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Posted by John on April 15, 19103 at 01:35:17:
In Reply to: Pegasus in Pound posted by Semmah on March 27, 19103 at 01:32:05:
Hello Semmah,
I have been studying the astronomy of Longfellow. Here is a quick write-up from some of my notes. I left out quite a bit of the astronomical stuff and kept it on a literary keel. I heavily paraphrased some of the references and interspersed it with additional comments and observations. This is not a complete ysis, but enough is given to flavor more research.
Good Luck,
John
Longfellow’s Pegasus
The winged horse, Pegasus, belonged to Apollo, the Sun god. The poet mounts the winged steed and they swiftly ride. His canter gives rhythm to the verse. His wings take the rider far above the earth.
Longfellow uses a similar technique in “Paul Revere’s Ride”. That is, the poetical rhythm of anapestic tetrameter in that poem is set to the gallop of his brown mare.
Longfellow was very interested in mythology, he even communicated with the famed Bulfinch. Therefore, there are brilliant subtle references in much of his poetry. Notice his references to Alectryon and the obscure allusion to Mount Helicon.
(Alectryon was a youth stationed by his master to give notice when Apollo was t appear. He fell asleep and as a consequence he was turned into a rooster- to crow when the Sun appears):
"Till at length the bell at midnight
Sounded from its dark abode,
And, from out a neighbouring farmyard,
Loud the Alectryon crowed."
Ovid says a blow from the hoofs of Pegasus opened a fountain (horsesprings) on Mount Helicon. The magical steed struck the ground on Mount Helicon, on the spot a sacred spring to the Muses as the source for poetic inspiration, began to flow. That is, poetry is a source of pleasure:
"But they found, upon the greensward
Where his struggling hoofs had trod,
Pure and bright, a fountain flowing
From the hoof-marks in the sod."
"From that hour, the fount unfailing
Gladdens the whole region round,
Strengthing all who drink its waters,
While it soothes them with its sound."
Longfellow’s love of the night sky provides a fertile topic to write about. Pegasus is also a constellation (viz. “the great square of Pegasus”). He renders an otherwise two dimensional asterism in the dark skies over an otherwise absent countryside into a dynamic larger-than-life steed over a very descriptive fog-covered autumn terrain:
"It was Autumn, and incessant
Piped the quails from shocks and sheaves,
And, like living coals, the apples
Burned among the withering leaves…"
"Not the less he saw the landscape,
In its gleaming vapour veiled;
Not the less he breathed the odours
That the dying leaves exhaled…"
"Then, with nostrils wide distended,
Breaking from his iron chain,
And unfolding far his pinions,
To those stars he soared again."
References:
1. “Longfellow’s The Children Hour, Paul Revere’s Ride, and Other Poems with Biographical Sketches and Notes” (Houghton Mifflin & Co: Riverside Press; Cambridge, MA, 1891, p. 20-22)
2. “Longfellow: Voice of the Night”, Stephen O’Meara, Sky and Telescope, June 2001, p. 76
3. “Pegasus”, http://members.fortunecity.com/wmccabe/pegasus.htm
4. “Longfellow and Thomas Bulfinch”. Edward L. Tucker.
ANQ Fall 1999 v12 i4 p17 (690 words), University Press of Kentucky, 1999
5. Longfellow Biography on-line:
http://ikarus.pclab-phil.uni-kiel.de/daten/anglist/PoetryProject/longfellow.htm
JCM