Snow-Storm, The, is a poem by the American philosopher, poet, critic, and essayist Ralph Waldo Emerson. Emerson was the most eminent of the American Transcendentalists, a group of thinkers who came to prominence in the 1830’s and 1840’s. The Transcendentalists believed in the presence of God in nature. They emphasized the role of the individual in perceiving things spiritual in the surrounding world.
Emerson’s first book, Nature (1836), held the essence of his Transcendentalist philosophy. For many critics and scholars, it contains the basis for all his subsequent ideas. But Emerson wrote many more works, including two volumes of poetry in 1846 and 1867. His poetry is highly regarded in its own right, and “The Snow-Storm” is among the most widely known of the poems. It describes the “wild” and “fanciful” handiwork of the wind after a snowstorm.
Announced by all the trumpets of the sky, Arrives the snow, and, driving o’er the fields, Seems nowhere to alight: the whited air Hides hills and woods, the river, and the heaven, And veils the farm-house at the garden’s end. The sled and traveller stopped, the courier’s feet Delayed, all friends shut out, the housemates sit Around the radiant fireplace, enclosed In a tumultuous privacy of storm. Come see the north wind’s masonry. Out of an unseen quarry evermore Furnished with tile, the fierce artificer Curves his white bastions with projected roof Round every windward stake, or tree, or door. Speeding, the myriad-handed, his wild work So fanciful, so savage, nought cares he For number or proportion. Mockingly, On coop or kennel he hangs Parian wreaths; A swan-like form invests the hidden thorn; Fills up the farmer’s lane from wall to wall, Maugre the farmer’s sighs; and at the gate, A tapering turret overtops the work. And when his hours are numbered, and the world Is all his own, retiring, as he were not, Leaves, when the sun appears, astonished Art To mimic in slow structures, stone by stone, Built in an age, the mad wind’s night-work, The frolic architecture of the snow.
Emerson’s poem deliberately uses simple language and imagery. In “The Snow-Storm,” he celebrates the wonderful artistry of nature, which transforms ordinary objects into sculptures reminiscent of white marble. (“Parian” wreaths refer to marble from the Greek island of Paros.) Emerson’s free poetic style reflects the wind’s own “wild work” with the snow. “Nought cares he / For number or proportion,” writes Emerson of the wind. He gently mocks the more plodding efforts of man’s “astonished Art” compared to the “frolic architecture of the snow.”
Emerson is most widely recognized as a philosopher and essayist who was also a distinguished speaker. Certain aspects of Emerson’s beliefs may seem dated today. But both his poetry and his prose have had an enormous influence on subsequent generations of writers.
For more information on Emerson, see Emerson, Ralph Waldo. See also American literature (The Era of Expansion (1831-1870)); Transcendentalism.
