VICTORIAN POETRY

What is Victorian?
In the history of the United Kingdom, the Victorian era was the period of Queen Victoria's
reign, from June 1837 until her death on January 1901.
The Poetry written in England during the reign of Queen Victoria (1837-1901) is referred to
as Victorian poetry. Following Romanticism, Victorian poets continued many of the previous
era’s main themes, such as religious skepticism and valorization of the artist as genius; but
Victorian poets also developed a distinct poetic sensibility.
The writers of this period are known for their interest in verbal embellishment, mystical
interrogation, brooding skepticism, and whimsical nonsense.
The most prolific and well-regarded poets of the age included Alfred, Lord Tennyson, Robert
Browning, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Matthew Arnold.

Historical Background
England was moving steadily in the direction of becoming Europe´ s most stable and
prosperous country.
The industrial revolution, the railway age, steam engines were being used in mines, factories
and ships. Small towns were beginning to swell into smoky centres of manufacturing
industry.

Historical Perspective of the Victorian Period: The period is known for economic progress,
poverty and exploitation. The gap between the rich and the poor grew wide and with drive for
material and commercial success there appeared a kind of a moral decay in the society. The
Victorian era saw a wild growth of industries and factories. One very important factor of the
age was its stress on morality. A feminine code of conduct was imposed on them which
described every aspect of their being from the proper apparels to how to converse, everything
had rules. The role of the women was mostly that of being angels of the house and restricted
to domestic confines. They were financially dependent on their husbands and fathers and it
led to a commercialization of the institution of marriage.

Urban growth: Unable to adapt to the new circumstances the peasant farmer had to leave his
land and emigrate to the colonies or drift to the industrial towns where there was a growing
demand for labour.
Growth of the economy: Economy grew from 1846 because of Free Trade. Salaries were
low and therefore; industries became more competitive in terms of exports. The basis for this
growth was: coal mining, iron foundry and the cotton industry.
Victorian poetry’s most distinctive qualities may stem, paradoxically, from its proximity to
other genres and forms: theatre, fiction, music, and art, all of them poetry’s competitors in a
fully stocked cultural marketplace. Asking in the 1833 essay “What Is Poetry?” the
philosopher John Stuart Mill responded with terms pilfered from drama: “Poetry is feeling,
confessing itself to itself, in moments of solitude. … All poetry is of the nature of soliloquy.”
In the era’s most heralded poetic innovation, Alfred, Lord Tennyson and Robert
Browning hybridized drama, fiction, and lyric into the dramatic monologue form: a poet
impersonates a fictional or historical character and addresses a silent audience without any
narrative framing or guidance.

The Victorian age was an age of material prosperity. The British Empire spread far and wide
during the reign of Queen Victoria. The Sun never set in the British Empire. Naturally the
Victorians became highly complacent. The Victorian age refers to contradictory qualities of
the mind and the spirit. It was outwardly materialistic but inwardly it was guided by a deep
spiritual vitality. The term ‘Victorian Poetry’ refers to the verses composed during the reign
of Queen Victoria in England (1837- 1901). This period was marked by the tremendous
cultural upheaval. There were a drastic change and development in the form of literature, art
and music. Although the Victorian Poetry was quite different from that of the preceding era,
yet there were some similarities that existed between the two periods.

This was a literature addressed with great immediacy to the needs of the age, to the particular
temper of mind which had grown up within a society seeking adjustment to the conditions of
modern life. And to the degree that the problems which beset the world of a century ago
retain their urgency and still await solution, the ideas of the Victorian writers remain relevant
and interesting to the twentieth century. Any enduring literature, however, must transcend
topicality; and the critical disesteem into which so much Victorian writing has fallen may be
traced to the persistent notion that the literary men of that time oversubscribed to values with
which our own time is no longer in sympathy. Yet this view ignores the fact that nearly all the
eminent Victorian writers were as often as not at odds with their age and that in their best
work they habitually appealed not to, but against the prevailing mores of that age. The reader
who comes to the Victorians without bias must be struck again and again by the underlying
tone of unrest which pervades so much that is generally taken as typical of the period. Sooner
or later he begins to wonder whether there is any such thing as a representative Victorian
writer, or at any rate, whether what makes him representative is not that very quality of
intransigeance as a result of which he repudiated his society and sought refuge from the spirit
of the times in the better ordered realm of interior consciousness. Since, however, any
tendency to exalt individual awareness at the expense of conventionally established attitudes
ran counter to the concept of the role of the artist which the Victorian age tried to impose on
its writers, there resulted a conflict which has been too often ignored, but which must be
taken into account in reaching any satisfactory evaluation of Victorian literature. This was a
conflict, demonstrable within the work of the writers themselves, between the public
conscience of the man of letters who comes forward as the accredited literary spokesman of
his world, and the private conscience of the artist who conceives that his highest allegiance
must be to his own aesthetic sensibilities.
Victorian Poetry brilliantly demonstrates the extraordinary sophistication of the genre. At the
same time it presents a vigorous challenge to some crucial issues in contemporary Marxist,
post-structuralist and feminist criticism.

Victorian Poetry is a major re-evaluation of the genre by one of the foremost scholars of the
period. In a work that is uniquely comprehensive and theoretically astute, Isobel Armstrong
rescues Victorian poetry from its longstanding sepia image as a `a moralised form of romantic
verse', and unearths its often subversive critique of nineteenthcentury culture and politics. For
the first time, the aesthetics and politics of Victorian poetry are brought together in a
sustained historical discussion. Isobel Armstrong examines its conservative and dissident
traditions, and compares the work of familiar middle-class male poets to that of female and
working-class poets. Victorian Poetry brilliantly demonstrates the extraordinary
sophistication of the genre. At the same time it presents a vigorous challenge to some crucial
issues in contemporary Marxist, post-structuralist and feminist criticism.
The foremost poet of the Victorian period was Alfred, Lord Tennyson, who served as poet
laureate of the United Kingdom from 1850 until his death in 1892. Much of Tennyson's
poetry focused on the retellings of classical myths. He experimented with meter, but most of
his poetry followed strict formatting—a reflection of the strict formality of the Victorian era.
His work often focused on the conflict between allegiance to religion and the new discoveries
being made in the field of science.
Also worth mention in a discussion of the Victorian era is a collection of writers and artists
called the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood of which Dante Gabriel Rossetti and his sister
Christina were a part. In the late 1840s, a group of English artists organized the Pre-
Raphaelite Brotherhood with the goal of replacing the popular academic approach to painting
with the more natural approach taken by artists who worked before the Italian Renaissance.
Several writers joined this movement, echoing a simpler, less formal approach to writing
literature.

Between the Romantics and the Pre-Raphaelites lie Tennyson, Browning, and Arnold, leading
the poetic chorus of the great Victorian noonday. By virtue of this midway position between
the two extremes represented by the schools of poetry which came before and after, their
work brings into sharp focus the choice which has been forced on the modern artist. In the
common view, these mid-Victorian poets, either unable or unwilling to maintain the spirit of
bellicose self-sufficiency which sustained their Romantic forbears, achieved rapprochement
with their audience by compromising with the middle-class morality of the time, and in so
doing deliberately sacrificed artistic validity. So flagrant a betrayal of the creative impulse,
the argument then continues, provoked a reaction in the following generation, whereby the
pendulum swung back towards the belief that art is and must be its own justification
irrespective of ulterior motive. But this version of the poetic situation in the nineteenth
century gravely misrepresents the real meaning of an endeavor on which Tennyson,
Browning, and Arnold were alike engaged. For each of them was ultimately seeking to define
the sphere within which the modern poet may exercise his faculty, while holding in legitimate
balance the rival claims of his private, aristocratic insights and of the tendencies existing in a
society progressively vulgarized by the materialism of both the nineteenth and twentieth
century. Thus, it came about that the double awareness, which so generally characterized the
Victorian literary mind, grew almost into a perpetual state of consciousness in these poets
through their efforts to work out a new aesthetic position for the artist. The literary careers of
Tennyson, Browning, and Arnold present a number of striking parallels which, since their
poetic endowments were so divergent, can only be explained in terms of influences
impinging on them from the outside. In the early manner of each there is an introspective,
even a cloistral element which was later subdued in an obvious attempt to connect with
contemporary currents of thought. Of the three, Tennyson succeeded most quickly in
conforming to the Victorian ideal of the poet as popular bard; his reward was the laureateship
as Wordsworth's successor. Browning's progress in public favor was more gradual, but the
formation of the Browning Society in 1881 signalized his eventual arrival within the select
company of Victorian idols of the hearth. Less versatile in poetic range, Arnold became a full-
fledged man of letters and won the prestige of the Oxford Professorship of Poetry only after
turning to prose; and it is perhaps worth pondering whether his inability to bring his poetry
into closer accord with the demands of the age does not account for the fact that he has
attracted a greater amount of serious critical attention in recent years than either Tennyson or
Browning.

The Victorian poetry is divided in two main groups of poetry: The High Victorian Poetry and
The Pre-Raphaelites. Dealing with the first group, “the major High Victorian poets were
Alfred, Lord Tennyson, Robert Browning, Elizabeth Barret Browning, Matthew Arnold and
Gerard Manley Hopkins.”
Queen Victoria's reign made the idea of empire appear in poetry, and one of the poets who
used it was Tennyson. For Robert Browning, the dramatic monologue was a great innovation,
but Alfred Tennyson and Dante Rossetti invented and used it too (in the PreRaphaelites). ”T o
be a dramatic monologue a poem must have a speaker and an implied auditor, and that the
reader often perceives a gap between what that speaker says and what he or she actually
reveals”, but there are some poets that does not agree with this last idea as Glenn Everett who
“proposes that Browninesque dramatic monologue has three requirements (1.The reader takes
the part of the listener. 2. The speaker uses a casemaking, argumentative tone. 3. We complete
the dramatic scene from within, by means of inference and imagination.)”.

Victorian poetry does not have a topic in the poems about love and worship of Nature as the
Romantics had in their poetry. It is because the Romantics loved Nature and it was shown
through their poems adoring and blessing her as if she were God. But, in the Victorian poetry
we have not found themes related to the topic of this paper, love and worship of Nature
because the Victorians do not talk about her in their poetry. Therefore, we will not relate this
topic with the Victorians, but we will talk about the Nature that the Victorian poets refer to in
the descriptions of places in the poems and the love and worship of God in comparison with
love and worship of Nature, Nature understood as part of God, created by Him, maybe as a
personification of God himself in the Earth.
In the middle of the 19th cent. the so-called Pre-Raphaelites, led by the painter-poet Dante
Gabriel Rossetti, sought to revive what they judged to be the simple, natural values and
techniques of medieval life and art.

Style and Form

• Victorian poetry often employs a range of poetic forms and styles, from the lyrical to
the dramatic. Poets used sonnets, dramatic monologues, and narrative verse to express
a variety of ideas.
• There was a notable shift toward a more personal, introspective style, with poets often
addressing their own emotions, thoughts, and reflections on life.
• The language of Victorian poetry can be ornate and formal, reflecting the society’s
sense of order and propriety, though some poets like Browning favored a more
colloquial style in their dramatic monologues.

The Role of Poetry in Victorian Society

• Poetry in the Victorian period was highly respected, and poets were often seen as
moral guides and social commentators. The Poet Laureate, a position given to
Tennyson, was an example of how poetry was woven into the fabric of public life.
Victorians looked to poets to reflect upon the moral dilemmas of their rapidly
changing world.

Victorian poetry is fundamentally a continuation of the Romantic movement.

The Reform Bill of 1832: In 1832, Parliament passed a law changing the British electoral
system. It was known as the Great Reform Act.
This was a response to many years of people criticizing the electoral system as unfair.
The Oxford Movement: The term ‘Oxford Movement’ is often used to describe the whole of
what might be called the Catholic revival in the Church of England.
The main objective of this movement was to reform society and rescue it from the spiritual
decay.
● The High Victorian Poetry &
● The Pre-Raphaelite Poetry

Characteristics (Features) of Victorian Poetry:

• Victorian poetry employs more humour and whimsy than the prior Romantic Period.
• Despite the whimsy, in the Victorian Era, poetry and literature take a more harsh and
utilitarian view of nature and philosophy.
• Victorian form favoured narrative and length over the short, lyric poems that were
popular in Romantic poetry. They emphasized imagery less, and instead they focused
on meter and rhythm.
• Themes were much more realistic, identifying emotions such as isolation, despair and
general pessimism. Pessimism: As already discussed, Victorians were quite realistic
and thus were more concerned about the reality rather than the ideal world. Due to
industrial revolution and advancement in science and technology, there was a drastic
increase in the city population that gave rise to slums, poverty, unemployment,
corruption diseases, deaths etc. Thus, Victorian Poetry which focused on the pains and
sufferings of commoners had a note of pessimism.
• Several factors that influenced Victorian poetry and literature were the conflicts
between scientific discoveries, such as evolution, and faith, the industrialization of
nations and a growing social consciousness about reform movements for better
working conditions for women and children.
• Even though many Victorian poets struggled with a loss of faith, there was still a
sense of high morality that they held close and revered.
• Victorian poets were interested in classical and medieval literature. They loved the
heroic stories and courtly attitudes. Through their writing, they tried to encourage
readers toward more noble actions and attitudes.
• The Victorian Poetry was quite realistic in nature and quite less idealized as compared
to the Romantic Poets who were idealists and believed in Art for the Art Sake Nature,
that was everything for the Romantics lost that idealized status in the Victorian era
and became just a source of leisure and inspiration for the poets.
• Romantic Poetry mainly focused on rural and rustic life. It is no way related to city
life. On the other hand, Victorian poets used language as well as themes common to
city life and thus wrote about the masses and for the masses. There was a drastic
increase in the city population that gave rise to slums, poverty, unemployment,
corruption diseases, deaths etc. Focus on Masses: The Romantic Poetry mainly
focused on rural and rustic life. It is no way related to the city life. On the other hand,
Victorian poets used language as well as themes common to the city life and thus
wrote about the masses and for the masses.
• Victorian poetry was objective.
• Dramatic poetry and the use of dramatic monologue.
• Innovation in the use of poetic diction neglecting the everyday language of the
romantics.
• Victorian poets paid attention to thought rather than to feelings They are interested in
politics and social problems and revolutionary ideas.
• The most important and obvious characteristic of Victorian Poetry is the use of
sensory elements. Most of the Victorian Poets used imagery and the senses to convey
the scenes of struggles between Religion and Science, and ideas about Nature and
Romance, which transport the readers into the minds and hearts of the people of the
Victorian age, even today.
• Realism: The Victorian Poetry was quite realistic in nature and quite less idealised as
compared to the Romanic Poets who were idealists and believed in Art for the Art
 Sake. Nature, that was everything for the Romantics lost that idealised position in the
Victorian era and became just a source of leisure and inspiration for the poets.
• Science and Technology: The advancement in science and inventions was welcomed
by the Victorian poets. It made them believe that a man can find all solutions to his
problems and sufferings. They made their readers believe that they should use science
for their betterment.
• Questioning to God: It was an important feature of Victorian poetry. The development
of empirical science, rationalism and radicalism led the people to give up the religious
thoughts and be more sceptic. Moreover, corruption in the Church, defining the
morality of Priests, etc also led the people to question the religious institutions.
• A sense of Responsibility: The Romantics believed in “return in nature”. A number of
the Romantics did not like the city life and instead of giving voice to the victims of
industrialisation, they left the city life. On the other hand, Victoria poets took the
responsibility of social reform and gave voice to the commoners by living with them.
• Morality: Though morality saw a steep decline in Victorian Era, a number of poets
tried to retain it by encouraging the people to be honest and noble.
• Interest in Medieval Myths and Folklore: The Victorians showed great favour towards
Medieval Literature. They loved mythical and chivalrous anecdotes of Medieval
Knights, Courtly Love etc. This interest is on contrary to the of Romantics as they
latter loved classical myths and legends.
• Use of Sensory Devices and Imagery: The poets of the preceding era used imagery
vividly. However, the Victorians also used sensory devices to describe the abstract
scenes of chaos between Religion and Science.
• Sentimentality: The Victorians wrote about artistic creations thus giving way to
deeper imaginations.
• Humour: A number of poets wrote humorous and whimsical verses. e.g. Bad Ballads.

