Hiawathography

I was reading a piece in the New York Review about a new biography of Longfellow, who is perhaps the best example of a poet, eminent in his day, who does not figure prominently – if at all – in academic accounts of literary history, and yet who remains a household name even today. He's the poetic anti-matter to, say, Emily Dickinson, Longfellow's once obscure but now highly-rated American contemporary. It's a funny old game, poetry, and one which has changed radically; it's hard to imagine how a serious, published poet in the 21st century could become known for turning out popular, highly-polished, best-selling verse by the yard. I think Alice Oswald is the most serious contender for the unsought, unoffered, and unremunerated title of "heavyweight champion poet of Britain" – a straight left to the glass jaw of Simon Armitage and he's down! – but her latest is never going to be the cause of midnight queues outside Waterstones.

There were some curious facts about Longfellow in that review, which I won't rehearse: read it for yourself. But there was one thing I couldn't resist following up. Apparently, Lewis Carroll wrote a parody of "Hiawatha", titled "Hiawatha's Photographing". Now, this may be widely known in that niche community where enthusiasms for large-format photography and minor 19th-century poetry overlap, but it was news to me. Dodgson / Carroll is, of course, well-known as an enthusiastic amateur photographer – we won't dwell on his subject matter of choice, other than to say I don't think anyone today would cut him the slack offered to, say, Sally Mann – so his thoughts on the matter are first-hand and well-informed (unlike Tennyson, for example, who seems to have thought trains ran in grooves, not on rails: see that very peculiar poem, "Locksley Hall").

So here, for your enjoyment, is the first part of that parody, with the later, technical verses about collodion, hypo, etc., added in:

From Hiawatha’s Photographing, by Lewis Carroll

From his shoulder Hiawatha
Took the camera of rosewood,
Made of sliding, folding rosewood;
Neatly put it all together.
In its case it lay compactly,
Folded into nearly nothing;
But he opened out the hinges,
Pushed and pulled the joints and hinges,
Till it looked all squares and oblongs,
Like a complicated figure
In the Second Book of Euclid.

This he perched upon a tripod –
Crouched beneath its dusky cover –
Stretched his hand, enforcing silence –
Said “Be motionless, I beg you!”
Mystic, awful was the process.

First, a piece of glass he coated
With collodion, and plunged it
In a bath of lunar caustic
Carefully dissolved in water –
There he left it certain minutes.

Secondly, my Hiawatha
Made with cunning hand a mixture
Of the acid pyrro-gallic,
And of glacial-acetic,
And of alcohol and water
This developed all the picture.

Finally, he fixed each picture
With a saturate solution
Which was made of hyposulphite
Which, again, was made of soda.
(Very difficult the name is
For a metre like the present
But periphrasis has done it.)

All the family in order
Sat before him for their pictures:
Each in turn, as he was taken,
Volunteered his own suggestions,
His ingenious suggestions.

There's more... Lots more. It's all on the Web, however, so check it out, if it piques your interest. As Carroll himself wrote, "In an age of imitation, I can claim no special merit for this slight attempt at doing what is known to be so easy. Any fairly practised writer, with the slightest ear for rhythm, could compose, for hours together, in the easy running metre of 'The Song of Hiawatha'". In that rhythmic regard the relentless Hiawatha tom-tom beat is rather like the hip-hop or rap of its time, I suppose. But that first stanza is great, isn't it? (although a modern ear would probably require the second line to be, "Took the camera made of rosewood"). It was clearly written by a man who'd used a view camera with the admiration of the enthusiast, and blissfully unaware that, one day, he'd be able to use his phone instead ("Phone, sir? Do you refer to Mr. Bell's ingenious device? I think you have quite misunderstood its intended purpose...").

Which reminded me of the picture below, taken on my Innsbruck residency in 2014. In the Tiroler Volkskunstmuseum (Tyrolean Folk Art Museum) there is a mock-up of an early photographer's studio, complete with cameras, backdrops, and props. Within the bellows of one of the larger view cameras a little demonic couple have been placed, lit with that red glow that either gives you a warm buzz of darkroom nostalgia, or (as in my case) bad memories of rocking slopping trays of chemicals long into the night (elephant one, elephant two...). The horror, the horror...

 As with Carroll's photography, I think we should pass quickly over the disturbing Tyrolean folk-psychology evinced by the chain-clutching Queen of Hell on the right. Have we been a good boy? Thought not... No, I've looked into that mind-set before, and backed away, cautiously (see Now Wash Your Hands). And then there's the naked mannequin waiting patiently by the folksy backdrop rolls. For what? They didn't say, and I didn't ask. Maybe lonely backwoods farmers needed a fake companion to stand woodenly beside them before a "happy families" backdrop (suitably clothed, of course), or – argh – maybe the egregious Hans Bellmer dropped round from time to time. No, don't look him up, you'll regret it.

Admire, instead, some more of Carroll's lines from the same poem, which will resonate with anyone who has attempted to take a photographic portrait:

Next to him the eldest daughter:

She suggested very little,

Only asked if he would take her

With her look of ‘passive beauty.’

Her idea of passive beauty

Was a squinting of the left-eye,

Was a drooping of the right-eye,

Was a smile that went up sideways

To the corner of the nostrils.

Hiawatha, when she asked him,

Took no notice of the question,

Looked as if he hadn’t heard it;

But, when pointedly appealed to,

Smiled in his peculiar manner,

Coughed and said it ‘didn’t matter,’

Bit his lip and changed the subject.

Nor in this was he mistaken,

As the picture failed completely.

So in turn the other sisters.