The Listeners

LINES 1-4: The opening lines of "The Listeners" introduce the poem's main character, set the
scene, and pose the question that is central to the mystery of the story. The subject of the
poem is called simply "The Traveller," which implies that his journeying is the most
important thing to know about him. He has come on horseback from some unknown
location into the scene of the poem, and immediately makes his presence known by
knocking on the door of a house and asking if anyone is there. The fact that the Traveller
knocks on a "moonlit door" establishes the poem's setting as a house at night, while the
"ferny floor" of a forest reveals that this house is located in a wood. The presence of ferns
further suggests that the forest has grown wild around the house, implying that it hasn't
been cared for: the inhabitants may have been absent for a while. The Traveller's question
opens the poem with a sense of urgency. If he is knocking at a door in the middle of the
night and asking if anyone is home, he must have a compelling reason. The reader is
encouraged to read on in order to find out what his errand entails, and what kind of
response he'll get. In these lines, de la Mare uses two devices to contribute to the effect of
.the woodland scene

LINES 5-8: The next lines do bring some sort of response to the Traveller's question, but not
the one he was looking for. A bird flies "up out of the turret," ostensibly having been
disturbed from its nest by his knocking. The fact that a bird has been living in the tower of
the house furthers the impression that this place is abandoned; nature has begun to take
over the human home, making the space its own. This might contribute to the increased
urgency with which the Traveller repeats his knocking and his question. In this case, de la
Mare uses the verb "smote" to describe the knocking. This is a violent striking action, and
shows that the Traveller is knocking with a great deal of force. He repeats his first question,
now even more desperate for someone to answer him. Line 7 extends beyond the others,
implying a longer period of knocking. The repetition of the action is emphatic: de la Mare
uses not only "again" but also "a second time," a tautology draws attention to the repeated
knocking. It also suggests that the Traveller's attempts are useless: more knocking does not
produce the effect he wants. The unchanged repetition of the opening question in line 8,
again, heightens the urgency of the moment. The Traveller wants an affirmative "yes" in
.answer to his question

LINES 9-12: The next lines tell the reader what doesn't happen in the poem. The Traveller
expects that someone will emerge from the house to speak to him, or at least lean out of the
window and acknowledge his presence. Neither of these things happen, however. The
reversal of his expectations confuses the Traveller, and momentarily stops him in his tracks.
The language of these lines focuses on absence and negation: "no one" descends to meet
the Traveller, and "no head" leans over the sill to look at him. Paradoxically, describing the
lack of these things makes the reader imagine them happening; it is difficult to talk about
something not existing without conjuring up an image of its existing. The Traveller becomes
so confused that for a while stops his attempts to make himself known, meaning that the
.silence and stillness of the wood absorb even him for the moment
The Traveller's eyes are described as "grey," which is the most specific thing the reader
knows about him. This detail isn't necessary to the story, which makes one wonder why it
might be included. Grey is an achromatic color, meaning that it has no actual color: it is
composed from black and white. The Traveller's eyes, being in between black and white,
might represent a meeting point of two states: for example, the living and the dead. In the
course of the poem, he is able to come close to the world of ghosts, but he is also
.definitively a representative of the human world

LINES 13-16: These lines introduce the other characters in the poem: the "listeners" referred
to in the title. The reader is allowed into the silent house, as the poem shifts perspective
from the Traveller on the outside to the listeners within. The inhabitants of the house are
described as "a host of phantom listeners," which implies that there is a large number of
them (a "host" meaning, in this case, a large group of people or things). This description also
underscores their supernatural nature: they are "phantom" presences, not living people.
They may be ghosts, or some other kind of spirit. In either case, they are of a different world
from the Traveller, who appears as a "voice from the world of men." They are definitely not
.living human beings, though the reader isn't told exactly what they are

The reader also finds out that the listeners "dwelt in the lone house then." They are
inhabiting the house, but it is unclear how long they have been there. The use of "then"
implies that their tenancy might be temporary. They might be the original inhabitants of the
house, who are now ghosts, or they might be spirits who have come from somewhere else.
The mysterious introduction of the listeners withholds more information than it gives,
encouraging the reader to continue reading in search of answers—much like the Traveller
himself continues knocking in the hopes of a response. Again, the moonlight appears here as
a signal of the paranormal. The moon has many traditional associations and uses, but "The
Listeners" uses its connection to the occult and otherworldliness. The fact that the listening
beings in the poem stand among the rays of the moon in the dark house emphasizes their
.mysterious nature

LINES 17-20: These lines add to the image of the listeners in the house, honing in on their
experience of the Traveller's voice. A brief instance of anaphora appears with the repetition
of "Stood" in line 15 and line 17. This has the effect of a kind of incantation, reinforcing the
strange, occult-like atmosphere of the poem. De la Mare's use of "thronging" again
emphasizes the large number of the listeners, since the word refers to people or things
being tightly packed into a space. These beings are crowded together, filling the staircase.
There is something disturbing about imagining such a large collection of spirits, and the
reader is left with more questions about who these phantoms are and what purpose they
have for gathering in the house. The listeners are further described as "hearkening" to the
.Traveller

