Daybreak" by H. W.

Longfellow
A Short Discussion

The Author:
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) was one of the great American poets of the
19thcentury. He was born at Portland, a seaport town in Maine, U.S.A. on 27 February, 1807.
His father Stephen Longfellow was a lawyer and was originally from Yorkshire, England. H.
W. Longfellow was the second one of eight children of his parents. He was friendly, sensitive
and meritorious from his childhood. He had his early education at Portland Academy. Then
he was admitted in Bowdoin College in Brunswick, Maine in 1822. At Bowdoin, he met
Nathaniel Hawthorne who became his lifelong friend. After graduating from there in 1825, he
made a long European tour.
He returned home in 1830 and became the first Professor of Modern Languages at
Bowdoin College. In 1831, he married Mary Storer Potter, an intelligent and beautiful girl of
Portland. But his 22 year old wife died during their trip in Rotterdam after suffering a
miscarriage in 1835. When he returned to the United States in 1836, he became the Professor
of Modern Languages at Harvard University. Then he settled in Cambridge, Massachusetts,
where he lived for the rest of his life although he liked to spend summers at his home
Nahant.
After seven years of courtship he married Miss Frances Fanny Appleton, the daughter of
a wealthy Boston industrialist, Nathal Appleton in 1843, eight years after the death of his first
wife. He resigned his professorship in 1854 to devote all his time to poetry. He was also a
devoted husband. But his marriage ended in sadness. After eighteen years of happy married
life, Fanny was accidentally burnt to death in 1861. Longfellow was devastated by her death
and never fully recovered. He died on 24 March in 1882, after suffering from peritonitis for
five years. He was buried at Mount Auburn Cemetery, Cambridge, Massachusetts.
He became one of the most popular poets of his day in America and England. He began
to write and publish poetry at the age of thirteen. His first notable publication Voices of
Night (1839) was a collection of poems including The Psalm of Life, The Beleaguered
City and The Midnight Mass of the Dying Year. His other major collection of poems
are Evangeline (1847),The Golden Legend (1851), The Song of Hiawatha (1855), The
Courtship of Miles Standish (1858), Tales of a Wayside Inn (1863), Birds of Passage, etc.
His poetry is based on common and easily understood themes with simple, clean and lucid
language.

The Source:
The poem Daybreak is taken from Birds of Passage, a collection of his poems.

The Substance:
At daybreak a wind rises from the sea. It receives the message of the morning and starts
to blow. It takes up a duty to spread the news. The heavy mists obstruct the wind. But the
wind is determined to blow. It is in haste and wants to make all awake. So it requests the
mists not to obstruct it. It first sees the ships anchored. But they should be set free from their
anchors as the sun rises and darkness is over. The wind reminds the mariners to undertake a
new journey. It blows over the distant lands and calls all to arise and awake. It calls the forest
to unfold its leaves, twigs and branches fully and freely. It tells the wood birds to get up and
start singing. Their song will announce the beginning of the day. It prompts the domestic
cocks to herald the day.
The light of the sun is the source of life to the plants of the fields. They are looked after
and nourished by it. They should be grateful to the sun. So the wind tells them to bow down
their heads and express their gratitude. The wind passes through the church tower and
results the bell to ring in the pleasant hour. Finally, the wind arrives at the graveyard of the
church. It sighs sadly for the dead and softly tells them to sleep on because it is not yet the
Judgement Day.

The Features:
Daybreak is a fine lyrical poem. An urge for work is the central theme of the poem. It is
written in nine lovely couplets. Keeping in mind the flow of the wind, the poet applies a
breezy style to the poem. It seems that we move on with the wind from one place to another.
The poet personifies the wind actually placing his own words into its lips. He successfully
catches the mood and atmosphere of the earth at daybreak. Overall, the poem is really
enjoyable.