Major Victorian Poets:

Victorian poets are also known as later nineteenth-century poets. Most of the writing of this
period reflects current social, economic, and intellectual problems. The poetry of this period
shows the crisis of religion and philosophy because of the development of science.
i) Alfred Lord Tennyson: Tennyson is one of the most skilled and self-conscious poets
of the Victorian age. He is typical Victorian who adopted the conventional religious
and social views and values of his age. His early poems were not much accepted, but
gradually he sharpened his skill. Tennyson's later poems are serious, thoughtful and
musical. His poem The Idylls of the King is preferred by many people even today.
In Morte D Arthur he turned Malory’s story into poetry. He did experiment with
different meters. In his long poem In Memoriam, he laments for the death of his
friend Arthur Hallam. Tennyson’s shorter poems are generally better than longer
ones. Ulysses is his most controlled and perfectly written poem which presents the
heroic voice of the aged hero. The Princess is the collection of his fine lyric which
shows his best mysterious and musical quality.
ii) Robert Browning: Browning is a major Victorian poet who voiced the mood of
optimism in his works. For Browning the intellect was more important than the
 music. His great knowledge was the result of his self-study and travels. His
reputation is higher as the writer of dramatic monologue. One of his successful
dramatic poems is Pippa Passes. We find many such poems in his dramas, but his
natural gift was in poetry. Sometimes we notice his poetic style very difficult. It is
because of his unusual knowledge of words and his strange sentence structure.
Sordello is a good example of his difficult poem. The Ring and the Book is a poem
based on a book that he found in Florence. Asolando is a collection of many fine
poems which was published on the day of Browning death.
iii) Matthew Arnold: Arnold was a great poet and critic of his time. He had been a
professor of poetry in Oxford for ten years. His works truly represent his age. A sad
undertone runs through nearly all his poetry. His views of modern life, of its
complexity, its sick hurry and divided aims are present in his poetry. Arnold, was also
the headmaster of Rugby School. He wrote a poem entitled Rugby Chapel. Thyrsis
is a poem of lament for his friend, Clough. In his poem The Scholar Gipsy the poet
talks about an Oxford man who joins a band of gypsies and wanders with them.
Memorial Verses is his sad poem in which the poet laments for the deaths of many
poets at home and abroad. He also wrote a critical sonnet of Shakespeare, whom he
praised too much. One of his other poems, Empedocles on Etna, has been highly
praised, perhaps because it is not altogether sad.
iv) Dante Gabriel Rossetti: Rossetti was a poet as well as a noted painter. His sonnets
are among the most musical in English. Many critics have accused him of writing a
moral poem belonging to the Fleshy School of poetry. But he argued that poetry
ought to be based on the senses. Many of his poetic lines are written in a way a
painter’s eye captures the beauty of the thing. Rosseti wrote about nature with his eye
on it, but did not feel it in his bones as Wordsworth does. Rossetti was too fond of
alliteration.
v) Elizabeth Barrett Browning: Another great poetess of this time was Elizabeth
Barrett, who, on her marriage, became Elizabeth Barrett Browning. Some of her
poems are too long, but in a sonnet, she could not write too much because the form is
limited to fourteen lines. Thus, much of her best work is contained in Sonnets from
the Portuguese. She pretended at first that these sonnets were translated from the
Portuguese; they were really an entirely original expression of her love for Robert
Browning.
vi) Algernon Charles Swinburne: Swinburne followed the poetic style of Rossetti, but
could not use alliteration so much successfully in his poems as did Rossetti. Critics
argue that his poetry does not contain much thought, though it can be sung well.
When his work Poems and Ballads appeared in 1866, he was much blamed for moral
reasons. A later book of Poems and Ballads is not so much offensive as the previous
one. It shows his interest in French writers and includes the laments for them.
Tristram of Lyonesse is usually considered to be his best work. It tells the undying
story of Tristram and Iseult.
vii) Edward Fitzgerald: One of the greatest poetic translators was Edward Fitzgerald.
He translated six of Calderon’s plays the Agamemnon of Aeschylus and the
Rubaiyat of the Persian poet Omar Khayyam. Most translations lose something and
are not as good as the originals. But this book is considered by some Persian scholars
to be better than Omar Khayyam’s work. In this translation of the Rubaiyat, he
 entirely omitted the hidden meanings of the original. The other poets of this age are
Arthur Clough, and Christina Rossetti.

Lord Alfred Tennyson (1808-1892)

Tennyson stood as the summit of poetry in England. For nearly half a century, he was not
only a man, and a poet, but the voice of all people, expressing their doubt and faith, grief and
triumphs. In his poetry we find:
• Dreaminess of Spenser
• Majesty of Milton
• The natural simplicity of Wordsworth
• The fantasy of Blake and Coleridge
• The melody of Keats and Shelley
• Narrative vigor of Byron

Robert Browning (1812-1889)

He was the lover of music. His famous poems are A Toccato of Galuppi, The Last Rider
Together, My Last Duchess, Rabbi Ben Ezpa, Fra Lippo Lippa, A Death to the Desert, Men
and Women (a collection of poems) etc. He was the supreme master of the Dramatic
Monologue.
Matthew Arnold (1822-1883)
He is a poet cum critic. His famous poems are Rugby Chapel, Thyrsis, Scholar Gypsy, Dover
Beach, Soharab and Rustam, Shakespeare (it is a sonnet), etc. Thyrsis is a great pastoralelegy
and in this poem he mourns the death of his friend, Arthur Clough. Rugby Chapel is also his
elegy in which he mourns the death of his father. However, he is mainly famous for his essay
(critical works) like, Culture and Anarchy, Literature and Dogma.

The Pre-Raphaelite Poets

The Pre-Raphaelite was a movement. It was begun in 1848 by three painters in England
including Dante Gabriel Rossetti. It aimed at a return to older principles in painting, but as
Rossetti and other followers like William Morris and Suinburne were also gifted writers, they
aimed to bring about a change in literary manner as well.

Many of the themes and meanings of Victorian poetry reflect a conflicted sense of self. At
once many poems by Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Browning portray a longing for
the ideals of the Romantic period in literature but they are stunted it seems by the unique
period and its new use of language, the changing and ever-growing economy in the bustling
city of London, and of course, the changing views of religion and its place in such a complex
world. Through the poems from the Victorian era of both Robert and Elizabeth Barrett
Browning and Matthew Arnold, the recurrent themes of shifting religious ideas, language
usage, and the economy are clear. During the long reign of Elizabeth religious dissent was
growing and the Church broke off into three distinct branches. This schism was also coupled
with the fact that new discoveries were being made, most notably by the controversial
theories of Darwin, but by other thinkers as well that argued for a more rational existence.
Influenced by the works of Percy and Mary Shelley, Robert Browning already had atheistic
ideas and although his feelings dissipated to some degree later in his life, his numerous
criticisms of religion are obvious in his poem “Fra Lippo Lippi” in which he tells the tale, in
the form of a narrative poem complete with slang and comedy, of a man that was not destined
to be in the Church and chooses to heed his more physical impulses instead of conforming to
the will of the Church. ” Browning seems to be engaging in a dialogue with the Church
regarding celibacy— both in the artistic and sexual sense.
The feelings of the poem’s narrator in “Fra Lippp Lippi” by Browning can easily be seen as
Browning’s own critique and while the main theme concerns art, the strict sense in which the
church views artistic pursuits and products is similar to the way it requires priests to live
celibate lives. While the church’s main argument is that art should be presented as something
“higher” than the base representation of the human form, this denies the essential humanity of
the subject, God’s people. Along these same lines, the way the church frowns upon sexual,
lustful activity on the part of its clergy by demanding celibacy is exactly the same request as
for the artist. Both demands of the church, artistic and sexual are idealized conceptions of
how humans should be represented and both, according to the narrator of the poem, are
entirely unrealistic and misguided. Through this poem, Browning is arguing against
mandatory celibacy for priests and is suggesting, through the story and artistic struggle of Fra
Lippo Lippi, that the demands of the church go against human nature

Victorian poetry employs every established verse form in the English language and exploits
every poetic subgenre, while refining upon some, such as the verse drama and pastoral elegy,
and innovating others, such as the dramatic monologue. Newly minted and ‘native’ forms of
the oldest vintage (Anglo-Saxon strong stress and alliterative patternings) also jostle with
antique ‘foreign’ versification borrowed from Latin, Greek and late medieval French poetry.
This course explores some of the poetic, political and philosophical ambitions that animate
this prosodic variousness.

Interpreting poetry on multiple levels is difficult for modern readers because singularity and
stability are important attributes to modernity. The Victorian era was a time of transition and
uncertainty.

Christina Rossetti provides a female voice on the subject of religion and offers commentary
on the position of women in a male-driven economy in “Goblin Market.” The poem is a
response to the needs of the “fallen women” of Victorian society and a cautionary tale for
daughters of the dangerous Victorian age. As a female poet, Christina Rossetti spoke about
issues that had rarely been addressed in poetry, the “highest” form of writing of which men
were mostly in control. Society decided what type of writers could contribute and what topics
were appropriate in each literary form.

Robert Browning, Dante Gabriel Rossetti and Christina Rossetti twisted traditional values
such as love and religion slightly to fit into their own poetic world. Browning is the poet
whose work was perhaps the least known of the three poets; in his time Browning may have
been better known for being the significant other of Elizabeth Barrett Browning.

Victorians were well on their way to modern ways with innovations in technology and ever-
increasing disparities between social classes. Several distinctions are clear immediately: their
dress, their working conditions and requirements, their speech, their looks and their reading
material. Women and children were most targeted as readers of “lower quality” material
while “high arts” were male oriented. Women assumed new roles in society as both the
“objects” of male desires and the writers of their own fantasies. Modern perspectives of
sexuality allow us to project terms like masturbation and lesbianism onto the text even before
the terms for those behaviors were coined.

Culture was changing in the Victorian era and its technologies were solidifying and
standardizing its language and customs at an alarming rate. We are provided with images
from the period, some of which reinforce the stereotypes we have long since associated with
Victorians and those that paint a different picture. The women in the poems and paintings
may seem one-dimensional but women themselves began to formulate their own opinions,
assert their own beliefs and write their own fairytales where they can redeem themselves
instead of waiting for a “prince” to do it for them. Women’s view of themselves was not
perfect and society still presented unrealistic and distorted images of what girls and women
could be, but so does every age, including our own.

Growth of Victorian Age:

After the romantic revival, the literature of the Victorian age entered in a new period. The
Literature of this period express the fusion of romanticism to realism. The Victorian age is
rich in literature. It produced two great poets like Tennyson and Browning; dramatists like
Shaw and Galsworthy; novelists like Charles Dickens and Hardy; and essayist like Carlyle
and Stevenson. The age is remarkable for the excellence of its literature.
Victorian Prose:
Victorian age produced two great essayists like Carlyle and Stevenson. Carlyle’s major works
include The French Revolution in 3vol. (1837), On Heroes, HeroWorship and the Heroic in
History (1841). His prose style differs from other prose writers. He writes about people and
events of the past. He has his own philosophy. He accounts great men as Hero. whereas
Stevenson writes famous essays in this period A Night among the Pines, Walking Tours, An
Apology for Idlers, A Plea for Gas lamps, El Dorado Familiar Studies of Men and Books and
Crabbed Age and Youth.
Victorian Poetry:
It produced three great poets- Tennyson, Browning and Arnold. Tennyson is the most
representative poet of the age. He represents Victorian conflict and compromise. He is a great
lyric poet. His lyricism is deep rooted and dominates all of his poems. It makes his poetry
sweet and smooth. His lyric can be divided into many parts like personal, dramatic, patriotic
and musical lyrics or songs. Among Tennyson’s personal lyric “ In Memorium” is very
important. It is a collection of lyrics composed on the death of his bosom friend Arthur
Hallam. Tennyson’s dramatic lyrics are in the form of dramatic monologues. Tennyson is
admired as a pictorial artist. His description of the nature is highly sensuous. Robert
Browning is known for his dramatic monologues and philosophy of hope. Browning is the
greatest writer of dramatic monologues. All of his monologues deal with different aspects of
love. Mathew Arnold is regarded as the greatest elegiac poet of Victorian age. He contributes
a number of elegies but the following five are of great merit: (i) Thyrsis (ii) Rugby Chapel
(iii)The Scholar Gipsy (iv)A Southern Night (v) West Minister Abbey

Pre-Raphaelite poetry Or Pre-Raphaelite brotherhood:

The Pre-Raphaelite brotherhood is also known as the Ore-Raphaelites. It was a group of
English painters, poets and critics, founded in 1848 by Dante Gabriel Rossetti, who reacted
against the artificiality of the art of the period. They wanted to return to the purity and
simplicity of the Italian art of the 13th and 14th century (before Raphael). There were seven
members in this “brotherhood”. The PreRaphaelite defined themselves as a reform-
movement. They were influenced by the ideas of the art critic John Ruskin, who considered
art as a way to react to the ugliness of modern, urban life. The main characteristics were:
fidelity to nature, sensuality, use of non-industrial materials, re-evaluation of medieval
religion and legends. The main representatives were: Dante Gabriel Rossetti, William Morris
and Edward Burne-Jones. William Morris created the Arts and Crafts Movement, which
designed and manufactured a great variety of objects for interiors (stained glass, wallpapers,
tapestries, rugs etc…). They used handicraft and simple decoration in reaction to industrial
machinery. The Pre-Raphaelite movement influenced the Aesthetic Movement. It originated
in France, following the ideas of The Ophelia Gautier; it was a reaction against the
materialism and the strict moral code of the bourgeoisie. Aesthetes were not interested in
political and social matters but isolated themselves in a world of beauty and art. Their motto
was “art for art’s sake”, which means that art doesn’t have any moral aim but it’s an end in
itself. The followers of Aesthetics led an unconventional life, full of sensations and excess
(they wanted to be different from the working masses and they also rejected the Victorian
moral values). The main representative in Britain was Oscar Wilde.