To hearken is to listen: more particularly, it means to listen with attention. For the listeners,
the Traveller's call is thus worth paying attention to. The sound of his call physically shakes
up the air around them and the stillness of the forest house in which they have been
dwelling, but it notably does not provoke movement in the listeners themselves. They alone
remain unaffected by "the world of men," underscoring humanity's ultimate solitude.
Indeed, the Traveller's call comes from a "lonely" source. This focuses the reader back in on
the singleness of the Traveller, and his division from the other beings in the poem. He is the
only living human present. His shout can vibrate in the air, but the forest quickly returns to
.stillness

LINES 21-24: At this point, the Traveller recognizes the presence of the listeners and
understands that they are not human beings like him, but something stranger. This
recognition happens "in his heart." It is not a logical understanding, then, but an emotional
one. He feels the oddness of the listeners and their difference from him. As with a more
typical ghost story, to understand what's happening requires moving beyond conventional
ways of experiencing and analyzing the world. De la Mare describes the "stillness" of the
listeners as "answering" the Traveller's cry. In one sense, this is a paradox; stillness can't
properly respond to anything. However, as with the non-presences noted in lines 9-11, the
evocation of absence makes another kind of presence clear. The listeners' silence is not a
complete lack of response to the Traveller, but an indication of their existence, their
.attention

The Traveller senses the difference between nobody being there, and someone who is there
but only listens without speaking. Meanwhile, the Traveller's horse continues to behave as if
nothing is abnormal about this situation. Either the horse is unaware of the supernatural
presences that the Traveller senses, or ghosts do not distress the animal. This suggests that
the horse, unlike its human rider, blends easily into the landscape of the forest. Its motion,
while contrasting with the stillness of the listeners, is ordinary and unremarkable. It has
simply become part of the woodland scene, grazing on the grass under the leaves and the
stars. Again, this highlights the loneliness of the Traveller himself. He is the only being in the
.scene who does not fit in this scene

LINES 25-28: Having reached some sort of understanding about the occupants of the house,
the Traveller makes one more effort to get through to them. Once again he bangs on the
door, "even louder" than before. (The alliteration of "suddenly smote" lends extra emphasis
to the action here and increases the scene's sense of urgency.) Then he lifts his head, in
order to project his voice as loudly as he can into the house, and leaves a message with the
listening phantoms. Here, the reader might hope to get more information about the
Traveller's errand—that is, to finally learn the reason he came to the woodland house with
so much urgency. This hope is disappointed, since the poem only offers a few more details
about the situation. The Traveller asks the listeners to tell an unnamed "them" that he kept
.his promise by coming to the house, but was thwarted by the absence of an answer

The lack of context in the Traveller's speech makes the poem's mystery even more
frustrating, and perhaps more sinister. Readers are left to wonder who the "them" the
Traveller came to see might be, why they aren't there to meet him, and what the Traveller
had promised to say or do when he reached them. The only real information is that the
Traveller promised someone he would come to the house, and that keeping his word is
important to him. Leaving his message with the listeners is an act of desperation for the
Traveller. He certainly can't be confident that his words will be passed on by such a silent
.force. However, the situation leaves him with no alternative
LINES 29-32: Predictably, given their earlier behavior, the listeners do not stir in response to
the Traveller's final words. His words are not insubstantial: in fact, they actually fall, taking
on a physical weight with this verb. In line 31, the longest of the poem, the words continue
to reverberate through the quiet house. The light sibilance of "spake," "shadowiness," and
"still" contribute to the sense of echoed words growing softer as the Traveller gives up in his
attempt to get a response. The length of line 31 is closest to that of line 17, which also
describes the interior of the house. Stretching these two lines out gives the scene a feeling
of suspended motion, as if time itself has stretched out. This suggests that the listeners live
in a state beyond the urgency of the Traveller; there is nothing to stir them from their
.stillness

They experience an unchanging existence, even as the world around them goes through
crises. In an interesting turn of phrase, the Traveller's words are described as coming from
"the one man left awake." A reader might wonder if this implies there are other humans
present, simply sleeping, unawakened by the shouting and knocking. This is a possible
reading. However, it seems more likely that de la Mare is using "awake" in an
unconventional sense, to contrast the Traveller's living state with the ghostliness of the
listeners. If he is "awake," they are somehow asleep. In art, literature, and religion, death
has frequently been compared to sleep. The listeners, possibly, are in their final sleep: one
.that separates the living from the dead

LINES 33-36: The final lines keep the reader firmly with the listeners as they hear the sounds
of the Traveller departing. There is a sense of claustrophobia in reading these lines—of being
stuck in the uncanny, motionless house as the only human gallops away. Each step of the
Traveller's departure is detailed, echoing the listeners' deep attentiveness. They (and the
reader) hear his foot hitting the metal riding support as he mounts his horse, then the sound
of the horseshoes hitting the stone path. Finally, when the fast-moving hooves have
disappeared, they hear the return of silence. The image apparently displayed in the final
lines, through sound, is that of the Traveller departing. However, once more, the presence of
what is not described is strong. The anaphora of "And," repeated at the beginnings of lines
34 and 35, reminds the reader that these sounds are being heard by someone. Again, the
listeners are vividly present, standing in their motionless ranks on the staircase. These four
lines display a concentrated sibilance, with "stirrup," "sound," "stone," and "silence surged
softly." There is a creepiness about the concentration of these "s" sounds, a whispering that
might send a shiver through the reader. Particularly in line 35, the return of silence is given a
strange weight by the sibilance. The silence surges, moving like a wave to cover the scene
again. It is the atmosphere of the supernatural world, and it is stronger than any human
.attempt to break into it