The Song of Hiawatha recap

Hiawatha, grandson of Nokomis and son of the West-Wind, grows into a culture hero who seeks to strengthen and unite his people. He gains corn through his contest with Mondamin, befriends the musician Chibiabos and the strong Kwasind, builds a swift canoe, defeats dangerous beings, and brings home wampum. He marries Minnehaha, teaches practical arts, and creates picture-writing. Loss increasingly overtakes his achievements: Chibiabos and Kwasind die, Pau-Puk-Keewis rebels and is transformed, and ghosts warn of hardship. During a severe winter Minnehaha dies of famine. When European missionaries arrive in spring, Hiawatha welcomes them and advises his people to hear their message. Believing his own mission complete, he leaves alone in his canoe and passes westward into the sunset.

Gitche Manito summons warring peoples, calls them to wash away their war paint, and urges peace. The poem then traces Hiawatha's family through Nokomis, her daughter Wenonah, and Mudjekeewis, the West-Wind who abandons Wenonah after fathering her child. Nokomis raises Hiawatha beside the lake, teaching him about animals, birds, stars, and natural forces, while Iagoo supplies stories and a bow. Hiawatha's first successful hunt marks his growing skill. Once grown, he travels west to confront Mudjekeewis over Wenonah's death. Father and son battle without gaining a decisive victory. Mudjekeewis acknowledges Hiawatha's courage and promises him authority over the north-west wind when his earthly work is finished. On the journey home Hiawatha has also seen Minnehaha, the daughter of a Dakota arrow-maker.

Hiawatha fasts not for personal glory but for a way to help his people. A youth named Mondamin comes from the sunset and wrestles with him on successive evenings. Following Mondamin's instructions after the final contest, Hiawatha buries him and carefully tends the ground until maize rises there, providing a new food. Hiawatha's companions are Chibiabos, whose music charms the world, and Kwasind, famed for his strength. Hiawatha makes a light birch-bark canoe and commands it to move swiftly across the water. He catches the giant sturgeon with the aid of animal allies. He then challenges Megissogwon, a dangerous magician guarded by serpents, defeats him with help from a woodpecker, and brings the magician's stores of wampum home for his people.

Against Nokomis's preference that he marry within his own community, Hiawatha travels to the Dakota country and asks for Minnehaha. Her family consents, and she returns with him. Their wedding feast joins the two peoples and is celebrated with Pau-Puk-Keewis's dancing, Chibiabos's song, and Iagoo's tale of Oweenee and Osseo. In that tale, Oweenee's faithful love survives her sisters' ridicule and a supernatural journey linked to the Evening Star. Hiawatha then calls on Minnehaha and other women to bless the maize fields and guard them from harm, securing the harvest. He also teaches a system of painted signs so that history, songs, remedies, and messages can be preserved beyond the limits of speech and memory.

The poem's mood darkens with the death of Chibiabos, lured onto unsafe ice by hostile spirits and drowned. Hiawatha mourns in isolation until healers restore him to communal life, and ceremonies help guide his friend's spirit toward the land of the dead. Pau-Puk-Keewis then becomes a disruptive challenger. He ruins Hiawatha's lodge, kills the birds Hiawatha had protected, and flees through a series of transformations. Hiawatha pursues him across land and water and finally overcomes him with the aid of the storm. Pau-Puk-Keewis is not simply erased: his spirit is assigned a new existence among the war-eagles, while the destruction he caused leaves another break in Hiawatha's circle.

Kwasind is killed when enemies exploit the one vulnerability that can overcome his strength, and Hiawatha loses another close companion. Two ghostly visitors then enter Hiawatha and Minnehaha's lodge. They silently consume the household's food and eventually explain that they have come from the land of spirits to warn the living against burdening the dead with excessive grave goods and uncontrolled mourning. After they depart, winter brings relentless snow and famine. Hiawatha ranges through the empty forest calling for game, but returns without food. Minnehaha grows weaker while Nokomis watches helplessly, and she dies before Hiawatha can save her. He buries his wife in the snow and mourns the end of their life together.

With spring comes a new change. Iagoo reports a great canoe carrying pale-faced strangers, and the community debates whether the visitors bring danger. Hiawatha welcomes them as guests. A missionary speaks about Jesus and Christian faith, and Hiawatha encourages his people to listen while he withdraws with Nokomis. He tells his grandmother that the strangers will be left in the community's care and that his own tasks are complete. Hiawatha launches his canoe, says farewell, and travels west across the shining water into the sunset. His people watch from the shore as he disappears toward the realm beyond the north-west wind, ending the poem with his departure and with the community facing the religious and historical transformation announced by the newcomers.

Famine and bitter winter bring tragedy to Hiawatha's lodge. Minnehaha weakens and dies despite Hiawatha's desperate search for food, and he mourns her burial beneath the snow. In spring, Iagoo reports the arrival of strangers in a great canoe. Hiawatha welcomes the European missionary and his companions, receives their account of Christian teaching, and urges his people to listen hospitably. He then tells Nokomis that his work is finished. Launching his canoe westward, he travels into the sunset and departs for the land beyond the north-west wind. The poem closes with his community watching him disappear, left to encounter the new faith and the historic changes represented by the newcomers.