VICTORIAN PERIOD:
The Victorian period of literature roughly coincides with the years that Queen Victoria ruled
Great Britain and its Empire (1837-1901). During this era, Britain was transformed from a
predominantly rural, agricultural society into an urban, industrial one. The Victorian, from the
coronation of Queen Victoria in 1837 until her death in 1901, was an era of numerous
disturbing social developments. The literature of the Victorian Age entered a new period after
the Romantic Revival.
The literature of Victorian age was preceded by romanticism and was followed by modernism
or realism. During this period, the writers were forced to write on the living issues of society.
In this way the literature of this Era was directed to issues such as the growth of English
democracy, the education of the masses, the progress of industrial enterprise and the rise of
materialistic philosophy and the problem of newly industrialized worker. However, during
this period there was a lot of radical social change. Many poets of this period did not like the
romanticized version of society.
New technologies like railroads and the steam printing press united Britons both physically
and intellectually. Although now the period is popularly known as a time of prim,
conservative moral values, the Victorians perceived their world as rapidly changing.
Religious faith was splintering into evangelical and even atheist beliefs. The working class,
women, and people of color were agitating for the right to vote and rule themselves.
Reformers fought for safe workplaces, sanitary reforms, and universal education. Victorian
literature reflects these values, debates, and cultural concerns. Victorian literature differs from
that of the eighteenth century and Romantic period most significantly because it was not
aimed at a specialist or elite audience; rather, because the steam printing press made the
production of texts much cheaper and because railroads could distribute texts quickly and
easily, the Victorian period was a time when new genres appealed to newly mass audiences.
Poetry was one of the most popular genres of the Victorian period. The Romantic poets,
particularly William Wordsworth (who lived through the beginning of the period, dying in
1850) were revered and widely quoted. The Victorians experimented with narrative poetry,
which tells a story to its audience, including Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s Aurora Leigh
(1856), an entire novel written in verse. The poem tells the story of Aurora Leigh, a woman
who seeks a career as a poet after rejecting an inheritance and a male suitor, and so tells, in
part, the story of Barrett Browning’s own struggles to make her poetic way in the world.
Narrative poetry could also be much shorter, like Christina Rossetti’s “Goblin Market”
(1862), which recounts how a woman is seduced into eating beautiful fruit sold by goblins
and how her sister saves her after she sickens.
Victorian poets also developed a new form called the dramatic monologue, in which a
speaker recites the substance of the poem to an audience within the poem itself. Robert
Browning’s “My Last Duchess” (1842), in which the Duke of Ferrara describes how he
(probably) killed his last wife to the man who is arranging his next marriage, is one of the
most famous examples of a dramatic monologue. Alfred, Lord Tennyson also used the form
in “Ulysses” (1842), in which Ulysses recounts his reasons for setting out on a last voyage to
the men with whom he will sail.
Tennyson also wrote lyric, or non-narrative poetry, including what is perhaps the most
famous poem of the Victorian era, In Memoriam A. H. H. (1849). Tennyson wrote this book-
length sequence of verses to commemorate the death of his close friend Arthur Henry
Hallam. The poem contains some of the most famous lines in literature, including “’Tis better
to have loved and lost/Than never to have loved at all,” and was widely quoted in the
Victorian period.
 Poets like Tennyson, the Browning’s, and Rossetti frequently wrote poetry in order to create
a powerful emotional effect on the reader, but some Victorian poets also wrote simply to
entertain. Lewis Carroll and Edward Lear wrote nonsense or light verse, a genre that plays
with sounds and rhythm in melodious ways. Famous examples include Carroll’s
“Jabberwocky” (1871), a poem that uses many invented words to narrate the killing of a
monster called the Jabberwock, and Lear’s “The Owl and the Pussycat” (1871), which
describes the adventures of the title characters.
Although different kinds of realism (see below) dominated the novel in the Victorian period,
the eighteenth-century tradition of the Gothic lived on, particularly in Charlotte Brontë’s Jane
Eyre (1847). Jane Eyre uses many Gothic conventions: a young, pure female heroine; a
sinister house filled with mysteries; and a handsome, brooding older man – but within a
Victorian frame. Jane Eyre must make her own way in the world as a governess, and must
also pursue what is right for her despite Victorian gender and class conventions.
Jane Eyre uses some Gothic tropes, but sensation fiction (so named because its suspenseful
plots inspired dangerous “sensations” in readers) more fully embraced the surprise and horror
typical of the Gothic. Sensation fiction typically centers on deception and bigamy, in which
men or women are lured into fake marriages – and worse. Wilkie Collins’ The Woman in
White (1859), which tells the story of two women who look strangely alike and are
substituted for each other at various points, is perhaps the most famous example. Mary
Elizabeth Braddon’s Lady Audley’s Secret (1862), in which a supposedly deranged woman
tries to kill her husband after he realizes that she has married another man, also shocked
Victorian readers.
One of the aims of sensation fiction was to surprise and trouble readers by challenging social
conventions, but another Victorian genre, melodrama, achieved popularity by upholding
popular values. Melodramas divide characters starkly into those who are vicious and those
who are virtuous. They evoke emotion in readers and viewers by making virtuous characters
the subject of vicious plots. These were some of the most popular theatrical productions of
the period. Although poetry and plays were important in Victorian cultural life, the period is
known as the great age of the novel. The serial form of publishing, in which instalments of a
novel were release dat regular intervals, encouraged engaged audiences. Victorian books are
also famously long. In part, this was because improvements in papermaking and printing
technology made printing books much cheaper. The rise of lending libraries, which would
individually lend out volumes of a book (a book like Jane Eyre was a “triple decker,” or had
three volumes) also contributed to the great length of Victorian novels. A three-volume book
could be read by three readers at the same time, while a one-volume book could only be read
by one. Lending libraries made more money on triple Deckers, and their encouragement
helped that form become dominant in the Victorian marketplace.
Realism, which aims to portray realistic events happening to realistic people in a realistic
way, was the dominant narrative mode of the Victorian novel – but it had many variants.
 MY LAST DUCHESS Robert Browning
Robert Browning was born in the comparatively rural parish of Camberwell on May 7, 1812.
His father was in the Bank of England. He was a man of more than ordinary culture and
originality of mind, who possessed a liberty of six thousand volumes. The poet’s mother was
a Scotch. He was influenced by Keats, Shelly and Byron. It was in 1845 that Browning met
his future wife. Elizabeth Moulton Barrett (1806-1816), herself a poet of high rank, know
already as the author of The Seraphim, 1838, and poems, 1844.At the age of twenty, the
young poet wrote his first printed Poem-Pauline: a Fragment of a Confession, which was
published in January 1835.
The style of the Monologue is dense and epigrammatic. The line, “all smiles stopped
together”, is a concentrated expression of a whole life’s tragedy. But despite this density and
concentration, the poem is lucid and clear. IT is entirely free from the usual faults of
Browning. No doubt, there are a few parentheses, but they do not come in the way of
understanding. The poem is written in Heroic couplets, but as the sense runs on from one line
to another, the readers are hardly conscious of the rhyme.
CONTEXT OF THE POEM: Phelps regards it as “one of the finest dramatic monologues,
not only of Browning, but in the whole range of English literature”. The speaker is the Duke
of Ferrara, an important city of Italy. It was an important culture centre during the
Renaissance. Whether the character of the Duke in the Monologue is based on some actual
historical figure or not, there can be no denying the fact that in the Monologue, the poet has
captured the very spirit of Renaissance Italy, its intrigues, its sensuality, its greed, as well as
its cultural and artistic activity. My Last Duchess was first published in the volume of poems
called Dramatic Lyrics, in 1842. It was republished in the Dramatic Romances of 1865. It is a
dramatic monologue. Borrowing’s monologues grow out of some ‘crisis’ or ‘critical situation’
in the life of principal figure, and embody the reaction of that figure to the particular
situation. In his monologue generally, the speaker refers to other character or characters, and
in this way reveals not only his character but that of other also. Thus, the present monologue
is a remarkable piece of character-study not only of the Duke but also of his last Duchess, and
the messenger of the neighbouring Count forms the listener and the interlocutor.

BRIEF SUMMARY:
The Duke of Ferrara. A powerful, proud, and hard-hearted Italian Duke of the 16thcentury
has been widowed recently. He intends to marry a second time. The messenger of a powerful
Count, who has his estate in the neighbourhood, comes to the Duke’s palace to negotiate with
him the marriage of the Count’s daughter. The Duke takes him round his picture gallery and
shows to him the portrait of his last Duchess. The portrait is life-like and realistic, and the
Duke, who is a great lover of the fine arts, is justly proud of it.
The Duke points out the portrait to the messenger and tells him that he alone uncovers the
picture and nobody else is allowed to do so. At this point, the Duke notice an inquiring look
in the eyes of the messenger and at once understands that he wants to know the cause of the
deep, passionate look in the eyes of the Duchess, and proceeds to satisfy his curiosity. In this
way Browning turns the monologue into a colloquy. The inquiring looks, a big question mark,
and provide the speaker with an occasion for explanation and self-analysis. In this way, much
valuable light is thrown on character, and much that is past and dead is brought to life.
In response to the inquiring look of the messenger, the Duke tells him that the deep passion in
the eyes of the Duchess does not result from any sex-intrigue or futility love. He did not give
her any occasion to be unfaithful to him. Even the portrait on the wall was done not by an
ordinary artist, but by a monk, and he was allowed only one day to do it. He did not allow the
Monk any longer time, for he did not want to provide them any occasion for intimacy. This
shows that the Duke is a jealous tyrant and the poor Duchess could not have enjoyed any
freedom of movements as the wife of such a man. Continuing further with his explanation,
the Duke tells the envoy that his last Duchess had very childish and foolish nature. She was
pleased with trifles, would thank others for even the slightest service they happened to render
to her, and had no sense of dignity and decorum. For example, the faint blush of joy on her
cheek and neck was not caused by the presence of her husband alone. If the painter happened
to mention that her cloak covered her wrist too much, or that paint could never hope to
capture the light pink glow on her throat, she would take such chance remarks as
compliments and blush with pleasure. She would had a childish heart, and was pleased too
easily by such trifles as the gift of a branch laden with cheerier, the beautiful sunset, or the
mule presented to her by someone for her rides round the terrace.
She would blush with pleasure at such trifles, just as much as she would blush at some costly
ornament presented by him. She was the wife of a Duke who belonged to an ancient family,
nine-hundred-year-old. But she considered even this gift of his at par with the trifling services
rendered to her by others. As a matter of fact, she had no discriminations, and no sense of
dignity and decorum. She smiled at everybody without any distinction; she thanked
everybody in the same way. He expected better sense from his wife. He did not correct her,
for even to notice such frivolity would have meant loss of dignity, and he did not like to
suffer this loss. Besides, she would have argued and discussed with him, instead of listening
to his advice. Her habit of smiling continued to grow till it became intolerable to him. At last
he gave orders, and “Then all smiles stooped together”. The line has been left intentionally
enigmatic; we cannot say for certain how the smiling stopped. But, most probably, the poor,
innocent Duchess was murdered at the command of her brutal and stony-hearted husband.
The Duke then asks the messenger to come down, where the other guests of his are waiting.
In passing, he tells the messenger that he would expect a rich dowry from his master, the
Count, though, of course, he adds very cleverly, his primary concern is the daughter, and not
the dowry. The Duke is not only hypocrite of the first water. The only good point about him is
his love of art. As they go down the stairs, he asks the messenger to have a good look at the
bronze statue of Neptune, the sea-god. In this status, the god is shown riding and controlling a
sea-horse. It was done specially for him by the great sculptor, Claus of Innsbruck. It is the
name of an imaginary artist invented to impress the messenger; just as earlier he had invented
the name of the painter, Fra Pandolf.

THE THEMES OF BROWNING POETRY:

Browning's interests were wide and varied, but primarily he was a poet of Man. His business
was, “soul-dissection”. Poet selects a wide variety of human types belonging to different
professions, ages and countries. This explains the wide variety of subjects which Browning
treats of in his poetry. Crimes, art, love, religion, philosophy, Nature, human personality, etc.,
are the main themes of Borrowing’s poetry. He is interested in all of them because they
enable him to study the human soul from various angles, and reveal its many facets. Human
soul is studied in the most varied, the most poignant, and the most unusual situations.
“Browing’s is not the drama of the importance until it is transformed into a form influencing
mind and character”. Sexual love considered as a passion has two aspects- it is spiritual as
well as physical.
Browning differs from the other Victorians who recoiled from the flesh and looked upon it as
an obstacle in the way of the development of the human soul. It is a measure of his realism
that he does not is regard claims of the body; rather he regards physical passion as essential
for a happy married life, and as a means to spiritual development. His concern is with the
harmonious development of human personality. If Browning had any special love for any
country, it was Italy, and more specially the Italy of the Renaissance. “Perhaps no English
poet ever knew any foreign country so well, as Browning knew Italy, certainly none has
dedicated more of his best work to a land which was not his own”. Browning had a great love
of nature, and his description of nature have an essentially Italian inspiration. His landscape is
real and actual, and they are always landscapes with human figures. Browning cannot keep
his human interests out of his poetry for any length of time. Nature serves as a landscape in
Grammarian’s Funeral, and Caliban upon Setebos. His theory of the relationship of Man, God
and Nature, is that nature has no vital sympathy for man, no message and neither is she a
refuge for broken spirits. Religions too, finds a prominent place in the poetry of Browning. It
was a subject and several of his poems deal with the theme of religion.

DRAMATIC MONOLOGUE:
Browning's genius was essentially dramatic. His dramatic bent of mind is seen in his
characterisation, and in the unfolding of strong dramatic situations. He also considered the
drama as the highest form of expression. His first play Strafford was produced in 1837, and
the last In a Balcony in 1844.As Hugh Walker points out, “Browning did not invent the
dramatic monologue, but he made it specially his own, and no one else has ever put such rich
and varied material into it”. With all, ‘external machinery’ of action and plot, and concentrate
his attention on, “the incident in the development of a soul”. The Dramatic Monologue is,’
dramatic’, because it is the utterance of imaginary characters and not of the poet himself, and
because in it character is developed not through any description on the part of the poet but,
through a conflict between the opposite thoughts and emotions of the character himself.
It is a ‘monologue’, because it is a conversation of a single individual with himself (Mono
means ‘one’ and ‘loge’ means conversation). The form is also referred to as monodrama.
Walter Pater has called the poetry of Browning, “the poetry of situation”. A power of
conceiving subtle mental complexities with clearness, and of expressing them in a
picturesque form and in perfect lyric language. Each poem renders a single mood, and
renders it completely. But it is still only a mood; My Last Duchess is a life. The poem is a
subtle study in the jealousy of egoism-not a study so much as creation; and it places before
us, a typical Duke of the Renaissance. The dramatic monologue is brought to perfection and
they must be entirely objective. Browning’s monologues grow out of some ‘crisis’ or ‘critical
situation’ in the life of the principal figure, and embody the reaction of that figure to the
particular situation. In his monologues generally, the speaker refers to other character or
characters, and in this way reveals not only his character but that of others also. The presence
of some listener or interlocutor is also implied. Thus, the present monologue is a remarkable
piece of character-study not only of the Duke but also of his last Duchess, and the messenger
of the neighbouring Count forms the listener and the interlocutor.

1. Alliteration: Occurs when the poet uses the same consonant sound at the beginning of
words. For example, “look” and “looked” in line twenty-four.
2. Caesura: Seen through pauses the poet uses in the middle of lines. For example:
“Somehow—I know not how—as if she ranked.”
3. Enjambment: Seen through line breaks. For example, the transition between lines two and
three as well as lines five and six.

“My Last Duchess” Introduction

o “My Last Duchess” is a dramatic monologue written by Victorian poet Robert
Browning in 1842. In the poem, the Duke of Ferrara uses a painting of his
former wife as a conversation piece. The Duke speaks about his former wife's
perceived inadequacies to a representative of the family of his bride-to-be,
revealing his obsession with controlling others in the process. Browning uses
this compelling psychological portrait of a despicable character to critique the
objectification of women and abuses of power.

Themes:

The Objectification of Women: “My Last Duchess” is a dramatic monologue in which the
Duke of Ferrara tells the messenger of his potential wife’s family about his previous wife, the
“last” duchess of the poem's title. Using a painting of that former duchess as a conversation
piece, he describes what he saw as her unfaithfulness, frivolity, and stubbornness, and implies
that he prefers her as a painting rather than as a living woman. Throughout the poem, the
duke reveals his belief that women are objects to be controlled, possessed, and discarded. In
many ways, this reflects the thinking of Browning’s own era, when Victorian social norms
denied women the right to be fully independent human beings. Through this portrayal of the
duke, Browning critiques such a viewpoint, presenting sexism and objectification as
dehumanizing processes that rob women of their full humanity.
The duke’s treatment of the painting reflects his treatment of women as objects to be owned.
His description of the painting as a “piece” and a “wonder” portrays it as a work of art rather
than a testament to a former love. By repeating the name of the painter (the famous “Fra
Pandolf) three times in the first 16 lines of the poem, he again implies that he values the
painting because of its status as an object that shows off his (that is, the duke's) wealth and
clout. The painting is meant to aggrandize the duke rather than honor the woman it portrays.
This is made even clearer by the fact that the duke has placed this painting in a public area of
his palace so he can proudly display it to guests, whom he invites to “sit and look at her”
much like a museum curator would direct visitors to a famous work of art in a gallery. Such
an attitude is reflected yet again when he tells the messenger that the Count’s “fair daughter’s
self [… is his] object”: he intends to make his new bride another one of his possessions.
Women, in the duke’s mind, are simply ornamental objects for men rather than actual people
in their own right.

The poem thus implies that the duke finds his former wife’s actions unforgivable because
they reflected her status as an independent person rather than an inanimate possession. Her
crimes appear to be not sexual or romantic infidelity, but rather being happy (“too soon made
glad,”), appreciative of others (she considered the duke’s “gift of a nine-hundred-years-old
name / With anybody’s gift”), self-confident (she wouldn’t “let / Herself be lessoned”), and
willing to stand up for herself (she “plainly set / Her wits to [his]”). The duke, however,
appears to believe that a husband owns his wife, and therefore has the right to dictate her
feelings and to be the sole recipient of her happiness, kindness, and respect; any indication
that she has thoughts or feelings of her own are unacceptable.

Ultimately, the poem heavily implies that the duke was so vexed by the idea that his former
wife had an inner life of her own that he had the "last duchess" killed. Of course, the duke
avoids explicitly confessing to assassinating his wife, and Browning himself allegedly once
said in an interview that the duke may have simply had her sent to a convent. Regardless, the
outcome is the same: there is no “last duchess” present in the poem to speak for herself and
give her side of the story. The poem thus underscores how objectifying women ultimately
silences them, robbing them of their voices and autonomy.
Social Status, Art, and Elitism: Though the poem doesn't outright condemn the duke, it
does suggest that he's a brutish figure whose social status is in no way a reflection of any sort
of moral worth. The duke repeatedly draws his guest's attention to his wealth and power, and
issues veiled threats about what happens to those who don’t put a high enough price on his
social standing. Through the duke, the poem takes a subtle jab at the snobbery of the upper
class, suggesting the shallowness of an elitist society that bestows respect based on things
like having a good family name or owning fancy artwork. Instead, the poem reveals the
various ways in which powerful men like the duke may use such markers of status simply to
manipulate—and dominate—those around them.

The duke repeatedly reminds the messenger of the power in his title. He does this in part by
mentioning the famous artists (Fra Pandolf and Claus of Innsbruck) who created works
especially for him, but also by mentioning his “nine-hundred-years-old name.” The duke then
moves quickly from intimidation to intimated threats when he hints that he had his former
wife killed for not valuing his status sufficiently: he objects that she “ranked" his "nine-
hundred-years-old name / With anybody’s gift” and so he “gave commands” that "stopped"
her "smiles."

