Notes

-What do the stars do for the speaker of “When I Heard the Learn’d Astronomer” that the lecture hall does not? The stars offer first-hand knowledge.

-Which best describes Bright Romanticism?a post-Revolutionary War literary movement that focused on the beauty and optimism of the period

-What does “When I Heard the Learn’d Astronomer” suggest about academic studies?that they are overwhelmingly tedious

-Read this excerpt from an Emily Dickinson poem.Because I could not stop for Death –
He kindly stopped for me – What is the speaker suggesting? that she is too engaged to worry about death

-Read the excerpt from “When I Heard the Learn’d Astronomer" by Walt Whitman.

Till rising and gliding out, I wander’d off by myself,

Why does Whitman use the words “rising and gliding” to describe the speaker’s exit from the classroom?These words suggest that the speaker is happy to leave.

-How does Whitman’s mention of “the mystical moist night-air” in “When I Heard the Learn’d Astronomer” support the theme of the poem?It communicates that the darkness connects him with a greater power.

-Read the excerpt from “How I Live” by Nathaniel Hawthorne.

I have been busy all day, from early breakfast-time till late in the afternoon. It has been a brisk, breezy day, an effervescent atmosphere, and I have enjoyed it in all its freshness,—breathing air which had not been breathed in advance by the hundred thousand pairs of lungs which have common and invisible property in the atmosphere of this great city. My breath had never belonged to anybody but me. It came fresh from the wilderness of ocean.

How does Hawthorne most likely feel about city life?He probably feels that cities are too crowded.

-Which best describes the author’s purpose in “When I Heard the Learn’d Astronomer”?The author intended for the reader to feel awed by the power of nature.

-Read the excerpt from “To the Fringed Gentian” by William Cullen Bryant.

I would that thus, when I shall see
The hour of death draw near to me,
Hope, blossoming within my heart,
May look to heaven as I depart.

This stanza reflects the attitude that:the spirit has greater strength than the body.

-Read this statement by C.K. Williams about Walt Whitman.

For a young poet, reading Whitman is sheer revelation, sheer wonder, a delight bordering on, then plunging into disbelief. How could all this have come to pass? . . . These countless images of daily life, of common life made uncommon, and the most boldly uncommon made jarringly intimate?

Which line by Whitman best supports this statement?“If you want me again look for me under your boot-soles”

-Read these lines from Walt Whitman’s “Song of Myself.”

I bequeath myself to the dirt to grow from the grass I love,
If you want me again look for me under your boot-soles.

What attitude toward the earth do these lines express?
The human body is made of material much like the earth.


-Read this excerpt from an Emily Dickinson poem.

Some keep the Sabbath going to church;
I keep it staying at home,
With a bobolink for a chorister,
And an orchard for a dome.

What attitude toward social habits does this excerpt indicate?Social habits are meaningless and arbitrary.

-What does “When I Heard the Learn’d Astronomer” suggest about the poet’s view of the world?He considers the world to be a place that deserves much contemplation.


-Read the stanza from “A Psalm of Life” by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.

Life is real! Life is earnest!
And the grave is not its goal;
Dust thou art, to dust returnest,
Was not spoken of the soul.

How does this stanza express an optimistic view?
It suggests that life continues after death.


-Given the theme of “When I Heard the Learn’d Astronomer,” why does the speaker call the astronomer “learn’d”?The astronomer possesses knowledge that doesn’t interest the speaker.