Snow-Flakes

Quiz — "Snow-Flakes" by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

1. Recall – Form & Publication: In what year was "Snow-Flakes" published, and in which collection did it appear?

1. Recall – Speaker & Personification: What human anatomical and clothing details does Longfellow use to personify the sky in the poem's opening movement?

1. Recall – Central Symbol: What natural phenomenon serves as the poem's central symbol, and what human experience does it primarily represent?

1. Comprehension – Extended Metaphor: How does Longfellow connect the behavior of the sky to human psychology in the poem's central movement? What parallel does he draw between nature and inner emotional life?

1. Comprehension – Landscape as Mirror: What condition are the woodlands and harvest-fields in before the snow falls, and why is this setting significant to the poem's emotional atmosphere?

1. Comprehension – Snow as Language: In the final stanza, Longfellow reframes snow as a form of communication. What does he call individual snowflakes, and what is ultimately being "whispered and revealed" to the world below?

1. Analysis – Tone: How would you characterize the tone of "Snow-Flakes"? Use at least two specific details from the poem's word choices or imagery, as described in the analysis, to support your answer.

1. Analysis – Biographical Context: How do the details of Longfellow's personal life in the years surrounding the poem's publication deepen the meaning of the sky's "long-held secret of despair"? Refer to at least two specific biographical events.

1. Analysis – Symbol: Choose ONE symbol from the poem (other than snow itself) and explain how it contributes to the poem's exploration of grief. How does it reinforce the connection between nature and human emotion?

1. Analysis – Themes: "Snow-Flakes" suggests that grief, though silent, can still communicate meaning. Using the themes of Language and Communication and Sorrow as identified in the analysis, explain how the poem argues that art—including poetry itself—can give voice to emotions that resist direct expression.

Answer Key

1. "Snow-Flakes" was published in 1863 as part of the collection Tales of a Wayside Inn.

1. Longfellow describes the sky as having a "bosom" and garments (cloud-folds), presenting it as a woman from whose clothing the snow is shaken loose.

1. Snow is the central symbol; it represents grief that has finally been released — sorrow that was long held in and is now gently let go.

1. Longfellow compares the sky's release of snow to the human psychological experience of a vague, bottled-up feeling finally finding form — just as inner turmoil can crystallize into words or art, the troubled sky transforms its hidden anguish into falling snow.

1. The woodlands are bare and the harvest-fields are forsaken — empty and stripped of life. This desolate landscape mirrors the bleak, grief-laden sky above, making the natural world a fitting partner in sorrow and reinforcing the poem's mood of quiet loss.

1. Longfellow calls individual snowflakes "silent syllables." What is ultimately being revealed is the sky's long-held secret of despair — sorrow that had been concealed in its clouds is now quietly communicated to the world below.

1. The tone is quiet and sorrowful, resembling a hushed voice at a funeral. Word choices such as "silent," "slow," and "whispered" keep the emotional register restrained and gentle, conveying a grief that has lingered long enough to find a measure of peace rather than erupting in sudden anguish.

1. In 1861, Longfellow's second wife, Fanny, died tragically in a fire, leaving him devastated. Around the same time, his son was seriously wounded at the Battle of New Hope Church during the Civil War. These losses lend personal, biographical weight to the poem's image of grief long suppressed in the clouds — the "secret of despair" reads as a thinly veiled expression of Longfellow's own accumulated suffering.

1. Acceptable answers include the cloud-folds, the sky/air as a woman, or the bare landscape. For example, the cloud-folds symbolize how grief builds up and is concealed over time; when they finally release the snow, it mirrors the moment a person can no longer contain their feelings and they pour outward — connecting the physical mechanism of weather to the emotional mechanism of human endurance and eventual release.

1. The poem argues that grief, even when unspoken, still carries meaning and finds a way to be understood. By casting snowflakes as "silent syllables" and the act of snowfall as a whispered poem written by the air, Longfellow suggests that sorrow — like art — does not need loud declaration to communicate. The poem itself enacts this idea: its quiet, measured form becomes a vehicle for expressing the very despair it describes, implying that art transforms private, inexpressible anguish into something shared and legible.