When we entered Harvard University’s Houghton Library, we were greeted by a strict disciplinarian whose main job, so it seemed, was to protect the priceless works housed in the building. She instructed the group to place ALL belongings in the lockers. The only thing we could bring with us was our hungry minds. I can respect that. Others in the group scoffed at her seemingly rude demeanor; however, it was her job to make sure these works were not disturbed. I would rather have a cold shoulder than a lax one, in this case. Once ushered into a room off of the lobby, we met our guide. A librarian who has worked at her craft for 27 years, our guide had an intellectual air about her that made her pause before speaking even the smallest of sentences. After a short introduction, she led us into our first room: the Dickinson room.

In the center of the small, mauve-painted room stood a nondescript bureau. For those who are either amateur Dickinson scholars or at least know a bit of literary legend, I know you are getting excited for me. For readers who may not know the story behind the chest of drawers, know that American literature would be extraordinarily altered if this piece of furniture did not exist. For in this simple set of drawers, Emily’s sister Lavinia discovered over 2,000 poems written by the recently deceased poet. In her will, Dickinson instructed that these works, as well as any letters or other writings, were to be destroyed. Sometimes not respecting the wishes of the dead is better than following their orders. While Lavinia did, in fact, burn the letters received by close friends and family, she saved the poems, believing that one day, they might become a part of history. The single act of saving Dickinson’s poems might have been, in some opinions, be the greatest moment in literary history.

Once gawking at Dickinson’s bureau, piano, library, and horrid needlepoint, we moved on to a meeting room. The librarian informed us that she had pulled a few items from the stacks. We first encountered a Bible written in a language no one in our group could decipher. We learned it was one of the Bibles that John Eliot translated into a Native American language. The next piece was a small folio of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s notes. We then read from a journal describing a sea voyage. We learned that Herman Melville, who had stopped working on ships to pursue other interests, still kept journals while traveling to Europe on the high seas. The next piece seemed discuss nature in great detail. We knew immediately that Henry David Thoreau kept a multitude of journals filled with observations and notes on the natural world that surrounded him at Walden Pond. Next to the notes on nature was Bronson Alcott’s journal detailing Christmas with his daughters and, among other things, reading Walden. Then came the gem.

In a red cloth-covered book was a hand-written manuscript of The House of the Seven Gables. There, in Hawthorne’s hand, was the story of Hepzibah and her cent shop, the helpful family members, and the stranger upstairs. As we flipped through the pages (we actually got to touch them!) we found ourselves at the end of the book looking at a poem. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow wrote an elegy for the occasion of Hawthorne’s death. Not only did T.J. Fields, in the interest of posterity, save the manuscript (most manuscripts were recycled and used for other things, as paper was rare), but he also attached the poem (written in Longfellow’s hand) aptly titled “Hawthorne.” It is difficult to describe how haunting it was reading the author’s pained words:

How beautiful it was, that one bright day
In the long week of rain!
Though all its splendor could not chase away
The omnipresent pain.

The lovely town was white with apple-blooms,
And the great elms o'erhead
Dark shadows wove on their aerial looms
Shot through with golden thread.

It was as if Longfellow’s emotions traveled through the ink of the pen and on to the paper. The effect was powerful.

Seeing the casual words of the authors displayed before me brought them to life in a way that no textbook, biography, or novel could ever do. The experience was incomparable to anything I have ever done in my life.