Kunal Bhatt
Tennyson’s Attempt for Encouragement
In many of his poems Alfred Lord Tennyson describes main characters who encounter seemingly unconquerable adversities. These characters are presented with choices about life and its difficult challenges, and there is an internal struggle within each one to decide a course of action. In Tennyson’s poems “Mariana” and “The Lady of Shalott” the main characters are isolated from the rest of the world, and both are afraid of facing life and the obstacles that it presents. However, each person makes different decisions about her life: The Lady of Shalott conquers her fear while Mariana remains in the miserable surroundings that suit her mood. One of Tennyson’s main purposes in writing “Mariana” and “The Lady of Shallot” was to tell his readers to conquer their fears and to live life to the fullest. Tennyson gets this message across to the reader by developing his characters through his use of concrete images and by contrasting the Lady’s courage with Mariana’s unwillingness to face her fears.
Tennyson’s poem “Mariana” poignantly expresses a woman’s longing for something better than her empty present. “Mariana” also addresses the issue of an individual’s fear of experiencing life and her lack of connection with society. The central figure of the poem, Mariana, is isolated from the rest of the world because of her unwillingness to face her fear. Mariana’s life is depressing and empty because of her decision to avoid life and its harsh realities. Mariana’s loneliness encourages her to wish her own death as she laments repeatedly throughout the poem, “My life is dreary/He cometh not, she said/ She said, ‘I am aweary, aweary’, /I would that I were dead.”(9-12).
Mariana is depressed and the reader is able to feel her gloominess not only when she repeats these four lines in every stanza of the poem, but also when the reader is told that she weeps all day in her house, “Her tears fell with the dews at even/Her tear fell ere the dews were dried…” (13-14). The lament itself is not the chief means of expressing the desolate mood in the poem, however; the scenic descriptions of Mariana’s environment brilliantly achieve this purpose. Her surroundings are desolate, secluded and dreary, and Tennyson is successful in rendering the atmosphere of desolation when he uses concrete images to describe Mariana’s home. The setting of the house is presented at different moments in the day, but the emphasis is upon its unvarying dreariness:
With blackest moss the flower-plots
Were thickly crusted, one and all;
The rusted nails fell from the knots
That held the pear to the gable-wall.
The broken sheds look’d sad and strange:
Unlifted was the clinking latch;
Weeded and worn the ancient thatch
Upon the lonely moated grange. (1-8)
Tennyson reveals Mariana’s character and mood by using these dark and somber images to describe her house. The imagery of thickly crusted flower pots, the weeded and worn ancient latch and the blackness of moss creates darkness and sets the mood of the poem. Other images that support this melancholic mood include the “flitting of bats,” “glooming flats,” “cold winds,” “a sluice of blackened water,” “marish-mosses,” and a “poplar with gnarled bark.” All of these images—the crusted moss, the rusted nails, the broken sheds, the swaying of a gusty shadow, the creaking of doors and the slow ticking of a clock—imply the passing of time without fulfillment.
Mariana’s house is described as being old, forgotten and untouched. In the sixth stanza there is an emphasis on the house’s emptiness and lack of human life:
“All day within the dreamy house,
The doors upon their hinges creak’d
The blue fly sung in the pane; the mouse
Behind the crevice peer’d about.
Old faces glimmer’d thro’ the doors,
Old footsteps trod the upper floors,
Old voices called her from without.” (61-67)
The words “old faces, footsteps and voices” suggest that the house has not welcomed human contact for a long time. By using an excellent choice of words and images, Tennyson effectively paints a vivid picture of Mariana’s isolated and dismal environment. These images of the house, however, also give the reader a clear description of Mariana.
In “The Lady of Shalott” Tennyson also reveals his protagonist’s character and life by describing her surroundings. To fully describe the dreariness of the Lady’s home and environment, Tennyson creates an obvious contrast between Camelot, a center of worldly activity and human interaction, and the remote island of Shalott. Flowers blossom and long fields of barley and rye stretch “to meet the sky” in Camelot. These are the signs of life that are absent in the Lady of Shalott’s surroundings. Her “silent isle” is isolated and secluded, just as Mariana’s house is lonely and troglodytic. The walls of the Lady’s home are gray and encompassing, preventing her from leaving it to truly experience life. The Lady is isolated from everyone just as her home is isolated from the rest of world. No one has ever really seen the Lady of Shalott, although some have heard her lovely song:
“But who hath seen her wave her hand?
Or at the casement seen her stand…
Only reapers, reaping early
In among the bearded barley,
Hear a song that echoes cheerly
From the river winding clearly
Down to tower’d Camelot.” (27-32)
The Lady of Shalott keeps free of an unknown danger by steadily tending her loom with “little other care.” She believes that a curse is preventing her from leaving the Shalott and from living her life to the fullest. At first the Lady is afraid of this curse, and her fear consumes her thinking and impels the Lady to weave “a magic web of colors gay,” looking through a mirror at the “shadows of the world” all day. Fear of the curse frustrates the Lady’s efforts to look directly upon the world, but she is able to see a myriad of things in the mirror that hangs in front of her: the reflection of the river, the high road that leads to Camelot, the red cloaks of market girls, an abbot on his horse, a troop of happy damsels, lovers “newly wed” and knights who ride “two and two.” These glimpses of human life make the Lady long for the world of experience: “I am half sick of shadows.” However, she is still too afraid to conquer her fears.
In Part III of the poem the reader is introduced to the one thing that convinces the Lady to face and conquer her fear—Sir Lancelot. Tennyson describes this heroic knight, who represents the vigor and vitality lacking in the Lady’s life, as being bold and brave The jubilant song and the dazzling reflection of Lancelot allow the Lady to experience something that she has never felt before—love. This new force prompts the Lady of Shalott to challenge her self-imposed curse and destroy it. However, when the Lady turns to behold Lancelot directly, her web unravels and the mirror cracks. She cries: “The curse is come upon me.” (40).
Despite the curse the Lady abandons the security of her home and ventures out into the world that she has only seen through a mirror. She is now able to take risks and truly experience life. The Lady sees things that she has never seen, feels things that she has never felt, and experiences things that she has never experienced. Although the Lady perishes at the conclusion of the poem, she is in a better situation than Mariana. The Lady is also more admirable than Marianna because she does what Mariana is unwilling or unable to do—face her fears.
Tennyson creates vivid images to not only describe setting and mood in “Mariana” and “The Lady of Shalott,” but also to reveal the character of each poem’s protagonists. Mariana’s environment is very dark and dreary, and her loneliness makes her yearn for something better. Mariana’s fear, however, prevents her from achieving this. The Lady of Shalott is in a similar situation, but she is able to conquer her fears, and by contrasting the Lady of Shalott’s courageous display with Mariana’s fear and by developing characters through concrete imagery Tennyson urges his readers to face their fears and live life to the fullest.
Works Cited
Abrams, M. H. "Lady of Shalott." The Norton Anthology of English Literature, Vol. 2 (Packaged with Media Companion). Boston: W. W. Norton & Company, 2003. 1114-118.
Abrams, M. H. "Mariana." The Norton Anthology of English Literature, Vol. 2 (Packaged with Media Companion). Boston: W. W. Norton & Company, 2003. 1112-114.
