Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    Evangeline
    Evangeline
    Evangeline
    Ebook102 pages1 hour

    Evangeline

    By Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

    3.5/5

    ()

    Switch to audiobook
    Read preview
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherArchive Classics
    Release dateJan 1, 1847

    Read more from Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

    Related to Evangeline

    Related ebooks

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      Some Wars Are Just

      Nov 24, 2022

      Some Wars Are Just
      6 min read

    • Article

      Aelfred’s Britain

      Jul 12, 2018

      Aelfred’s Britain
      2 min read

    • Article

      A Northern Farm cradled in Pines

      Jun 23, 2022

      A Northern Farm cradled in Pines
      22 min read

    • Article

      A Novel Finding: Power Of Fiction

      Nov 1, 2022

      A Novel Finding: Power Of Fiction
      2 min read

    • Article

      The Modest Man

      Oct 17, 2019

      The Modest Man
      5 min read

    • Article

      The Blue Jay’s Dance

      May 10, 2017

      The Blue Jay’s Dance
      4 min read

    • Article

      Paolo Arrigo

      Jan 3, 2023

      Paolo Arrigo
      3 min read

    • Article

      A Wandering Mind

      Jan 13, 2022

      A Wandering Mind
      5 min read

    • Article

      Man On A Mission

      Jun 18, 2021

      Man On A Mission
      5 min read

    • Article

      Hunting Heroines

      Dec 31, 2020

      Hunting Heroines
      5 min read

    • Article

      Best Books of 2023

      Nov 20, 2023

      Best Books of 2023
      15 min read

    • Article

      In Search Of The New

      Jan 3, 2023

      In Search Of The New
      5 min read

    • Article

      In The Novel ‘Emily’s House,’ The Dickinsons’ Irish Maid Speaks Her Mind

      Oct 27, 2021

      Amy Belding Brown’s historic novel “Emily’s House” sheds light on Emily Dickinson and her family, through the observations of their Irish maid.

      3 min read

    • Article

      Transformed Lives

      Sep 21, 2021

      A Worse Place Than Hell is a cogent, elegantly written examination of the far-reaching impact of a single battle. “More concerned with the personal than the political,” author John Matteson eschews history on the grand scale for a view shaped by the

      7 min read

    • Article

      The Ordinary Woman Theory

      Jul 30, 2019

      The Ordinary Woman Theory
      4 min read

    • Article

      'The World Broke In Two': Four Writers, One Transformational Year

      Jul 25, 2017

      Using excerpts from letters and diaries, historian and critic Bill Goldstein follows writers Virginia Woolf, E. M. Forster, D. H. Lawrence and T. S. Eliot through the tumultuous literary year of 1922.

      3 min read

    • Article

      The Mirror of Erised: On Death, Harry Potter, and Retreating to Childhood Reads

      Aug 16, 2018

      I’d known Monica 20 years when her sister was killed in a hit-and-run motorcycle accident. We spent our childhoods in a tiny Bay Area town that I left at 14. I only went back to visit twice. In the years between, Monica and I sent each other videos,

      4 min read

    • Article

      Reese's Horror Over murder Plot!

      Jul 24, 2022

      Bestselling author Delia Owens is renowned for her mysterious murder novel, Where The Crawdads Sing, which was recently adapted into a film, thanks to actress-turned-producer Reese Witherspoon. But the bright lights of Hollywood have unexpectedly tur