Since the duke and his potential father-in-law, the Count, are about to sit down to discuss the
fiancée’s dowry, they will put a price on exactly how much his name is worth. Consequently,
the duke’s claim that the Count’s generosity is “ample warrant”—that the Count will give
him a substantial amount of money for the daughter’s dowry—can actually be read as a
veiled threat: the duke implies that, if the in-laws want their daughter to live, they will value
his name and pay him a large sum.

Immediately before beginning negotiations with the prospective in-laws, the duke also tells
the emissary to admire a statue of Neptune “taming a sea-horse,” made by a famous sculptor.
The duke emphasis the statue's aesthetic merit as a means of imbuing himself with more
importance: the statue is a "rarity" and was created just for him.

This moment has nothing to do with the duke emphasizing his refined tastes and his
appreciation of art. Instead, again, it serves as a warning: Neptune was the Roman god of the
sea, and the statue depicts this god forcefully subduing a creature who challenged him. By
drawing the emissary’s attention to this statue before the negotiation, the duke implies that he
himself is a godlike figure like Neptune, who will tame the emissary and the Count just as he
did the former duchess. The trappings of upper-class status are again mainly a means for the
duke to bully people.

The duke's seemingly refined manner and opulent surroundings are thus no indication that
he's any better than those with lesser means—or that he's even a decent person at all. Through
this depiction, the poem offers a subtle rebuke of elitism and the upper class. To men like the
duke, beauty is not something to be valued and appreciated; instead, it is only something to
dominate.

Control and Manipulation: Closely tied to the duke's repeated emphasis on his social status
and his objectification of women is his clear desire for control. By treating women as objects
to be possessed, the duke can more readily dominate them; similarly, by drawing attention to
his title and social clout, the duke can intimidate others into following his commands. Yet the
poem also draws attention to quieter forms of control, as the duke dictates everything from
the flow of conversation with his guest to the choreography of the scene itself. Through these
forms of asserting dominance, the poem suggests the power—and danger—of such
inconspicuous manipulation, which is made all the more insidious by its subtly.

The duke uses his social status—indicated by his ancient name and opulent artwork—to
intimidate and threaten his guest. More discreetly, however, Browning also shows the duke
controlling the conversation via its physical setting. The duke has staged the area with the
duchess’s painting: the painting is behind a curtain so he can limit who can view it, thereby
reminding his audience that he can give and take away whatever he wants. He has also placed
a seat in front of the painting so he can command visitors to sit while he tells the story of his
former wife, a power dynamic that literally elevates him above anyone else in the room.

The duke likewise controls the flow of the conversation. He never gives the messenger a
chance to speak, and once goes so far as to pretend that the messenger has asked a question
(“not the first / Are you to turn and ask thus”) even though the messenger himself remains
silent. This action gives the messenger the illusion of being an active participant in the
conversation without having any actual agency in it whatsoever.
Most intriguingly, there is nothing improvisatory about the duke’s words, even when he trips
over them. He comments that “strangers” who have seen the painting have asked him about
the former duchess’s expression, and that the messenger is “not the first” to inquire. The
duke’s insistence that others have asked about the duchess’s expression suggests that he has
given this spiel about his wife’s supposedly inappropriate behavior to others. It is hard to
believe, therefore that his interjections about his inarticulateness (“how shall I say?” or
“somehow—I know not how”) are genuine hesitations: if he has given this speech before,
then presumably he knows what to say and how. In other words, his actions contradict his
stated lack of expertise. The improvised nature of the duke’s speech, then, with its self-
interruptions and hesitations, might all be an act. He is so committed to controlling others that
he seemingly rehearses even his moments of self-deprecation and seeming uncertainty. He
says he doesn't have any "skill in speech"—meaning he's not a good talker—but this clearly
isn't the case.

Poetic Devices:
Enjambment: Browning's use of enjambment makes the poem sound conversational. It tends
to obscure where one line ends and another begins, which subtly deemphasizes the meter,
rhyme scheme, and number of feet in the line.

This poem uses predominantly enjambed lines throughout in part to reflect the fact that it is a
dramatic monologue, and therefore is understood as being spoken to a listener. Again, the
free-flowing lines suggest a conversational tone. They also suggest that the duke likes to hear
himself talk, as his speech spills over from one line to the next offering no chance for his
guest to voice any interruptions. Enjambment thus allows the duke to control the conversation
and reflects his need to dominate and manipulate those around him.

Historical Context
Browning wrote this poem during the Victorian Era, which encompassed the second half of
the 19th century during the reign of Queen Victoria in England. The Victorians were
fascinated with the Italian Renaissance, including its poetic forms, music, architecture, and
culture. The Renaissance, which extended from roughly the 14th to the early 17th century,
placed an emphasis on humanism, individualism, the arts, and science—all of which
particularly appealed to a Victorian society that was making scientific and artistic advances of
its own.
The Renaissance also was a time when some elite and wealthy families served as patrons of
artists, supporting their favorites' artistic endeavors. In a way, the poem critiques such patrons
as perhaps being more concerned with the social clout conferred by being associated with
certain artists than they were with the actual artwork itself. In other words, it suggests that
some patrons just wanted to seem cool and influential by supporting artists, but didn't actually
appreciate their art.
This poem focuses on a real historical patron of the arts—the Duke of Ferrara. Also known as
Alfonso II d'Este, the Duke of Ferrara was an actual historical figure who lived in Italy in the
late 1500s. Like the speaker, Alfonso II had multiple wives, the first of which died very
young and after only a few years of marriage.

INTRODUCTION TO THE POEM "The Last Duchess" is a dramatic monologue that was
first published in 1842 as part of Browning's collection "Dramatic Lyrics". The speaker of the
poem is the Duke of Ferrara, who is speaking to an emissary of the Count of Tyrol. The Duke
is showing the emissary a portrait of his late wife, the last Duchess, and commenting on her
behavior and character. Through the Duke's words, we get a glimpse into his twisted mind
and the events that led to the Duchess' death.

Themes
While knowing the poem is important, you also need to be able to show the examiner that
you can write an informed, personal response. Therefore, you need to develop a solid
understanding of the theme, main ideas and events depicted.
It is still important to have an awareness of background information that is relevant to the
themes in the poem, even though you are not explicitly assessed on context. This can help
you develop a sustained, critical understanding of the text
To help you do this, the section below has been divided into two main themes that Browning
explores in 'My Last Duchess Ferrara':
• Social criticism
• Sexism and oppression
Social criticism
• 'My Last Duchess Ferrara' is set in Italy during the Italian Renaissance
• At this time in Italy, art was heavily valued
o The artists and the artwork mentioned in the poem, as well as the Duke
himself, are fictional
o However, it is likely that the character of the Duke was based on Alfonso II,
the fifth Duke of Ferrara
o His wife died in suspicious circumstances
 • Browning was born in London, but spent most of his life in Italy
o Changing the setting of the poem allowed him to better disguise his criticism
of society
Sexism and oppression
• The poem was written at the start of the Victorian era, during the Industrial
Revolution
• This was a period when society was starting to change
• Women were starting to demand equality and it saw the beginning of
the suffrage movement
o In the 1800s, when a woman married, she became the legal property of her
husband
o The only way for a woman to gain status or influence was via her husband
o This is shown in the poem through the Duke’s “gift of a nine-hundred-years-
old-name”
o It was also believed that women were incapable of rational thought
o This is reflected in the line “I choose never to stoop”
o This suggests there is no point in arguing with a woman as she cannot
understand
o The poem can therefore be considered a criticism of Victorian attitudes
towards women and their effort to suppress female sexuality
• Browning was a liberal, who married for love
o His wife was also a well-respected poet in her own right
• Victorian Britain was also very modest and traditional
o It could be argued that the Duke’s obsession with controlling and ultimately
“fixing” his wife’s behaviour reflects Victorian society’s obsession with the
reputation of women remaining perfect
• Furthermore, the conflict in the poem displays itself not only in the power the Duke
has over the Duchess’s life, but also between how the Duke presents himself to the
outside world versus his true character
o Conflict arose when the Duke realised that he ultimately couldn’t control the
Duchess’s behaviour in line with his expectations of a wife
o He retaliated by killing her, which is an abuse of his power and control
o This also demonstrates how easily those in power can lose control
Structure and Form:
‘My Last Duchess‘ by Robert Browning(Bio | Poems) is a dramatic monologue written in five
sections and made up of rhyming couplets. The poem is written mostly in iambic pentameter.
This means that the lines contain five sets of two beats, the first of which is unstressed and
the second of which is stressed. There are a few examples of trochees and other stresses.
Consider the final line of the poem as an example of iambic pentameter. It reads: “Which
Claus of Innsbruck cast in bronze for me!”

Literary Devices:

• Alliteration: occurs when the poet uses the same consonant sound at the beginning of
words. For example, “look” and “looked” in line twenty-four.
• Caesura: seen through pauses the poet uses in the middle of lines. For example:
“Somehow—I know not how—as if she ranked.”
• Enjambment: seen through line breaks. For example, the transition between lines two
and three as well as lines five and six.
 Christina Rossetti’s Goblin Market
Christina Rossetti’s Goblin Market is a narrative poem that is often studied for its rich imagery,
themes, and its use of Victorian symbolism. If you're preparing for a study or essay on Goblin
Market for your undergraduate studies, I can offer some insights on its key themes, characters,
and literary devices to help with your understanding. Here’s a brief overview:
Summary:
Goblin Market is a fantastical poem that centers on two sisters, Laura and Lizzie, who
encounter goblin merchants selling magical, forbidden fruits. Laura succumbs to temptation
and buys the fruit, but soon falls into a state of despair. Her sister Lizzie, who resists the goblins’
temptation, saves Laura by undergoing a trial and ultimately revives her through an act of
sacrifice.
Themes:
1. Temptation and Desire: The goblin merchants symbolize temptation, and the fruits
they offer represent earthly desires. Laura’s fall is a metaphor for succumbing to
temptations that can lead to ruin.
2. Sisterhood and Sacrifice: The relationship between Laura and Lizzie is central to the
poem. Lizzie’s selfless act of saving her sister highlights the power of familial love and
sacrifice. Lizzie’s act of resistance and sacrifice can also be interpreted as a form of
redemption.
3. Sexuality and Purity: The poem contains subtle sexual imagery, particularly in the
descriptions of the fruit and the interactions between the goblins and the sisters. This
has often been analyzed in feminist and psychoanalytic readings of the text. The fruit
can symbolize sexual allure, and Laura's indulgence and subsequent suffering reflect
the consequences of giving in to temptation.
4. Victorian Morality and the Fall from Innocence: The poem also reflects the Victorian
concerns with morality, particularly the dangers of sexual temptation and the
consequences of losing innocence. Lizzie, who remains pure, is ultimately rewarded,
while Laura’s fall leads to a period of suffering before redemption.
5. Economic Exchange and Consumerism: The poem also critiques the
commodification of desires. The goblins’ trade of fruit for gold coins can be seen as a
metaphor for consumerism, with Laura paying a high price for momentary pleasure.
Literary Devices:
• Alliteration and Assonance: Rossetti uses repetition of consonant and vowel sounds
to create musicality, rhythm, and emphasis. This is especially prominent in the goblins'
chants and the descriptions of the fruits.
• Imagery: The poem is rich in vivid, often lush descriptions of the fruits, the goblins,
and the sisters. The imagery of the fruit is particularly potent, suggesting sensual
pleasure and the danger that lies within indulgence.
 • Symbolism: The goblins themselves symbolize temptation, while the fruit represents
the allure of forbidden pleasures. Lizzie’s resistance is symbolic of virtue and moral
strength.
• Allegory: Goblin Market can be read as an allegory about temptation, sin, and
redemption, with each character and event representing a larger moral or philosophical
point.
Key Passages for Analysis:
• The descriptions of the fruit and its intoxicating effect on Laura.
• Lizzie’s struggle to resist the goblins and the vivid imagery of her transformation.
• The final scenes where Lizzie saves Laura through her selfless actions.
Possible Analytical Approaches:
1. Feminist Reading: Explore the roles of women in the poem, focusing on the contrast
between Laura's fall and Lizzie’s resistance. Consider how female sexuality, morality,
and sisterhood are depicted.
2. Psychoanalytic Reading: Focus on the themes of desire and the unconscious,
interpreting the fruit and the goblins as representations of repressed desires, or using
Freudian analysis to explore the psychological implications of the poem.
3. Victorian Social Criticism: Analyse how Rossetti critiques Victorian societal norms,
especially in terms of gender roles, morality, and consumerism.

Brief Biography of Christina Rossetti:

Christina Georgina Rossetti was born into an artistic, well-educated Italian-English

family. Her father was a political exile, poet, and translator, and her maternal uncle,

John Polidori, was a writer and physician to the famous Romantic poet Lord Byron.

Rossetti was educated at home by her mother, Frances, who was devoutly religious

and influenced her daughter’s lifelong devotion to the Anglican faith. Despite the

family’s literary connections, they were relatively poor. Like many young women in

her position, Rossetti prepared to become a governess (one of the few “respectable”

occupations for women at the time), but poor health prevented her from teaching. The

Rossetti household was intensely creative and artistic. All three of her siblings were

writers, and her brother, Dante Gabriel, helped found the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood,

one of the most influential artistic movements of the Victorian period. Although not

an official member, Rossetti collaborated with the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood,

 contributing poetry to their journal, The Germ, under the pen name Ellen Alleyn, and

modelling for their paintings. Rossetti’s early poetry—influenced by Romantic

literature as well as her own ill health—focused on themes of love and death. As her

family’s financial situation worsened and her health deteriorated, Rossetti grew more

devoutly religious. Choosing to remain single, she led a relatively restricted life

devoted to poetry, religion, and companionship with her mother and aunts. Between

1859 and 1870, Rossetti volunteered with the Church Penitentiary Movement, which

offered a home, religious instruction, and training to women who were formerly

prostitutes. The experience influenced her thoughts about fallen women and may have

influenced “Goblin Market,” which she published in 1862. Rossetti was a prolific

writer. She published several more collections of poetry, devotional works, and short

stories, and contributed to magazines and charity publications. During her lifetime,

Rossetti had an excellent literary reputation in both the U.S. and the UK, where she

was considered as a possible candidate for Poet Laureate following Tennyson’s death

in 1892. Rossetti died in 1894, and today she is recognized as one of the finest poets

of the nineteenth century.

Early Life and Education

Christina Rossetti was born on December 5, 1830, in London, England, to a family of

intellectuals and writers. The youngest of four children, her siblings were Maria Francesca,

Gabriel Charles Dante (better known as famous painter and poet Dante Gabriel), and William

Michael. An appreciation for literature and the arts was cultivated from their childhood into

adulthood. All four Rossetti children eventually gained success in artistic careers.

Her mother, Frances Polidori, was of English and Italian ancestry. Frances was trained as a

governess and educated the children at home. The texts she favored for her children were

religious ones, including John Bunyan's The Pilgrim's Progress (1678), the Bible, and

didactic stories such as those written by Anglo-Irish author Maria Edgeworth (1767–1849).

Once the children were reading on their own, they discovered Gothic literature, including
English authors Ann Radcliffe (1764–1823) and Matthew Gregory ("Monk") Lewis (1775–

1818), as well as fantastic tales such as The Arabian Nights, which has a publication history

dating back to the 9th century, and Thomas Keightley's The Fairy Mythology (1828). These

influences clearly appear in Rossetti's poetry; "Goblin Market" in particular is rife with both

religious and fantastical imagery.

Her father, Gabriele Rossetti, was an exiled Italian poet and Dante scholar. A year after her

birth, her father became the chair of the Italian department at King's College in London. Her

uncle John William Polidori is famous for writing what is arguably the first published

vampire short story in English, "The Vampyre" (1819). Another influence in Rossetti's

childhood was the time spent in her grandfather's cottage at Holmer Green. There, according

to a March 1884 letter, she could "prowl all alone about [her] grandfather's cottage-grounds."

Likewise, her parents' shift to an Anglo-Catholic faith, as part of the Tractarian/Oxford

Movement (1840s), proved to be foundational in Rossetti's upbringing.

Writing Career and the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood

By the young age of 16, Rossetti had already written the poems that would be privately

published as Verses in 1847. These poems were well received, including a poem called "The

Dead City," which critics see as anticipatory of the style of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood

(PRB). The Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood was founded in 1848 by three artists, including

William Holman Hunt (1827–1910), John Everett Millais (1829–96), and Christina's brother

Dante Gabriel Rossetti. They invited others to join them, including Dante and Christina's

brother William Michael Rossetti, who became the secretary of the PRB (the name they

chose for themselves). The ideals of this group of artists would spread to literature, and the

group would expand to include Christina Rossetti. Her next seven published poems were

released in the PRB journal, The Germ (1850). She was the only female artist published

by The Germ although others were associated with the movement.

