"Snowbound" -- remembering an American poet

The snowfall we’ve had these past 24 hours has reminded me of a poem I was required to read in grade school. It was “Snowbound” by John Greenleaf Whittier, a Quaker poet who lived from 1807 to 1892. The full title of the poem is “Snowbound – a Winter Idyl.”

Whittier’s poem is prefaced by one from Ralph Waldo Emerson, “The Snow Storm”:

"Announced by all the trumpets of the sky,

Arrives the snow, and, driving o'er the fields,

Seems nowhere to alight: the whited air

Hides hills and woods, the river and the heaven,

And veils the farm-house at the garden's end.

The sled and traveller stopped, the courier's feet

Delayed, all friends shut out, the housemates sit

Around the radiant fireplace, enclosed

In a tumultuous privacy of Storm."  

Whittier was one of the Fireside Poets -- a group of American poets which included Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, William Cullen Bryant, James Russell Lowell, and Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. “The Fireside Poets did not write for the sake of other poets; they wrote for the common people. They meant to have their stories told for families,” according to the popular online reference, Wikipedia. 

According to KimoPress.com, “Whittier was once considered a national treasure; his birthday was a holiday in many states, and his verse memorized by schoolchildren.”

I was interested to learn that Whittier was influenced by the Scottish poet, Robert Burns. (My brother-in-law, Bill Henderson, used to recite Burns’ poetry by heart with a beautiful Scottish accent inherited from his parents, Isa and Alexander.)

But I digress. . . .back to the snow that has shut down many schools and community activities this week, reminding us of what it was like to be truly “snowbound”  two hundred years ago.  That is to say, even though many schools shut down this week and many meetings and public functions have been cancelled, we’re never truly snowbound in 21st century America. The snowplows continue to wend their way through community streets; even the mailman got through today. 

It makes us imagine, though, what it was like in Whittier’s childhood, when the only lights glowing at night were from candles and from wood burning in the fireplace. In the poem, all the adults tell stories – the father, the mother, the uncle, and the aunt. This helps pass the time, without the benefit of radio or TV, and it brings the family unit closer. 

The poem is very, very long (over 4,000 words) but you can check it out at “The Poets’ Corner” which you can access online at: http://theotherpages.org/poems/whitt02.html. Another popular site is www.PoemHunter.com.

Thinking about “Snowbound” reminded me of another “snowbound” story which I enjoyed much more – Laura Ingalls Wilder’s Little House in the Big Woods. I was right there with Laura and her family when the snow buried them inside the little house and her father had to burrow a tunnel to the barn. 

Winter. It’s a wonderful time to snuggle up with a good book.  Who knows then, or cares, if it's snowing outside?