      2 min read

    • Article

      Mussel Memory

      Jun 3, 2021

      Mussel Memory
      14 min read

    Reviews for Evangeline

    3.5/5

    6 ratings6 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

    • 1/5
      This review is of this stupid Amazon free Kindle edition, not Longfellow's great poem. THIS EDITION COMPLETELY OMITS THE PRELUDE. The prelude sets the tone for the entire poem, and nicely mirrors the final stanza. Apparently the "group of volunteers" who converted the hard copy to an ebook were a bunch of Philistines who thought that the book's Part the First began at the Roman numeral one, and that the few preceding stanzas were just a bunch of stuff somebody added for no good reason. Well, since this edition is free, I guess one shouldn't expect to receive the complete work. This is so bad because anyone new to poetry might not know the prelude was omitted, and thus be robbed of a slice of Longfellow's genius that goes a long way to making Evangeline the masterpiece that it is. Shame on those volunteers.
    • 4/5
      Beautifully illustrated with drawings and paintings from earlier editions, this is a wonderful collectors edition. I recently saw the Charlottetown Centre for the Arts production of the musical version of Evangeline and the story line they used did not always follow the one I thought existed. Thus I read the full poem to check what Longfellow had really written especially the part where the musical suggested Evangeline and Gabriel had been married. They were not married in the poem, just betrothed.The introduction by Fergusson is full of interesting details about why the poem was written and from what sources Longfellow took his geography lessons as he described Evangeline's travels.
    • 5/5
      Evangeline by Henry Wadsworth LongfellowThe beautiful, lyrical poem about the Acadians after the discovery of America.One of the most beautiful openings in the history of literature:"This is the forest primeval. The murmuring pines and the hemlocks,Bearded with moss, and in garments green, indistinct in the twilight,Stand like Druids of eld, with voices sad and prophetic,Stand like harpers hoar, with beards that rest on their bosoms.Loud from its rocky caverns, the deep-voiced neighboring oceanSpeaks, and in the accents disconsolate answers the wail of the forest.I am certain that many of us here on LT know those words by memory."Evangeline is just a beautiful, lovely poem a little over 100 pages long about love and loss; the searching and finding of it again only to realize it is too late.My copy has been handed down in the family and is a very delicate April, 1908 copy. It was copyrighted in 1900. My grandfather gave it to my father as a young man & my father gave it to me when I graduated from H.S. in 1966. I try to make sure I read this every year.I read this for the first time in the fifth grade and have never forgotten it. I very highly recommended "Evangeline" for anyone who loves poetry and beautifully written prose. I rated it 5 stars.
    • 4/5
      Serene, relentless, first published in 1847, ninety-two years after the neutral town of Gran Pre was destroyed, and its inhabitants removed and separated, during the hostilities between new England and new France, in which Acadia was a pawn. The story of a girl separated from her lover in that derangement, grown old looking for each other, and finally finding each other again, on the threshhold of death.
    • 5/5
      Having grown up in Canada, this was required reading and I must say, it was, and remains, one of my favourites. It is hugely tragic, but incredibly interesting as a history.Longfellow's work details the exile of the French Acadians from Nova Scotia by the English in the mid-18th century, many of whom ended up in Louisiana (the word "cajun" being a bastardization of "acadian,") and the lifelong search of one woman named Evangeline for her love Gabriel from whom she was separated during the exile.There is some debate as to Evangeline's actual existence, but the fact is, whether she existed or not, under another name (as many believe) or not at all, but she is immortalized in a beautiful epic poem, in a parish in Louisiana and in a driving route in Nova Scotia. Longfellow's poem brings to the forefront an oft-neglected piece of both Canadian and American history in a beautiful, if tragic, story.
    • 3/5
      Longfellow's classic poem about the expulsion of the Acadians from Nova Scotia is a bit creaky, but still intriguing for those who have never read it. The dactylic hexameter lines dance through the poem of love lost, love sought, resignation and the final culmination of spiritual transcendance. Longfellow's attempt to create a North American legend has spawned tourist attractions from Nova Scotia to Louisiana.

    Book preview

    Evangeline - Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

    The Project Gutenberg EBook of Evangeline, by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

    This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.net

    Title: Evangeline A Tale of Acadie

    Author: Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

    Posting Date: October 26, 2008 [EBook #2039] Release Date: January, 2000

    Language: English

    *** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK EVANGELINE ***

    Produced by Stewart A. Levin.

    Evangeline.

    A Tale of Acadie.

    by

    Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.

        THIS is the forest primeval. The murmuring pines and the hemlocks,

      Bearded with moss, and in garments green, indistinct in the twilight,

      Stand like Druids of eld, with voices sad and prophetic,

      Stand like harpers hoar, with beards that rest on their bosoms.

      Loud from its rocky caverns, the deep-voiced neighboring ocean

      Speaks, and in accents disconsolate answers the wail of the forest.

        This is the forest primeval; but where are the hearts that beneath it

      Leaped like the roe, when he hears in the woodland the voice of the huntsman?

