The Ghosts

Discussion Questions — "The Ghosts" (Canto XX, The Song of Hiawatha) — Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

1. Close Reading | AQA AO2 / AP Close Reading: Longfellow opens "The Ghosts" with a nature simile comparing the gathering of sorrows to vultures circling a wounded animal. How does this image establish the emotional and thematic stakes of the canto before any supernatural event has taken place? What does it suggest about the relationship between misfortune and grief?

1. Tone & Atmosphere | IB Guiding Question / AQA AO2: The poem's trochaic tetrameter — borrowed from the Finnish epic Kalevala — has been described as steady and drum-like, lending a ritual quality to even ordinary domestic scenes. How does this metrical choice shape the way a reader experiences the arrival of the ghosts? In what ways does the rhythm prevent the poem from tipping into sentimentality or horror?

1. Symbolism | AQA AO2 / AP Literary Argument: Fire and shadow function as opposing symbols throughout "The Ghosts" — firelight representing warmth and the bonds of the living, while the darkened corners of the wigwam represent the threshold state of the dead. How do these two symbols work together to define the boundary between the world of the living and the world of the dead in the poem?

1. Theme: Hospitality & Honour | IB Guiding Question / AQA AO1: Hiawatha's restraint — welcoming the strangers without question, masking any impatience — is presented as a form of moral virtue. How does Longfellow use the behaviour of the entire household, not just Hiawatha, to argue that hospitality is a communal obligation rather than an individual act? What does this suggest about the poem's broader values?

1. Character & Authorial Intent | AQA AO1 / AP Argumentation: The ghosts are ultimately revealed to be agents of a spiritual test rather than malevolent forces. How does Longfellow's decision to frame the supernatural visitors as teachers rather than threats shape the poem's attitude toward death and mourning? What does this choice reveal about his interpretation of Ojibwe beliefs?

1. Historical & Biographical Context | AQA AO3 / IB Context: Longfellow based The Song of Hiawatha on Henry Rowe Schoolcraft's ethnographic studies of Ojibwe oral traditions, yet critics have argued that his romanticized version oversimplifies the complexity of real Ojibwe life. In what ways might "The Ghosts" both honour and distort the Ojibwe traditions of mourning and the afterlife that it draws upon? How should a modern reader navigate this tension?

1. Language & Communication | AQA AO2 / AP Close Reading: Much of the drama in "The Ghosts" is built around silence — the ghosts do not speak, the household does not question, and understanding is deferred until Hiawatha finally breaks the quiet. How does Longfellow use silence as a structural and thematic device? What does the poem suggest about the limits of language when it comes to grief and communication between the living and the dead?

1. Symbol & Theme: Ritual | IB Guiding Question / AQA AO2: The ghosts' parting instruction — to light a grave-fire for four nights — transforms an abstract lesson about mourning into a concrete, repeatable ritual. Why might Longfellow choose to end the canto with a specific, measurable act rather than a philosophical statement? What does the symbolism of the number four and the sustained fire suggest about how the poem understands the process of grief?

1. Tone & Theme: Winter | AQA AO1–AO2 / AP Literary Argument: Winter in "The Ghosts," personified as Peboan, is described as a time when the natural world falls into stillness — lakes freeze, rivers halt, plains smooth over. How does this seasonal backdrop function as more than setting? In what ways does Longfellow use winter as an extended metaphor to align the natural world with the poem's meditation on death, memory, and the pause between life and whatever follows?

1. Authorial Intent & Legacy | AQA AO3 / IB Comparative: Longfellow consciously chose a Finnish epic meter to tell a story rooted in Indigenous North American oral tradition. What does this formal decision reveal about how nineteenth-century American writers approached cultural borrowing and literary legitimacy? How might this choice have shaped the way contemporary audiences received "The Ghosts" — and how might it be judged differently today?