Rossetti also sat as a model for two of her brother Dante's paintings: The Girlhood of Mary

Virgin (1848–1849) and Ecce Ancilla Domini! (1850). Both paintings depict her in the

familiar Pre-Raphaelite style.

Rossetti's work was also published in 1861 in Macmillan's Magazine. The Macmillan firm

purchased and published her first commercial collection, Goblin Market and Other Poems, in

1862. The collection was widely reviewed, and numerous critics declared it a success,

including The London Review (April 1862), The Spectator (April 1862), The

Athenaeum (April 1862), The Saturday Review (May 1862), The Eclectic Review (June

1862), and The British Quarterly Review (July 1862).

Rossetti continued to publish in magazines, notably in two feminist journals—The English

Woman's Journal and Victoria Magazine—as well as in Macmillan's Magazine. A second

poetry collection, The Prince's Progress and Other Poems (1866), followed. It received a less

exuberant response than her Goblin Market and Other Poems.

Rossetti's third collection, Commonplace and Other Short Stories, was published in 1870.

This time, she opted to publish with F.S. Ellis, who was also Dante's publisher. The book was

not well received. A fourth collection, Sing-Song and Other Nursery Rhymes, followed in

1872. This illustrated collection of poems for children published by Routledge was positively

received.

In 1874 Rossetti published the first of six volumes of devotional writing, Annus Domini: A

Prayer for Each Day of the Year, Founded on a Text of Holy Scripture. The same

year, Speaking Likenesses was published, and several devotional works followed. Her third

commercial collection, A Pageant and Other Poems, was published in 1880.

Romantic Life

Another aspect of Rossetti's life was altered by the PRB: she met and became engaged to

PRB member James Collinson (1825–81). Though she rejected his first proposal in 1848
because he had left high Anglicanism and converted to Catholicism, Rossetti accepted a later

proposal after he reverted to the Church of England. The engagement ended in 1850,

however, when he again returned to Catholicism.

In 1866 a second suitor proposed to Rossetti. Charles Bagot Cayley was a Dante scholar who

had begun to study with her father in 1847. The exact reasons for Rossetti's refusal of

Cayley's proposal are unclear beyond an assertion by her brother William, who wrote that

"religious faith" was the reason she did not marry him. Despite her rejection of him, Rossetti

remained close to Cayley and was executor of his literary estate when he died in 1883.

Service Work

In 1954 Rossetti volunteered to be a nurse during the Crimean War, but she was turned down.

Her aunt Eliza Polidori was accepted. Rossetti briefly stood in for her aunt. Her most

significant service work, however, was with the St. Mary Magdalene Penitentiary in Highgate

(often known simply as Highgate House). Her work there began in 1859, and evidence of her

strong devotion to these so-called "fallen women"—women who had sexual encounters

outside of marriage, including seduction, rape, adultery, and prostitution— appears in

numerous texts, including "Goblin Market."

Death and Legacy

In 1892 Rossetti was diagnosed with breast cancer and had a mastectomy. The cancer

returned, and she died December 29, 1894. Her contributions to literature were not limited to

her lifetime. Scholarly work on Rossetti's writing saw a resurgence in the 1980s and

continues today.

Historical Context of Goblin Market:

During the nineteenth century, there were strict societal expectations about women’s behavior.
These rules were particularly rigid when it came to expressions of sexuality. There was a
distinct sexual double standard, and women suffered much more serious consequences for their
sexual actions than did men. In part, this was because many Victorians believed that women
were morally superior to men, so a sexual “transgression” marked them out as bad and
irredeemable. Women were expected to remain virgins until they married, be faithful
throughout marriage, and avoid the appearance of being interested in sex. If a woman violated
these norms, she might be regarded as “fallen” and lose her reputation (and perhaps even her
home). Men’s sexual behavior was not limited or policed in this way. The term “fallen” itself
could encompass a variety of acts, from engaging in sex outside of marriage, to becoming a
mistress, to prostitution. Husbands could divorce their wives for being unfaithful, and many
works of art and literature from the nineteenth century represented the fallen woman as
abandoned by her family, husband, and lover, contemplating suicide, or even as a corpse. In
“Goblin Market,” Rossetti radically revises these typical fates by allowing her fallen woman,
Laura, to recover through the help and self-sacrifice of her sister, Lizzie.

‘Goblin Market,’ first published in 1862, is deeply entrenched in its time’s concerns,
particularly Victorian society’s gendered rules and aspects and their ramifications in all other
realms. In the Victorian era, the roles of men and women became more defined than ever in the
“separate spheres” of the domestic and the public, wherein women inhabited the domestic and
men the public.
The Victorian idea of the ideal woman, popularly known as “the angel in the house,”
an emblem phrase taken from the title of Coventry Patmore’s poem ‘The Angel in the House,’
aptly presents the model characteristics of a virtuous Victorian woman such as, modest,
domestic, nurturing, selfless, chaste or virgin, fragile, morally upright, well-educated enough
to raise children, and untainted from the morally corrupt public world inhabited by the man.
Women were considered physically inferior and morally superior, and being the moral center
of the “sacred” domestic space, they were responsible for maintaining the morality of the man
of the public world.
Not allowed to continue higher education and with no opportunities in the economic market,
women had no option but to follow the expected path of marriage to raise children (not for
sexual satisfaction) while they were subjected to strict and biased Victorian morality wherein
they were supposed to stay chaste or virgin before marriage and considered almost asexual; Dr.
William Acton famously claimed that “The majority of women (happily for them) are not very
much troubled with sexual feeling of any kind.” Thus, female sexuality was forbidden and
unaccepted, and the women who looked friendly in the company of men, gained higher
education, transgressed the boundaries of domesticity, or rejected the path of marriage were
looked down on or considered “fallen,” as if they had lost their purity; the term “fallen women”
was explicitly used for prostitutes, who were usually women from the lower classes. The figure
of prostitutes threatened Victorian patriarchy by its moral defiance, economic independence,
knowledge of the trade, and an active position in the economic market.
The women who transgressed the moral boundaries were punished and ostracized to die alone.
Moreover, there was a developed campaign wherein prostitutes or women who did not conform
to the moral and sexual norms were subjected to shame, humiliation, and intimidation in
sermons, newspapers, and art. By redeeming Laura, ‘Goblin Market‘ undoes this
predetermined fate of a “fallen” woman. However, men were not subjected to such high
standards of morality and took the services of prostitutes before and even during marriage, for
which women were also held responsible as they couldn’t guard the morality of the man.
Nonetheless, with rising venereal diseases like syphilis, particularly among soldiers, the
Contagious Diseases Act (1864) was passed to curb the disease for which only prostitutes were
held responsible and were forced to undergo medical examinations and were locked in “Lock
Hospital” till they were cured or had completed their sentence; this exposed the society’s
double standards and sparked a campaign against the act which was repealed in 1875. Many
philanthropists and religious organizations established Magdalen asylums, which operated till
the late 20th century, for the rehabilitation and reform of prostitutes or women who were
outcasted for sexual activities before marriage. Charles Dickens also established one Magdalen
asylum called Urania Cottage with Angela Burdett-Coutts. Christina Rossetti was also involved
in the reformation of labeled “fallen women” and volunteered at St Mary Magdalene House
from 1859 until 1870; this experience is considered to have significantly influenced the poem
‘Goblin Market.’

Literary Context
The term “fallen woman,” essentially implying sexual activity outside marriage, prevalent in
the 19th century and used explicitly for prostitutes, extended to define and label any woman
who might have indulged in premarital sex or extramarital sex, who had been coerced and
sexually assaulted, any woman who seemed or appeared to have sexual knowledge or had a
friendly relationship with men, any woman who defied any gendered rules or the confines of
domesticity, or lower-class working women in industrial factories or elsewhere, amid the
patriarchal Victorian morality wherein women’s chastity was highly valued.
The subject of “fallen women” became a typical trope in mainstream 19th-century literature
and art. Many significant artists and authors incorporated this subject in their novels, poetry,
and paintings, often exposing the double standards of Victorian morality while showing the
plight and exploitation of women, particularly the lower class, and the corruption of men who
manipulate, exploit, use, and abandon women.
Significantly, many of the texts, like Elizabeth Gaskell’s Ruth (1853) and Thomas Hardy’s Tess
of the d’Urbervilles (1891), though having a sympathetic portrayal of “fallen women,”
culminate in their death and challenging life as they deal with exploitation, betrayal,
humiliation, raising children, societal judgment, ostracization, etc; it is this predetermined fate
of “fallen women” which ‘Goblin Market‘ challenges and changes by saving Laura, and
showing her as equal and similar to Lizzie even after eating the fruits implying absence of
moral judgment or commentary. Thus, ‘Goblin Market‘ is considered radical in its treatment
of “fallen women” by rejecting the typical fates of death, struggle, exile, and moral judgment
while offering a domestic life akin to the “pure” Lizzie.
Other significant texts concerning the subject of “fallen women” include Charles
Dicken’s David Copperfield (1850) and Bleak House (1852), George Eliot’s Adam
Bede (1859), Leo Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina (1873), George Moore’s Esther Waters (1894),
etc.; some significant poems include, Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s ‘Aurora Leigh‘ (1856),
Thomas Hardy’s ‘The Ruined Maid‘ (written in 1866, first published in 1901), Thomas Hood’s
‘The Bridge of Sighs‘ (1844), etc.
Notably, the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, a group of significant painters, poets, and artists, co-
founded by Christina Rossetti’s brother, Dante Gabriel Rossetti, focused on the classical revival
of art and inspiration from medieval Italian paintings and lush nature, including visually
appealing details and colors, mythological and fantastical elements, often created dark,
symbolic, and sensual paintings akin to ‘Goblin Market‘s’ narrative, imagery, and symbols;
many of these paintings incorporated the subject of “fallen women.” Some of the significant
paintings include William Holman Hunt’s The Awakening Conscience (1853), John Everett
Millais’s Ophelia (1851-52), Dante Gabriel Rossetti’s Found (1854-55, 1859-1882, i.e., till his
death still unfinished) and Bocca Baciata, i.e., “mouth that has been kissed” (1859), depicting
a woman’s sensuality and sexual experience, Richard Redgrave’s The Outcast (1851), and John
William Waterhouse’s The Lady of Shalott (1888), inspired from Tennyson’s poem ‘The Lady
of Shalott‘ (1832 and 1842).

Structure and Form

‘Goblin Market’ is a lyrical narrative poem that is separated into stanzas of different lengths.
Various groups of lines, often in couplets and triplets, rhyme throughout the poem; in moments,
it has a nursery rhyme-like feel, but it often heightens the drama and creates tension with
shorter sentences and repetition. Further, it enhances narrative drama and musicality akin
to oral tradition with alliteration, enjambment, anaphora, repetition, and occasional rhyme
while featuring evocative imagery and rich symbolism. With its fantastical elements, fairy-tale
tropes, musicality, narrative drama, and omniscient narrator, it resonates with the features of
fairy-tale and folklore genres.

Literary Devices
Rossetti makes use of several literary devices in ‘Goblin Market.’ These include but are not
limited to alliteration, imagery, metaphors, anaphora, onomatopoeia, allusion,
simile, personification, and enjambment.
The first of these, alliteration, is a type of repetition that’s used when the poet repeats a
consonant sound at the beginning of words. For example, “glen” and “goblin” at the beginning
of stanza five and “purloin” and “purse” in lines three and four of stanza six.
Imagery is one of the most important literary devices used in ‘Goblin Market’ or in any poem.
Without it, readers would leave the piece unaffected. Some of the best lines are “The whisk-
tail’d merchant bade her taste / In tones as smooth as honey, / The cat-faced purred” from
stanza five and these from stanza eight: Like two blossoms on one stem, / Like two flakes of
new-fallen snow, / Like two wands of ivory / Tipped with gold for awful kings.”

Several metaphors throughout the poem convey specific ideas, emotions, and themes. Some
examples include, “That juice was wormwood to her tongue,” conveys the taste of the juice by
comparing it with the bitterness of the wormwood plant; the metaphor of fire in lines, “She
dwindled, as the fair full moon doth turn / To swift decay and burn / Her fire away,” and “Swift
fire spread through her veins, knocked at her heart, / Met the fire smouldering there” conveys
the life force and energy of Laura which the fruits took away and the antidote rushed back
respectively; the proverb “One may lead a horse to water, / Twenty cannot make him drink”
emphasizes Lizzie’s indomitable will and strength; “Sweeter than honey from the rock” uses
the biblical metaphor of “honey from the rock” to emphasize the extent of sweetness and
pleasure the fruits offered to Laura.
Anaphora is another kind of repetition, one that’s concerned with the use and reuse of the same
word or words at the beginning of lines. For instance, “Like” starts in five of the seven lines of
stanza four. There is also an example in stanza five with the word “One.” It starts six lines in
this stanza. This kind of repetition helps create the feeling of accumulation as if the poet is
building up to something or is bringing together lines for a common purpose.
The use of onomatopoeic words, i.e., words that imitate the sounds they are describing,
enhances the poem’s lighthearted tone and engaging narrative style. Some examples of
onomatopoeia include words like “buzzing,” “cooing,” “howling,” “Puffing,” “Chuckling,
clapping, crowing,” “Clucking and gobbling,” “purring,” “hissing,” etc.
Enjambment is an important formal device that’s used when the poet cuts off a line before the
natural conclusion of a sentence or phrase. For example, there is a transition between lines two
and three of stanza eight and lines six and seven of stanza ten.

Character Analysis
Laura:
The more impulsive and chaotic of the two sisters in the poem, Laura initially goes against the
rules she’s known all her life, engaging with the goblins and eating their fruit. However, Laura’s
actions cause her to live in misery and want as she struggles for redemption. Eventually Laura
is saved, and she is able to recognize her wrongdoings and share them with others to offer
enlightenment on the evils of temptation.
Lizzie:
The more practical of the sisters in the poem, Lizzie is always described as good, virtuous, and
pure. She listens to the rules and doesn’t give into the temptation of the goblins like her sister
does. Upon learning of her sister’s misery and struggle, Lizzie nearly sacrifices her life in order
to save her sister. Her actions of sacrifice and love allude to the biblical Jesus Christ. The
Goblins:
Ugly creatures who move in unusual ways, the goblins exist in contrast to the two sisters; while
the girls are lovely and pure, the goblins are ugly and soiled. They trick unsuspecting girls into
buying their fruits only to leave them in a state of despair. The role of the goblins alludes to the
story of the biblical Eve’s temptation in the Garden of Eden, with the goblins representing the
devil.

Other Books Related to Goblin Market

“Goblin Market” was inspired by nursery rhymes, fairytales, and fables, as well as by the Bible.
Rossetti was devoutly religious, and she intertwines her tale of enchanted fruit and sisterly
sacrifice with Biblical imagery connected with the stories of Adam and Eve, the Last Supper,
and the temptation of Christ. In addition to its fantastical and religious elements, “Goblin
Market” is also deeply concerned with the position of women in nineteenth-century society, a
theme Rossetti returned to again and again. Her poems “Cousin Kate” (1862), “Maude Clare”
(1862), and “An Apple Gathering” (1862) are all thematically related to “Goblin Market” and
show the evolution of Rossetti’s ideas about gender, sexuality, and power. Rossetti’s focus on
women’s roles and the sexual double standard that defined nineteenth-century society also
connects “Goblin Market” with earlier works of literature including Coventry Patmore’s 1854
poem “The Angel in the House,” which created an idealized and highly influential model of
domestic Victorian womanhood, as well as Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre (1847) and Elizabeth
Barrett Browning’s Aurora Leigh (1857), both of which challenged beliefs about women’s
roles in society. “Goblin Market” is also related to the substantial body of literature that
considered the plight of fallen women, or women who have sex outside of marriage. However,
unlike many Victorian authors who wrote about fallen women—from Charles Dickens’s Oliver
Twist (1837-1839) and Bleak House (1852-1853), to Thomas Hood’s “The Bridge of Sighs”
(1844), to Elizabeth Gaskell’s Ruth (1853)— Rossetti allows her fallen woman to escape the
typical fate of death or exile. Radically for the time, in “Goblin Market” Rossetti insists that
fallen woman can be rehabilitated. Rosetti’s poem also famously influenced Lewis
Carroll’s Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (1865). It is among Rossetti’s most popular
poems, and it has been illustrated, adapted, and reinterpreted in a variety of ways—from
children’s literature, to comic books, to erotica—in the 160 years since it was composed.

