A dramatization of Longfellow's Hiawatha: A spectacular drama in six acts

By Henry Wadsworth Longfellow and Alice L. De Vine

"A dramatization of Longfellow's Hiawatha" by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow|Alice L. De Vine. Published by Good Press. Good Press publishes a wide range of titles that encompasses every genre. From well-known classics & literary fiction and non-fiction to forgotten−or yet undiscovered gems−of world literature, we issue the books that need to be read. Each Good Press edition has been meticulously edited and formatted to boost readability for all e-readers and devices. Our goal is to produce eBooks that are user-friendly and accessible to everyone in a high-quality digital format.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Good Press
• Release date: Aug 21, 2022
• ISBN: 4064066418809

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) was an American poet. Born in Portland, Maine, Longfellow excelled in reading and writing from a young age, becoming fluent in Latin as an adolescent and publishing his first poem at the age of thirteen. In 1822, Longfellow enrolled at Bowdoin College, where he formed a lifelong friendship with Nathaniel Hawthorne and published poems and stories in local magazines and newspapers. Graduating in 1825, Longfellow was offered a position at Bowdoin as a professor of modern languages before embarking on a journey throughout Europe. He returned home in 1829 to begin teaching and working as the college’s librarian. During this time, he began working as a translator of French, Italian, and Spanish textbooks, eventually publishing a translation of Jorge Manrique, a major Castilian poet of the fifteenth century. In 1836, after a period abroad and the death of his wife Mary, Longfellow accepted a professorship at Harvard, where he taught modern languages while writing the poems that would become Voices of the Night (1839), his debut collection. That same year, Longfellow published Hyperion: A Romance, a novel based partly on his travels and the loss of his wife. In 1843, following a prolonged courtship, Longfellow married Fanny Appleton, with whom he would have six children. That decade proved fortuitous for Longfellow’s life and career, which blossomed with the publication of Evangeline: A Tale of Acadie (1847), an epic poem that earned him a reputation as one of America’s leading writers and allowed him to develop the style that would flourish in The Song of Hiawatha (1855). But tragedy would find him once more. In 1861, an accident led to the death of Fanny and plunged Longfellow into a terrible depression. Although unable to write original poetry for several years after her passing, he began work on the first American translation of Dante’s Divine Comedy and increased his public support of abolitionism. Both steeped in tradition and immensely popular, Longfellow’s poetry continues to be read and revered around the world.

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Henry Wadsworth Longfellow|Alice L. De Vine

A dramatization of Longfellow's Hiawatha

A spectacular drama in six acts

Published by Good Press, 2022

[e-mail]

EAN 4064066418809

Table of Contents

INTRODUCTORY.

SYNOPSIS OF SCENES AND INCIDENTS.

ACT I. THE PEACE PIPE.

ACT II. HIAWATHA’S CHILDHOOD.

ACT III. HIAWATHA’S WOOING, TRIBE OF OJIBWAYS.

Scene First. Hiawatha’s Discussion with Nokomis and Departure.

Scene Second. Hiawatha’s Journey.

Scene Third. Wooing of Minnehaha.

ACT IV. HIAWATHA’S WEDDING FEAST.

ACT V. FAMINE, FEVER AND MINNEHAHA’S DEATH.

ACT VI. HIAWATHA’S DEPARTURE.

INTRODUCTORY.

Table of Contents

To ye whose hearts are fresh and simple

Who have faith in God and Nature,

Who believe that in all ages

Every human heart is human,

That in even savage bosoms

There are longings, yearnings, strivings

For the good they comprehend not,

That the feeble hands and helpless,

Groping blindly in the darkness,

Touch God’s right hand in that darkness

And are lifted up and strengthened,

Is submitted

this portrayal of the primitive life of the American Indians in their native forest home. Fully realizing how rapidly the race is becoming extinct before the onward march of civilizing influences, and how little the people of this and other countries really know of such customs, dress, and peculiarities, it is believed this spectacular drama will be found historical, an educator to the young and interesting to

all

. In thus depicting the higher and better life of the Indian race, their mode of living, dress, pastimes, feats of skill, dances, wooings, wedding feasts, festivities, death scenes and legends, the author has adhered to the original language of the poem as closely as is consistent with a faithful dramatization thereof.

This is the first and only known drama of this kind or character in existence, and no other subject, throughout the wide and varied field of poetry, offers like opportunities to the facile pen of the skilled playwright.

SYNOPSIS OF SCENES

AND INCIDENTS.

Table of Contents

ACT I.

The Peace Pipe.

Gitche Manitou (Great Spirit) descends from Heaven and admonishes the tribes to cease warfare and bloodshed—Indians discard weapons and war paint—Gitche Manitou promises to send Hiawatha as a guide—Fashions a Peace Pipe—Sets fire to the forest and vanishes in smoke.

ACT II.

Hiawatha’s Childhood.

Tribe of Ojibways—Hiawatha