaret. Papers on Literature and Art. New York: Wiley and Putnam, 1846.

1846—

American Literature.

“American Literature.”

mentioned

“Longfellow is artificial and imitative. He borrows incessantly, and mixes what he borrows, so that it does not appear to the best advantage.”

Fuller, Margaret. "American Literature." New-York Daily Tribune, 23 September 1846. · 23 September 1846

1846—

American Literature

“American Literature”

analyzed · quoted · read5 selected passages

“Tribune," which, with a review of Longfellow's poems, are subjoined to eke out the statement as to the merits, of those authors.”

Inferred Fuller names Longfellow but not the work — “Tribune," which, with a review of Longfellow's poems, are subjoined to eke out the statement as to the merits, of those authors.” — so the identification as poems is the editor’s and is not confirmed by this passage alone.

Also printed in Art, Literature, and the Drama (1869), p319; page given is to the 1869 reprint.

“From the cool cisterns of the midnight air My spirit drank repose; The fountain of perpetual peace flows there, From those deep cisterns flows.”

Also printed in Art, Literature, and the Drama (1869), p331; page given is to the 1869 reprint.

“As instances of his best manner we would mention " The Reaper and the Flowers," " Lines to the Planet Mars," " A Gleam of Sunshine," and " The Village Blacksmith.”

Also printed in Art, Literature, and the Drama (1869), p334; page given is to the 1869 reprint.

“In " Nuremberg" are charming passages. Indeed, the whole poem is one of the happiest specimens of Mr. L.'s poetic feeling, taste and tact in making up a rosary of topics and images.”

“But still let us not forget — Excelsior ! !”

Also printed in Art, Literature, and the Drama (1869), p336; page given is to the 1869 reprint.

Fuller, Margaret. Papers on Literature and Art. New York: Wiley and Putnam, 1846.

1846—

The Modern Drama

“The Modern Drama”

quoted · read

“Somewhere betwixt these and the mere acting plays stand such as Maturin’s Bertram, Talfourd’s Ion, and (now before me) Longfellow’s Spanish Student.”

Fuller, Margaret. Papers on Literature and Art. New York: Wiley and Putnam, 1846. · p123

Also printed in Art, Literature, and the Drama (1869), p123; page given is to the 1869 reprint.

Undated

Pieces with no legible date. They are part of the record but cannot be placed on the lifeline.

n.d.—

Mostly Extracts

pp71–73

excerpted · quoted · readManuscript page

“A gleam of Sunshine / Longfellow. / This the place. Stand still, my steed / Let me review the scene, / And summon from the shadowing past / The forms that once have been.”

Fuller, Margaret. "Mostly Extracts." Houghton Library, Harvard University; bMS Am 1086 (89); Box 5 (89).

Fuller's first line reads 'This the place' — likely a transcription error for 'Midst the place'