Key Facts about Goblin Market

• Full Title: Goblin Market
• When Written: 1859
• Where Written: London, England
• When Published: 1862
• Literary Period: Victorian
• Genre: Poetry, Fairytale
• Setting: An unidentified, rural, idyllic setting, possibly in England
• Climax: Lizzie sets out to buy fruit from the dangerous goblin men, hoping it might
save
• Antagonist: The goblin men, who represent sexual temptation and seem to exist only
to destroy young women
• Point of View: Third-person; though the narrator has access to Laura’s and Lizzie’s
motivations and emotions, the narrator never shares the goblins’ point of view.
THEMES:
Temptation and Fallen Women: “Goblin Market” is a complex poetic allegory about sexual
temptation. Writing in the mid-nineteenth century, at a time of strict societal expectations
regarding women’s behavior, Christina Rossetti was intensely interested in the plight of fallen
women—those women who, by society’s standards, were perceived to have given in to the
temptation of engaging in sex outside of marriage and who were subsequently shunned.
Rossetti’s fairytale-like poem focuses on two sisters, Laura and Lizzie, one of whom succumbs
to sexual temptation with near-fatal consequences, while the other withstands temptation and
saves her fallen sister. While it is tempting to read “Goblin Market” as a warning to women to
avoid sexual temptation, Rossetti’s allegory also lends itself to more complex readings. In
contrast to many other representations of fallen woman in nineteenth-century art and literature,
Rossetti’s fallen woman, Laura, never loses her purity and is ultimately saved through the self-
sacrificing love of her sister. Rossetti thus seems to argue, against the dominant view of her
time, that fallenness is not a permanent state and that fallen women can be saved and
reintegrated into their communities through the compassion and support of their unfallen
sisters.
Opening her poem with the goblin men’s seductive cry, Rossetti immediately establishes them
as figures symbolic of sexual temptation. The goblins seem to exist solely in order to tempt
young women to purchase their delicious but poisonous fruits, which they describe in terms
that are unmistakably erotic: from “Plump unpecked cherries”—simultaneously suggestive of
virginity and sexual ripeness—to voluptuous “Bloom-down-cheeked peaches” that invite the
buyer to touch as well as taste. Their sales pitch is effective; when Laura and Lizzie hear it,
they crouch close to the ground and hide themselves not just to avoid looking at the dangerous
goblin men, but seemingly also to hide the evidence of their sexual arousal: their blushes and
“tingling cheeks and finger tips.” The goblins are an object of curiosity and desire, and their
exotic fruit functions as a metaphor for forbidden desires that cause young women to transgress
the boundaries of acceptable feminine behavior at the time. While Lizzie runs away to prevent
herself from looking at the goblin men or sampling their fruit, Laura finds the spectacle of their
bodies—which resemble animals—irresistible. Although the goblins use gentle, seductive
language to persuade the women, their potential for sexual violence is foreshadowed by their
animalistic appearances, which hint at their wildness and unpredictability.
Laura suffers a kind of symbolic sexual fall that is set in motion when she disregards her sister’s
warnings and looks at the goblin men, sensuously stretching forth “her gleaming neck” because
her “last restraint is gone.” Although Laura is apprehensive about accepting the goblins’ fruits
without paying, they persuade her to cut a lock of her hair and “Buy from” them “with a golden
curl.” In nineteenth-century culture, locks of hair were considered to be precious and were
exchanged between lovers, friends, and family members. Symbolically, the goblins commodify
a part of Laura’s body—a part associated with love and intimacy—so when Laura cuts her hair
in exchange for the fruit, she symbolically sells herself and becomes aligned with the fallen
woman or prostitute. Her immediate regret is signaled by the fact that she “dropped a tear more
rare than pearl,” however she sucks the fruit “until her lips [a]re sore,” with a violent intensity
that is distinctly sexual. Here, Laura is not just aligned with fallen women but with the biblical
Eve, the archetype of the fallen woman, who ate forbidden fruit from the Tree of Knowledge
and was expelled from the Garden of Eden. Like Eve, Laura similarly loses her innocence after
eating the fruit; the desire to purchase more preoccupies her thoughts, and when she finds that
the goblins have abandoned her, she pines away, ages prematurely, and refuses to eat.
Following a pattern established by many works of art and literature about the fallen woman,
the goblin men abandon Laura after seducing her, destroy her peace, and bring her to the verge
of death.
Rossetti allows Laura to avoid the typical fates for fallen women in nineteenth-century
literature, however, which are death, exile, or transportation to the colonies. In doing so,
Rossetti seems to suggest that fallenness is only a temporary state rather than a stain that
remains on a woman for the rest of her life and that complete rehabilitation and reintegration
into her community remains possible. Laura’s rehabilitation is made possible by her sister,
Lizzie. Lizzie knowingly puts herself in danger by confronting the goblins at nightfall to buy
more fruit for Laura; she understands that, like Laura, she might be tricked into eating their
fruit herself. However, the goblins, finding that they cannot persuade Lizzie to eat, violently
attack her. Not only do they scratch her arms and pull out her hair, but they try to force fruit
into her mouth in a scene that resembles a sexual assault. Lizzie withstands their attack and
refuses to eat. Triumphantly returning home to Laura, Lizzie instructs her to lick the juices
from her face with the sexually suggestive words: “Hug me, kiss me, suck my juices,” “Eat
me, drink me, love me.” Despite their sexual undertones, Lizzie’s words evoke Christ’s
instructions to his followers at the Last Supper to drink his blood and eat his body. Laura is
revived by sucking the fruit juices from Lizzie’s body, as if she has taken part in a sisterly
version of holy communion. Lizzie, then, functions as a Christ-like figure, whose self-sacrifice
and willingness to risk death enables her to purchase the redemption of her sister.
The poem concludes years later, with Laura explaining to her own and Lizzie’s daughters the
importance of sisters protecting and supporting one another, “For there is no friend like a
sister.” Rossetti thus argues that fallen women are not inherently tarnished or irredeemable, and
can be reclaimed through the love and labor of other women.

Women’s Role in Society: In “Goblin Market,” Rossetti reflects on the role of women in
Victorian society. Victorian men had more freedom, education, opportunity, and leeway to
express themselves sexually, but women were expected to remain sexually innocent or face
serious consequences. The poem critiques the unfairness of society’s double standards,
showing how they put women at a disadvantage, and then challenges them by
allowing Laura to achieve a happy ending despite her transgression. However, both Lizzie and
Laura’s ultimate redemption involves a return to motherly duties and caring for the next
generation of girls. Rossetti, then, ultimately upholds a distinctly gendered view of society in
which women occupy and find fulfilment within very specific domestic roles.
Many Victorian commentators argued that women should remain innocent—or ignorant—
about their own sexuality until they were married, and Rossetti seems to connect Laura’s
symbolic sexual fall to her innocence and incomprehension of the dangers posed by the goblin
men. Lizzie understand the risks involved in associating with the goblins and eating their fruit,
explaining to Laura that “Their offers should not charm us, / Their evil gifts would harm us.”
Later she also relates a cautionary tale about a young woman named Jeanie, who ate the
goblins’ fruit and then withered and died. While Lizzie’s knowledge protects her from
temptation, Laura is curious because she lacks knowledge and experience. Like the biblical
Eve, who gave into temptation—eating the forbidden fruit from the Tree of Knowledge and
suffering a fall from grace—Laura cannot control her curiosity or her appetite. She lingers in
the glen and purchases the goblins’ fruit with a lock of her hair—an action that aligns her with
prostitutes and fallen women. Rossetti thus seems to suggest that prizing “innocence” and
keeping women ignorant about their own sexuality leaves them vulnerable to sexually
predatory men who would flatter, use, and then discard them—just as the goblins have done to
Jeanie and will do to Laura.
Rossetti further seems to criticize the unfairness of society’s double standards, which punished
women much more severely than men for illicit sexual activity—that is, sexual activity that
takes place outside of marriage. Each of the three named women in the poem—Laura, Lizzie,
and Jeanie—suffers terribly due to the seduction and violence of the goblin men. Laura suffers
psychologically, becoming distraught when she can no longer hear the goblins’ call; she also
becomes ill and prematurely ages. Lizzie is brutally assaulted by the goblins for refusing to eat
their fruit. Jeanie, like Laura, withers and fades after eating the fruit before ultimately dying.
The goblins, however, get away without reproach. If the goblins represent sexual temptation at
the start of the poem when they seduce Laura, their threat to women becomes intensified as the
poem progresses. Lizzie’s confrontation with the brutal goblin men shows that they represent
men’s dangerous sexual appetites and, by extension, their capacity for sexual violence.
Although Laura is saved and Lizzie survives her ordeal, the goblin men are never punished.
Years later, they continue to pose a threat to the next generation of women—Laura and Lizzie’s
daughters. This seems like an acknowledgement, on Rossetti’s part, of the rootedness of the
sexual double standard in Victorian culture: if men go unpunished for seducing or assaulting
women, women can only combat their threat by informing and watching out for one another.
Rossetti also quite radically, represents Laura and Lizzie, the fallen sister and the sexually pure
sister, respectively, as nearly identical characters who achieve an identical outcome at the
poem’s conclusion: marriage and motherhood, which were considered to be the goal of
Victorian women’s lives. Rossetti stresses the similarities between Laura and Lizzie by giving
them the same white skin and golden hair, and by describing them identically in language that
emphasizes their purity even after Laura’s “fall”: they sleep “Golden head by golden head, /
Like two pigeons in one nest / Folded in each other’s wings,” “Like two blossoms on one stem,
/ Like two flakes of new-fallen snow.” The difference between the sisters is not that Laura is
corrupt and Lizzie is pure; it is that Laura gives in to temptation. In maintaining Laura’s purity,
Rossetti implies that men’s seduction is the most significant cause of fallenness among women
and argues that sexual curiosity and activity do not make women impure or irredeemable.
However, despite rejecting the widespread belief that fallen women were “ruined” and could
never be fully rehabilitated, Rossetti is still somewhat conventional in that she seems to present
motherhood as an ideal state for women—evident in Lizzie’s wistful remembrance of Jeanie,
“Who should have been a bride.” On the other hand, Rossetti intriguingly never mentions by
name Laura’s and Lizzie’s husbands or the fathers of their (presumably all female) children. It
is possible, then, to read the ending of “Goblin Market” as the creation of an ideal community
comprised entirely of supportive women, which includes mothers, sisters, and daughters but
perhaps not men. Although Rossetti critiqued the sexual double standard, in this poem she does
not reject outright the belief that women were naturally suited to marriage and motherhood.
Rather, as exemplified by Lizzie, Rossetti seems to suggest that women could become
empowered through acts of nurturing.
Salvation and Sacrifice: Lizzie saves her sister, Laura, through an act of self-sacrifice that
occurs at the poem’s dramatic climax. Believing Laura to be on the brink of death, Lizzie seeks
out the dangerous goblin men and, in doing so, places herself in extreme danger; she risks being
tempted, as Laura and Jeanie were, to eat the forbidden fruit, and, although she does not know
it when she sets out on this dangerous mission, she will also be physically—and, it is implied,
sexually—assaulted by the goblin men. Rossetti uses biblical allusions to align Lizzie with
Christ, whose sacrifice saves humanity from death, a radical decision given that Victorian
society did not treat men and women as equals. Perhaps more radically still, Rossetti seems to
suggest that the plight of fallen women might call out the nobler qualities—like bravery and
self-sacrifice—in their unfallen sisters, calling them to become more like Christ.
Simply confronting the goblins alone, in the dark forest, is a significant sacrifice on Lizzie’s
part for the sake of her sister. For Lizzie, the goblins are a source of terror. Not only was she
so frightened of them that she “thrust a dimpled finger/ In each ear, shut eyes and ran” away,
leaving Laura to contend with them alone and setting in motion her fall at the start of the poem.
She has also observed firsthand their dangerous effects on women, having buried Jeanie and
witnessed Laura’s suffering and decline after eating the fruit. The extreme fearfulness with
which Lizzie initially regarded the goblins—coupled with her intense physical response to
them, her veiled blushes and “tingling cheeks and finger tips”—indicates that she believes
herself to be susceptible to their seductive sales pitch. By confronting the goblins, Lizzie
willingly puts herself in danger and risks becoming a fallen woman herself, an important
symbolic reversal of her previous act of sisterly abandonment.
Lizzie’s fears about the goblins are well-founded. When she arrives at the brook, they try to
seduce her. Finding she will not give in to temptation, however, they begin to brutally assault
Lizzie while also attempting to force their fruit into her mouth—an attempt to violate her body
that might be read as a metaphorical rape. Lizzie, however, sacrifices her safety and subjects
herself this attack because she is desperate to bring the goblins’ fruit back home to revive
Laura—even if she is only able to bring back the “juice that syrupped all her face,/ And lodged
in dimples of her chin,/ And streaked her neck which quaked like curd.” Unlike at the start of
the poem, this time, Lizzie refuses to run away.
Determined to withstand the goblins’ attack, Lizzie is described in a series of images that
emphasize her strength and moral purity in the midst of turmoil and danger. She is compared
to “a beacon left alone/ In a hoary roaring sea,/ Sending up a golden fire” and “a fruit-crowned
orange-tree/ White with blossoms honey-sweet/ Sore beset by wasp and bee.” More
importantly for the religious elements of Rossetti’s allegory, Lizzie is also described as “a royal
virgin town/ Topped with gilded dome and spire/ Close beleaguered by a fleet/ Mad to tug her
standard down.” These lines seem to connect Lizzie with the Virgin Mary, who is often viewed
as a second Eve. Through the birth of her son, Jesus, Mary was believed to have reversed the
consequences of Eve’s fall and saved mankind from sin and death. This connection
foreshadows the way that Lizzie’s sacrifice—in submitting to the goblins’ attack—will reverse
Laura’s fall and secure her salvation.
Not only does Lizzie survive the goblins’ attack and refuse to eat their fruit, and not only, like
the Virgin Mary, does she manage to reverse Laura’s fall. Through her act of self-sacrifice in
undergoing this terrifying ordeal, Lizzie becomes thoroughly Christlike. When she returns
home, she instructs Laura to lick and suck the goblins’ fruit juice, which covers her face and
body, in words that echo those of Christ at the Last Supper: “Eat me, drink me, love me;/ Laura,
make much of me.” In the Bible, Christ’s sacrifice in allowing himself to be tried, tortured, and
crucified allows him to purchase eternal life for his followers. In the same way, Lizzie’s act of
self-sacrifice secures the salvation of her sister, who recovers after sucking the fruit juices from
Lizzie’s battered body. Like Christ, who transformed water into wine, Lizzie’s sacrifice
transforms the once delicious goblin fruit—“Sweeter than honey from the rock”—into a bitter
but life-restoring antidote.
Contrary to the dominant beliefs of her time, Rossetti seems to suggest that braving danger in
order to help fallen women (who were often vilified by society) is what makes a woman
Christlike, not maintaining sexual purity by avoiding danger altogether. Through Lizzie’s act
of self-sacrifice, Laura is saved from Jeanie’s fate, and Lizzie, herself, grows in strength and
understanding. In overcoming her fear, Lizzie sets an example for the young women of the next
generation—including Lizzie’s and Laura’s own daughters—of the way that women should
care for one another, “For there is no friend like a sister.”

Female Solidarity and Sisterhood

Female solidarity and sisterhood is a primary theme of "Goblin Market." Laura and Lizzie are
sisters who live together, and the importance and strength of their relationship is one of the
focal points of the poem.
When Laura returns home after being out all night with the goblin men, Lizzie greets her in
worry and warns, "Twilight is not good for maidens." Though Laura dismisses her concerns
with "Nay, hush, my sister," trying to help Laura not to falter or fall prey to temptation is clearly
fundamental to Lizzie's sense of sisterhood.
Lizzie's response to Laura's withering decline highlights her identification with her sister:
"Tender Lizzie could not bear / To watch her sister's cankerous care." She makes what in the
context of the poem is the ultimate sacrifice: putting herself in danger by facing the goblins in
an attempt to save her sister.
When Lizzie returns home with the cure for Laura, Laura is overcome: "She clung about her
sister." The salvation for her fallen state comes from the risk undertaken by a sister. This story
is the tale that Laura will pass on to her children: she "would tell them how her sister stood / In
deadly peril to do her good." "Goblin Market" ends with a very pointed summation of the
theme: "For there is no friend like a sister / In calm or stormy weather; / To cheer one on the
tedious way, / To fetch one if one goes astray." The story of the goblin men demonstrates how
female solidarity overcomes the "deadly peril" of (goblin) men.
Christina Rossetti was influenced by Elizabeth Barrett Browning's Aurora Leigh not only in
her life but in her writing. The devotion to lifting up fallen women caused Rossetti to volunteer
at the Highgate House and also to write this poem.

