The Children's Hour Essay Questions

What does the poem say about domestic spaces?

Longfellow was identified with Craigie House, the famous Brattle Street abode formerly occupied by George Washington. Many of his poems threw open the door of this poet-professor-father's intimate and intellectual New England lifestyle. Domestic spaces figure prominently, no doubt because, as critic Matthew Gartner writes, "domestic spaces...are typical products of mid-nineteenth-century America's enshrining of the private home as a kind of sacred space whose high priestess was the wife and mother." The father, though, was its authority and the person by whose labor allowed it to exist in the first place. Domestic spaces contain the sum of a person's life—happiness, love, sorrow, pain—and Longfellow was famous for being open about his own home and family.

What is melancholy about this otherwise happy poem?

Much about this poem is, of course, charming and lighthearted. The daughters are sweet, the father is amenable to their playfulness. On the surface there is no pain, no anger, nothing to disturb the intimate and lovely scene in the study. However, the father's words provide some insight into the cares of a father—he knows that time passes quickly (after all, he is already an "old mustache"). He wishes he could hold onto his daughters forever and never let anyone age or die. For the father, this is a melancholy moment (although the girls probably cannot tell), but it is also one that expresses the difference between the innocent ignorance of youth and the bittersweet knowledge of old age.