      Where is the thatch-roofed village, the home of Acadian farmers,—

      Men whose lives glided on like rivers that water the woodlands,

      Darkened by shadows of earth, but reflecting an image of heaven?

      Waste are those pleasant farms, and the farmers forever departed!

      Scattered like dust and leaves, when the mighty blasts of October

      Seize them, and whirl them aloft, and sprinkle them far o'er the ocean.

      Naught but tradition remains of the beautiful village of Grand-Pré.

        Ye who believe in affection that hopes, and endures, and is patient,

      Ye who believe in the beauty and strength of woman's devotion,

      List to the mournful tradition still sung by the pines of the forest;

      List to a Tale of Love in Acadie, home of the happy.

    PART THE FIRST.

    I

        IN the Acadian land, on the shores of the Basin of Minas,

      Distant, secluded, still, the little village of Grand-Pré

      Lay in the fruitful valley. Vast meadows stretched to the eastward,

      Giving the village its name, and pasture to flocks without number.

      Dikes, that the hands of the farmers had raised with labor incessant,

      Shut out the turbulent tides; but at stated seasons the flood-gates

      Opened, and welcomed the sea to wander at will o'er the meadows.

      West and south there were fields of flax, and orchards and cornfields

      Spreading afar and unfenced o'er the plain; and away to the northward

      Blomidon rose, and the forests old, and aloft on the mountains

      Sea-fogs pitched their tents, and mists from the mighty Atlantic

      Looked on the happy valley, but ne'er from their station descended.

      There, in the midst of its farms, reposed the Acadian village.

      Strongly built were the houses, with frames of oak and of chestnut,

      Such as the peasants of Normandy built in the reign of the Henries.

      Thatched were the roofs, with dormer-windows; and gables projecting

      Over the basement below protected and shaded the door-way.

      There in the tranquil evenings of summer, when brightly the sunset

      Lighted the village street, and gilded the vanes on the chimneys,

      Matrons and maidens sat in snow-white caps and in kirtles

      Scarlet and blue and green, with distaffs spinning the golden

      Flax for the gossiping looms, whose noisy shuttles within doors

      Mingled their sound with the whir of the wheels and the songs of the maidens.

      Solemnly down the street came the parish priest, and the children

      Paused in their play to kiss the hand he extended to bless them.

      Reverend walked he among them; and up rose matrons and maidens,

      Hailing his slow approach with words of affectionate welcome.

      Then came the laborers home from the field, and serenely the sun sank

      Down to his rest, and twilight prevailed. Anon from the belfry

      Softly the Angelus sounded, and over the roofs of the village

      Columns of pale blue smoke, like clouds of incense ascending,

      Rose from a hundred hearths, the homes of peace and contentment.

      Thus dwelt together in love these simple Acadian farmers,—

      Dwelt in the love of God and of man. Alike were they free from

      Fear, that reigns with the tyrant, and envy, the vice of republics.

      Neither locks had they to their doors, nor bars to their windows;

      But their dwellings were open as day and the hearts of the owners;

      There the richest was poor, and the poorest lived in abundance.

        Somewhat apart from the village, and nearer the Basin of Minas,

      Benedict Bellefontaine, the wealthiest farmer of Grand-Pré,

      Dwelt on his goodly acres; and with him, directing his household,

      Gentle Evangeline lived, his child, and the pride of the village.

      Stalworth and stately in form was the man of seventy winters;

      Hearty and hale was he, an oak that is covered with snow-flakes;

      White as the snow were his locks, and his cheeks as brown as the oak-leaves.

      Fair was she to behold, that maiden of seventeen summers.

      Black were her eyes as the berry that grows on the thorn by the wayside,

      Black, yet how softly they gleamed beneath the brown shade of her tresses!

      Sweet was her breath as the breath of kine that feed in the meadows.

      When in the harvest heat she bore to the reapers at noontide

      Flagons of home-brewed ale, ah! fair in sooth was the maiden.

      Fairer was she when, on Sunday morn, while the bell from its turret

      Sprinkled with holy sounds the air, as the priest with his hyssop

      Sprinkles the congregation, and scatters blessings upon them,

      Down the long street she passed, with

    Enjoying the preview?
    Page 1 of 1