Temptation
Lizzie and Laura face the temptation of the goblin men on a regular basis. Laura initially is
able to resist; she even verbalizes why there is danger: "We must not look at goblin men, / We
must not buy their fruits: / Who knows upon what soil they fed / Their hungry thirsty roots?"
Lizzie also experiences temptation. When she watches the goblin men, she "veil'd her blushes."
However, on the night of the poem's opening, Laura is weakened and stays behind. She appears
helpless in resisting temptation, through comparisons to a "rush-imbedded swan " (swan
trapped in the rushes) and a vessel "at the launch / When its last restraint is gone."
Lizzie resists their temptation. She says to Laura, "You should not peep at goblin men," but
Laura details what she sees. Lizzie again resists and warns Laura, "Their evil gifts would harm
us." Then Lizzie "thrust a dimpled finger / In each ear, shut eyes and ran." She flees temptation
after trying to convince her sister to do the same.
Notably, the goblin men are animalistic, compared to rats, wombats, snails, cats, and parrots.
Their voices, on the other hand, are alluring: "Cooing all together: / They sounded kind and
full of loves." Temptation is not simply in the forbidden fruit, but in the words and the
friendliness of the goblins—which is directly contrasted by Lizzie's violent experience with
them when they are rejected. Their true nature, constituting a "deadly peril," is revealed in the
contrasting scenes of Laura, who gives in to temptation, and Lizzie, who returns to face and
reject it for Laura's sake.

Redemption
Lizzie does not turn her back on her sister after Laura falls. When Laura returns home after her
encounters with goblin men, Lizzie meets her, "full of wise upbraidings." Lizzie reminds her
sister of Jeanie, a girl who fell to the goblin men in the moonlight. She reminds her that
"twilight is not good for maidens." Laura continues to discard the warnings, instead saying
"nay, hush, my sister" and revealing that she intends to return to see the goblin men. Laura is
well and truly fallen, but Lizzie still cares for her and loves her. She has sinned and is forgiven.
In fact when Laura sickens from the time with goblin men, Lizzie risks herself, facing "deadly
peril" to go to the goblin men for fruit to feed her sister. She does not lose her innocence in her
efforts. She resists them, offering a coin rather than a "golden curl" as Laura has. Lizzie does
not even respond verbally to their aggression: She "utter'd not a word; / ... / Lest they should
cram a mouthful in."
When Lizzie returns to her ailing sister as a Christlike figure who has been treated cruelly by
the goblin men, she offers her body—which is where the fruit has been smashed—as a cure to
her sister: "Eat me, drink me, love me; / Laura, make much of me; / For your sake I have braved
the glen / And had to do with goblin merchant men." This phrasing suggests various Christian
Eucharist prayers. Like Christ, Lizzie is the body and blood; her sacrifice cleanses Laura of her
sin. So while Laura falls to temptation—as people do—Lizzie provides her with forgiveness,
acceptance, and ultimately, redemption.
The Work:
“Goblin Market,” which appeared in Christina Rossetti’s first published collection of poetry, is
unquestionably her most original poem and stands out as a masterwork of aesthetic taste.
Rossetti’s ties with her brother Dante’s Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood (she contributed verses to
their short-lived magazine, Germ) also explain why the anthology has been labeled the
movement’s first literary success. It was Dante, furthermore, who suggested the title, having
written a poem himself about the market of fallen girls. “Goblin Market,” however, differs
notably from her other poetic work, which possesses a depth and a Victorian pathos all its own,
principally in its alluring singsong quality and pervasive sexuality.

That Rossetti could have been unaware of the intense sexual imagery of “Goblin Market”
seems unlikely, although in a note to the poem, her brother William Michael (who edited most
of her poetry) speaks of her insistence that nothing “profound” had been intended. It is far more
feasible to see her apparent obsession with certain images in the poem as suggestive of a more
religious interpretation, one in which the goblins may be seen as maliciously evil creatures who
have set out to beguile—and then seduce—the two girls. In this respect, the poem does bear a
resemblance to Rossetti’s major poetic themes, which are heavily laden with introspection,
suffering, and otherworldly love.
Dedicated to Rossetti’s sister Maria, “Goblin Market” deals with two sisters, Laura and Lizzie,
who, while on their usual way to a brook to fetch water, hear goblins hawking their wares, the
goblin fruits. Lizzie warns Laura not to listen to them and flees, knowing that their sister Jeanie,
who had eaten of the goblin fruit, had languished to her death. Laura, however, is thoroughly
enticed by the goblins and buys their luscious fruit, paying them with a lock of her golden hair,
as she has no coins. Shortly afterward, she begins to undergo the same transformation that
Jeanie did, her hair growing thin and gray, and, almost inexplicably, she can no longer hear the
goblin men’s cries, though she yearns passionately for their figs and plums.
The strong-willed Lizzie, in a desperate attempt to save her sister, returns to the goblin men
that only she can now hear and offers to buy their fruit, although she adamantly refuses to join
them at their feast. After bravely resisting the evil creatures’ attacks, during which her mouth
and face are smeared with fruit juices, Lizzie makes her way home. Greeted by Laura, she
invites her sister to partake of the restorative juices she knows will cure her:
Hug me, kiss me, suck my juicesSqueezed from goblin fruits for you,Goblin pulp and goblin
dew.Eat me, drink me, love me;Laura, make much of me.
After Laura does as she is asked, Lizzie spends the night tending to her, holding water to her
lips and cooling her face. When dawn comes, Laura has been restored to her former self, her
hair once again gleaming and golden. Later, when the grown girls have become wives and
mothers, they tell the story to their own children, exhorting them to cling together: “For there
is no friend like a sister,/ In calm or stormy weather . . . .” Quite clearly, the main themes of the
poem revolve around temptation and seduction as well as individual sacrifice and its saving
grace. In a moral sense, which is perhaps the best of interpretive modes, the poem is very
similar to those of Samuel Taylor Coleridge (and those of the French poet Paul Verlaine, in its
nuances and musical cadence), evoking in the mind of the reader a wealth of pictorial images,
a strong sense of the magical, and an almost spellbinding musical quality. There is no doubt
that the language is captivatingly sensuous, almost shamelessly so, as can readily be seen from
such lines as “She sucked and sucked and sucked the more/ Fruits which that unknown orchard
bore.”
It is a unique trait of the poem that, even beyond its moral apologue, one can truly appreciate
the richness of the language and the exquisite delight of the rhythm, as it jaunts on its way to
the almost cloying climax. Clearly, in “Goblin Market,” it is not the buying of the fruit that
presents a danger to the soul, but the actual consuming of it. Ironically, even though Lizzie
“tossed them her penny,” holding out her apron to be filled with the delectable fruits, the goblins
seek to entice her to sit and eat with them. Indeed, when Lizzie tells them she cannot join them
in their repast, for she has one who “waits at home alone for me,” the creatures begin grunting
and snarling, viciously attacking her. In essence, it is the “sharing” of the fruit in the physical
presence of the goblins that holds the key to this particular type of damnation. Laura is in the
thrall of their bewitchment, for this is precisely the “sin” she has committed, as Jeanie did. The
goblin men have no need of money and take both pennies and curls alike, but the fruit they
deliver must be consumed in their presence, in what could almost be described as a copulatory
ritual. When Lizzie indicates to her tormentors that, if they will not sell her their fruits, she will
want her money back and will very likely be on her way, their chattering turns to violence, and
they begin trying to force the forbidden fruits into her unwilling mouth. Lizzie knows, however,
that if she keeps the fruit from entering her mouth, she will be safe. Once she has returned
home to her sister and explained the “sacrifice” she has endured for Laura’s sake, only the
sucking of the juices from Lizzie’s face and mouth can truly restore Laura’s health. By kissing
her sister “with a hungry mouth,” Laura is now allowed to taste the bitterness of the sacrifice
itself, a sacrifice that was “wormwood to her tongue,” but that brought solace to her aching
soul and healed its lost innocence. The juices on Lizzie’s mouth no longer harbor the sickly
sweet taste of the original fruit/sin but have now been transformed into the chrism of salvation.
Rossetti’s basic message is a strong one: There is no love like that of a sister. It is interesting
to speculate how the suggestive intimacy of the two girls, Laura and Lizzie, emphasized as it
is throughout the poem, bears a resemblance to the close relationship between Christina (who
never married) and Maria (who became an Anglican nun). It would indeed seem that, while
avoiding forbidden pleasure will certainly keep Laura safe and chaste, physical intimacy with
Lizzie (though not sexual in nature) is to be encouraged. It should be recalled that Christina
originally wanted to call the poem “A Peep at the Goblins,” as if the two girls, totally unfamiliar
with men and the seductions of the mundane world, had for one brief moment been allowed a
glimpse of sexual pleasure outside the bonds of matrimony. Although the reader may wonder
what physical pleasures, if any, were eventually reserved for Laura and Lizzie when they
became “wives with children of their own,” Rossetti reminds us that, after all, Jeanie was in
her grave because of “joys brides hope to have.” As unmarried maidens, Lizzie and Laura
cannot taste the fruit of the tree of sexual knowledge, a joy granted to them only after marriage.
Proposed to by two different suitors during her lifetime (the first, James Collinson, was a friend
and fellow art student of Dante, and the second, Charles Cayley, was a scholar and linguist),
Rossetti saw both of these relationships come to an abrupt end. Although it is presumed that
Collinson left her (and that her family merely kept up appearances by saying she had broken
off the engagement), she turned Cayley down of her own volition. It appears that, in both cases,
religion played a part in the difficulties, as Collinson wavered between Catholicism and
Anglicanism and Cayley seemed an agnostic. Rossetti’s devout Anglican upbringing, in which
her mother and her sister played such intrinsic roles, probably made her shrink from the idea
of the fulfillment of love. To the quiet and often clinically depressed Rossetti, this may have
been a way of reconciling her love of man with her love of God. It is unlikely, in fact, that she
really would have married either man, perhaps more from a sense of honoring her own
Victorian conviction that she would not give to man what was reserved for Christ than for any
other reason.
In this regard, then, “Goblin Market” becomes the ultimate vehicle for Rossetti’s matrimonial
convictions, and it is perhaps more revelatory than her other poems since it so fittingly weds
the theme of unbridled sensuality—and its inherent dangers—with the salvation that can only
be offered through family ties. The latter were especially strong for Rossetti and were assuredly
a source of consolation in her later years. Though her later poems reveal a desolatory kind of
suffering and an almost ethereal desire to transcend death in search of a more perfect love,
“Goblin Market” seems to lightly foreshadow such yearnings, especially in her descriptions of
Jeanie’s death and of Lizzie’s sufferings at the hands of the goblins. Until Laura and Lizzie do
become the wives and mothers they were meant to be, thus eligible to eat the “goblin fruit,”
they can only lie “cheek to cheek and breast to breast” in sisterly—but irreproachable—
intimacy.
It should further be suggested, to emphasize the recently developed theory of child eroticism,
that the poem is also a unique interpretation of how the Victorian mind imagined children
within the spectrum of human sexuality. In retrospect, to identify the two girls as
representatives of the erotic life of children and to see their misadventures as typical of a
Victorian nightmare nursery world in which cruelty and sexuality are revealed in all their
forcefulness would seem almost overemphatic. Yet, there is something musically childlike in
the repetitious lilt Rossetti lends to the poem as well as in the girlish relationship between the
two sisters, the infantile sucking of the fruit and the odd aloofness between the two sisters and
the goblin “brothers”—the latter quite possibly suggesting a latent sibling animosity (although
to all appearances the Rossettis had a serene and lifelong relationship).
In a perhaps equally disturbing analysis based on the transmigration of the personality or, more
appropriately, on the metamorphosis of woman into grotesque creature—a theme dear to
Victorian mythos—the reader can see how Laura, in her desire to eat more of the fruit she can
no longer have, begins gnashing her teeth and weeping uncontrollably, revealing her own
potential to become one of the goblins herself. This curious vampirish quality, at which Rossetti
hints only subtly throughout the poem, makes “Goblin Market” all the more remarkable
because the reader senses, and rightly so, that its enduring quality lies in both the fleeting
elusiveness of its images and in the fact that Laura is, in actuality, waging a war with her own
self.
From the moment she stretches her gleaming neck to the instant she sucks the fair fruit globes,
Laura is destined to suffer a lasting change. She does not know whether it is night or day and,
her mouth constantly watering, she begins exhibiting the signs of a hunger-crazed creature who
longs for the night, the time she will be able to return to the brook and seek out the goblins.
The fruit merchant goblins, however, whose seduction of Laura is by now complete, have no
desire to pursue their intercourse with her and abandon her to her fate. Laura, cold as stone and
in the throes of exceeding pain, dwindles in listless apathy, no longer tending to her chores and
unable to get her seeds to bear the tiniest of shoots. Even her physical appearance coincides
with her inner decay as her sunken eyes and fading mouth become the mark of the vampire’s
victim. The only hope for Laura is the redeeming ruby juices on her sister’s face, whose
cleansing properties work a miracle on Laura’s soul, restoring her wholesomeness and
purifying her virtue, much like the blood of a sacrificial lamb. Lizzie’s steadfastness, like the
cradling arms of an angelic savior, has ultimately broken the goblins’ witchery.
Bibliography
Bellas, Ralph A. Christina Rossetti. Boston: Twayne, 1977. A straightforward look at both
Rossetti’s life and works, suitable for beginning students. Includes useful notes, bibliography,
and index.
Bloom, Harold, ed. Christina Rossetti. Philadelphia: Chelsea House, 2004. Collection of
critical essays on Rossetti’s poetry, including several essays analyzing “Goblin Market.” The
essays examine the links between this poem and Rossetti’s other works, interpretations of the
symbolism and religious allegory in the poem, and the depiction of sisterhood and self in the
work.
Hassett, Constance W. Christina Rossetti: The Patience of Style. Charlottesville: University of
Virginia Press, 2005. Traces the development of Rossetti’s poetry, analyzing the strengths and
weaknesses, the use of rhythm and diction, and other elements of her work.
Marsh, Jan. Christina Rossetti: A Literary Biography. London: J. Cape, 1994. Biography based
in part on newly discovered letters and other information. Quotes extensively from Rossetti’s
poetry to describe her inner life and the relationship between her poetry and her life.
Morrill, David F. “’Twilight Is Not Good for Maidens’: Uncle Polidori and the Psychodynamics
of Vampirism in Goblin Market.” Victorian Poetry 28, no. 1 (Spring, 1990): 1-16. A fascinating
journal article that deals with the theme of vampirism in “Goblin Market,” tracing its origins
back to John William Polidori’s “The Vampyre.”
Palazzo, Lynda. Christina Rossetti’s Feminist Theology. New York: Palgrave, 2002. Analyzes
Rossetti’s devotional poetry within the context of nineteenth century women’s theology.
Chapter 1 provides an examination of “Goblin Market” and her other early poems.
Spivack, Charlotte. “’The Hidden World Below’: Victorian Women Fantasy Poets.” In The
Poetic Fantastic: Studies in an Evolving Genre, edited by Patrick Murphy and Vernon Ross
Hyles. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1989. Examines the theme of the fantastic as it was
used by Victorian women poets, including Rossetti, and makes specific reference to “Goblin
Market.” Applies the theories of Joseph Campbell to the genre.
Thompson, Deborah Ann. “Anorexia as a Lived Trope: Christina Rossetti’s Goblin
Market.” Mosaic: A Journal for the Interdisciplinary Study of Literature 24, nos. 3/4
(Summer/Fall, 1991): 89-106. Presents an unusual, yet exceptionally well-written
interpretation of “Goblin Market” by viewing anorexia nervosa as the underlying theme of the
poem.
Goblin Market | Narrative Voice
The narrative voice of "Goblin Market" is that of an omniscient third-person speaker safely
removed from the action. The speaker describes the experiences of Lizzie and Laura, who
encounter fantastical goblin men, and also quotes them directly.
The speaker of the poem carries the reader through their experiences, enabling the reader to
hear the alluring voices of the goblin men hawking their wares. Thus, the speaker provides a
depiction in which the two sisters' differences are readily apparent—Lizzie, the cautious sister,
runs from the temptation of the forbidden fruits offered at twilight by the goblin men while
Laura falls to the temptation.
The speaker tells of Laura's decline and Lizzie's ultimate decision to risk her safety to save her
sister. The poem ends with the speaker peering into the future, when both sisters are married
with children, to offer the moral that they would pass down to their children: there is "no friend
like a sister."
It is this closing section that links the speaker's voice to Rossetti's actual life, as a volunteer for
an organization where "pure" women were lifting up those who had fallen.
 FRA LIPPO LIPPI BY ROBERT BROWNING
‘Fra Lippo Lippi’ by Robert Browning is a dramatic monologue running the length of 376
lines. The poem is written in blank verse with each line following the meter of iambic
pentameter. There are five beats per line, each beginning with an unstressed syllable, and
ending with a stressed one. It is important that this poem not be confined by a rhyme scheme as
Browning needs the lines to sound like a conversation is taking place. This helps the reader
imagine that they too are participating in the rapid storytelling.

