The Chambered Nautilus

The Fireside Poets—Holmes, William Cullen Bryant, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, James Russell Lowell, and John Greenleaf Whittier—were a group of 19th-century poets whose popularity was such that their work was read by the fireside in the average American home. They were among the first American poets to garner critical attention home and abroad. Longfellow, in particular, was considered on the same level as Alfred, Lord Tennyson, the British Poet Laureate. Ralph Waldo Emerson is sometimes included in the Fireside Poets as well, but he more often wrote prose. Situated in the Northeast, particularly Massachusetts, the men, due to their wealth, intelligence, and spheres of influence, deeply shaped literary taste of the time. The poets seriously believed that good writing could create empathy among its readers, and their work often embraced a didactic tone. They felt that they did not write for other poets but for a general audience and employed American colloquialisms and humor.

Stylistically, as can be seen in “The Chambered Nautilus” by Holmes, the Fireside Poets tended to use standard rhyme and meter in organized forms. This helped make their poems popular for recitation, and their work was often assigned to be studied, adding to the poets’ and their poems popularity and longevity.