R. Browning was born on May 7, 1812 at Camberwell. He was educated semi-privately and
from an early age, he had an aptitude for studying unusual subjects. Browning was influenced
and fascinated by Shelley and his love for liberty and revolt against convention and oppression.
It was the example of Shelley that inspired him to dedicate his life to poetry, in the hope of
making some striking contribution to the progress of intellectual freedom and the perfection of
man. Byron and his comic style also influenced him. In 1834, Browning for a short period
travelled to Russia, then lived in London, where he became acquainted with the leaders of
literary and theatrical worlds. During his first visit to Italy (1838), he came under the influence
of Venice, an influence that proved permanent. An interest in the poems of Elizabeth Barrett
ripened into love and as her father refused consent to their marriage, they married secretly in
September 1846. The remainder of his life was occupied with journeys between England,
France and Italy. Mrs. Browning was six years older than her husband. The period following
their marriage was the happiest and most fruitful from the point of view of poetry in Browning‘s
life. Their happy love and the climate and culture and art of Italy blossomed his genius. They
stayed on in Italy till Mrs. Browning‘s death in 1861. Her death was a great loss to him. He
came back to England and devoted himself to the education of his son. With time, his grief was
softened and he became a constant figure in London society.

Summary:
The poem begins with the painter being accosted by a number of policemen. He claims to be
on his way home and not, as they think, stopping to visit a brothel. He mocks them for their
mistake and reveals that he is a monk in the employee of the powerful Cosimo Medici. The
officers are taken aback by this and release the monk but Lippi still feels the need to justify
himself. He launches into the story of how he ended up there that night.
He tells the men that he was painting in his studio, “saints, and saints / And again saints,” and
was very bored. He heard music out his window, climbed down to the street, and joined up
with the procession of musicians. After celebrating for a time he was on his way home when
he was stopped. Still not satisfied that they understand him, Lippo decides to tell them about
his childhood and how he grew up on the street.
Both of his parents died when he was young and he was forced to beg for scraps from men and
dogs. He did this for a number of years before being taken into a monastery. There, he was
finally able to eat his fill and indulge in his affinity for idleness. The monks attempted to make
him study and learn Latin, but he says it was a waste of time.
They then noticed his abilities at painting and decide that is what he should focus on. He does
so, painting everything he sees, but the Prior of the monastery is not happy with what he has
made. The Prior wants more soul in the art and the painter wants soul and beauty. Some of the
monks are very critical of his work but he claims not to care as he has Cosimo Medici to fall
back on. Even so, he does seem hurt by their rebuffs.
Due to his harsh treatment at the monastery, he rebels by sneaking out in the night, as he did
on the night the story is being told. He informs the guards he is speaking to that there is another
young man at the monastery who is going to grow up and act just as he does. He is not an
aberration. Lippo continues to speak against the monks but after a time starts to feel bad, and
nervous, about what he has said. He does not want to get in trouble with the church.
Lippo tells his listeners that he has a plan to get back in the good graces of the church. He is
going to paint a large painting that includes God and the Madonna and child. This painting will
also include a self-portrait. Lippo’s guilt recedes at this point and he jumps into an entertaining
narrative regarding the painted version of himself and how he will spend time with the angels.
At the conclusion of this story, he tells the guards his reputation with the church will be restored
in six months and runs off into the night as the sun is rising.

About Robert Browning

Robert Browning was born in Camberwell, London in May of 1812. His father was able to
accumulate a large library containing around 6,000 books. This would form the basis of
Browning’s early education and stimulate his interest in literature.
From early in his life Browning’s family supported his poetic aspirations and helped him
financially as well as with the publishing of his first works. He lived with his family until he
met and married the fellow poet Elizabeth Barrett. Elizabeth and Robert moved to live in
Florence, Italy. They had a son in 1849 and Browning’s rate of production dropped off
significantly. Elizabeth, now known by her married name, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, died in
1861. After this, Browning and his son moved back to England.
After receiving mixed reviews from critics when he was young, Browning finally gained some
critical acclaim when he was in his 50s. His greatest work, The Ring and the Book, was
published in 1868-69.
Before Browning’s death in 1889 in Venice, he lived to see the formation of the Browning
Society and received an honorary Doctorate of Civil Law from Balliol College at Oxford
University. He is buried in Westminster Abbey.

Form
“Fra Lippo Lippi” takes the form of blank verse—unrhymed lines, most of which fall roughly
into iambic pentameter. As in much of his other poetry, Browning seeks to capture colloquial
speech, and in many parts of the poem he succeeds admirably: Lippo includes outbursts, bits
of songs, and other odds and ends in his rant. In his way Browning brilliantly captures the feel
of a late-night, drunken encounter.
Analysis
The poem centers thematically around the discussion of art that takes place around line 180.
Lippo has painted a group of figures that are the spitting image of people in the community:
the Prior’s mistress, neighborhood men, etc. Everyone is amazed at his talent, and his great
show of talent gains him his place at the monastery. However, his talent for depicting reality
comes into conflict with the stated religious goals of the Church. The Church leadership
believes that their parishioners will be distracted by the sight of people they know within the
painting: as the Prior and his cohorts say, “ ‘Your business is not to catch men with show, / With
homage to the perishable clay.../ Make them forget there’s such a thing as flesh. / Your business
is to paint the souls of men.’ ” In part the Church authorities’ objections stem not from any real
religious concern, but from a concern for their own reputation: Lippo has gotten a little too
close to the truth with his depictions of actual persons as historical figures—the Prior’s “niece”
(actually his mistress) has been portrayed as the seductive Salome. However, the conflict
between Lippo and the Church elders also cuts to the very heart of questions about art: is the
primary purpose of Lippo’s art—and any art—to instruct, or to delight? If it is to instruct, is it
better to give men ordinary scenes to which they can relate, or to offer them celestial visions
to which they can aspire? In his own art, Browning himself doesn’t seem to privilege either
conclusion; his work demonstrates only a loose didacticism, and it relies more on carefully
chosen realistic examples rather than either concrete portraits or abstractions. Both Fra Lippo’s
earthly tableaux and the Prior’s preferred fantasias of “ ‘vapor done up like a new-born babe’ ”
miss the mark. Lippo has no aspirations beyond simple mimesis, while the Prior has no respect
for the importance of the quotidian. Thus the debate is essentially empty, since it does not take
into account the power of art to move man in a way that is not intellectual but is rather aesthetic
and emotional.
Lippo’s statements about art are joined by his complaints about the monastic lifestyle. Lippo
has not adopted this lifestyle by choice; rather, his parents’ early death left him an orphan with
no choice but to join the monastery. Lippo is trapped between the ascetic ways of the monastery
and the corrupt, fleshly life of his patrons the Medicis. Neither provides a wholly fulfilling
existence. Like the kind of art he espouses, the Prior’s lifestyle does not take basic human needs
into account. (Indeed, as we know, even the Prior finds his own precepts impossible to follow.)
The anything-goes morality of the Medicis rings equally hollow, as it involves only a series of
meaningless, hedonistic revels and shallow encounters. This Renaissance debate echoes the
schism in Victorian society, where moralists and libertines opposed each other in fierce
disagreement. Browning seems to assert that neither side holds the key to a good life. Yet he
concludes, as he does in other poems, that both positions, while flawed, can lead to high art:
art has no absolute connection to morality.

Themes

Multiple Perspectives on Single Events

The dramatic monologue verse form allowed Browning to explore and probe the minds of
specific characters in specific places struggling with specific sets of circumstances. In The Ring
and the Book, Browning tells a suspenseful story of murder using multiple voices, which give
multiple perspectives and multiple versions of the same story. Dramatic monologues allow
readers to enter into the minds of various characters and to see an event from that character’s
perspective. Understanding the thoughts, feelings, and motivations of a character not only gives
readers a sense of sympathy for the characters but also helps readers understand the multiplicity
of perspectives that make up the truth. In effect, Browning’s work reminds readers that the
nature of truth or reality fluctuates, depending on one’s perspective or view of the situation.
Multiple perspectives illustrate the idea that no one sensibility or perspective sees the whole
story and no two people see the same events in the same way. Browning further illustrated this
idea by writing poems that work together as companion pieces, such as “Fra Lippo Lippi” and
“Andrea del Sarto.” Poems such as these show how people with different characters respond
differently to similar situations, as well as depict how a time, place, and scenario can cause
people with similar personalities to develop or change quite dramatically.

The Purposes of Art

Browning wrote many poems about artists and poets, including such dramatic monologues as
“Pictor Ignotus” (1855) and “Fra Lippo Lippi.” Frequently, Browning would begin by thinking
about an artist, an artwork, or a type of art that he admired or disliked. Then he would speculate
on the character or artistic philosophy that would lead to such a success or failure. His dramatic
monologues about artists attempt to capture some of this philosophizing because his characters
speculate on the purposes of art. For instance, the speaker of “Fra Lippo Lippi” proposes that
art heightens our powers of observation and helps us notice things about our own lives.
According to some of these characters and poems, painting idealizes the beauty found in the
real world, such as the radiance of a beloved’s smile. Sculpture and architecture can
memorialize famous or important people, as in “The Bishop Orders His Tomb at Saint Praxed’s
Church” (1845) and “The Statue and the Bust” (1855). But art also helps its creators to make a
living, and it thus has a purpose as pecuniary as creative, an idea explored in “Andrea del
Sarto.”

The Relationship Between Art and Morality

Throughout his work, Browning tried to answer questions about an artist’s responsibilities and
to describe the relationship between art and morality. He questioned whether artists had an
obligation to be moral and whether artists should pass judgment on their characters and
creations. Unlike many of his contemporaries, Browning populated his poems with evil people,
who commit crimes and sins ranging from hatred to murder. The dramatic monologue format
allowed Browning to maintain a great distance between himself and his creations: by
channeling the voice of a character, Browning could explore evil without actually being evil
himself. His characters served as personae that let him adopt different traits and tell stories
about horrible situations. In “My Last Duchess,” the speaker gets away with his wife’s murder
since neither his audience (in the poem) nor his creator judges or criticizes him. Instead, the
responsibility of judging the character’s morality is left to readers, who find the duke of Ferrara
a vicious, repugnant person even as he takes us on a tour of his art gallery.

Robert Browning’s Fra Lippo Lippi is a dramatic monologue, a genre Browning often used to
explore complex characters and psychological depth. It is a perfect text for undergraduate study
because it invites discussion on themes such as art, religion, and personal freedom. Here’s a
breakdown of the poem and some ways you can approach it:
Summary of Fra Lippo Lippi (1855):
The poem is narrated by Fra Lippo Lippi, a 15th-century monk and painter, who is speaking to
a guard after being caught out late at night. Through his speech, Lippo recounts his life story,
the struggles of being a monk, and his passion for art. He explains his views on painting, how
he feels constrained by the religious vows he took, and how he believes art should depict the
true nature of humanity, flaws and all.
Throughout the poem, Lippo expresses his belief that art should be an expression of life’s
realities rather than a depiction of idealized religious or saintly figures. He argues that the
human body, in all its imperfections, is worthy of being captured in art. His ideas about art
reflect the growing tensions between religious orthodoxy and artistic freedom during the
Renaissance.
Themes:
1. Art vs. Religion: Lippo’s views challenge the religious traditions of his time. While he
is a monk, he advocates for the naturalistic representation of human beings in art, which
conflicts with the religious idealization of saints and biblical figures. This theme opens
a conversation about the role of art in religious and societal contexts.
2. Freedom vs. Conformity: Lippo is a character who feels restricted by both the vows
of his monastic life and the constraints placed on him by religious expectations of art.
His passionate defense of painting what he sees, rather than idealized images of
holiness, can be seen as a critique of institutionalized religion and societal norms.
3. The Nature of Art: Lippo discusses his philosophy of painting, suggesting that art
should be about portraying the truth of life, including human flaws and imperfections.
This is a reflection of the Renaissance belief in humanism and the celebration of the
human experience, including the material and the sensual.
4. Conflict Between Individual and Authority: The poem shows Lippo's conflict with
the religious authorities, represented by the church and its expectations. His insistence
on artistic freedom reflects his desire to break free from oppressive authority, and his
belief that art should be a form of self-expression.
5. The Role of the Artist: Lippo reflects on the purpose of art and the role of the artist in
society. He sees himself not just as a servant of the church but as someone who brings
the divine to life by painting the human form in all its complexity.
Character Analysis:
Fra Lippo Lippi is a complex character. On one hand, he is a devout monk who has taken
religious vows, but on the other, he is a passionate, sensual artist who rebels against the
constraints of his life in the monastery. His speech reveals his inner conflict between his duties
as a monk and his desire for artistic freedom. Through his monologue, Browning gives us an
insight into the artist’s psyche, one that is torn between the sacred and the secular.
Literary Devices:
1. Dramatic Monologue: As a dramatic monologue, the poem is spoken by a single
character (Fra Lippo) who reveals his personality, thoughts, and emotions through his
speech. The reader gains insight into his inner struggles and philosophies.
2. Irony: There is a strong element of irony in the poem. Lippo, a monk, speaks with a
sort of irreverence toward the religious institutions and ideals he is supposed to uphold.
His candid attitude toward both art and life stands in contrast to his position within the
religious order.
3. Colloquial Speech: Browning uses informal, conversational language to reflect
Lippo’s personality. His speech is full of digressions, interruptions, and humor, giving
him a lively, vivid voice.
4. Vivid Imagery: The poem contains strong visual descriptions, particularly when Lippo
discusses painting. His words often paint pictures themselves, describing the human
body and the landscapes he wishes to portray with a painter’s eye.
5. Philosophical Dialogue: Lippo’s monologue is more than just a personal confession;
it is also a philosophical discourse on art, religion, and life. Through his reflections,
Browning invites the reader to think about the nature of creation and the role of the
artist.
Approaching Fra Lippo Lippi for Undergraduates:
1. Historical Context: Understanding the context of the Renaissance and the tensions
between the Catholic Church and the emerging ideas of individualism and humanism
will provide depth to your analysis. Lippo’s views can be connected to the humanist
movement that celebrated human nature and the study of the classical world.
2. Analyzing the Monologue: Since it’s a dramatic monologue, focus on Lippo’s
character traits. What does his speech tell you about his personality? Is he self-
justifying? Does he come across as rebellious, naive, or simply misunderstood?
3. Philosophy of Art: Explore Lippo’s philosophy on art. He suggests that painting should
capture the human form in its natural state, flaws and all. What does this suggest about
the relationship between art and truth? You might compare Lippo’s views with other
artistic movements, like the Romantic or Modernist emphasis on individual expression.
4. Religious Tension: There’s an ongoing tension in the poem between religious duty and
personal desire. Lippo, as a monk, is supposed to live a life of piety and devotion, but
his passion for art and his desire to paint the human form clash with these ideals. How
does this tension reveal broader conflicts between religion and personal freedom?
5. Browning’s Use of Humor: Browning uses humor to lighten Lippo’s serious
reflections. For example, Lippo’s rambling nature and his frequent diversions make his
monologue engaging but also reveal his impulsive, almost rebellious nature. How does
Browning use humor to make Lippo’s personality stand out?
 THE LADY OF SHALOTT ALFRED TENNYSON
Alfred Lord Tennyson (1809-1892) is one of the most prominent English poets and is, even
today, both read and cherished by a big audience. Tennyson's early writing is clearly inspired
by the Romantic tradition, though most of his work was published during the Victorian period.
"The Lady of Shalott" is one of his most famous poems, and was published in Tennyson's first
collection of poems in 1832.

The Lady of Shalott, narrative poem in four sections by Alfred, Lord Tennyson, published in
1832 and revised for his 1842 collection Poems.
Typically Victorian in its exaltation of an imprisoned maiden who dies for a chaste love, the
poem tells of Elaine of Arthurian legend, shut in her father’s coldly beautiful castle on the
island of Shalott. Tennyson evokes his heroine’s dreamlike, monotonous life through
incantatory rhyme and metre.

Alfred, Lord Tennyson (born August 6, 1809, Somersby, Lincolnshire, England—died

October 6, 1892, Aldworth, Surrey) was an English poet often regarded as the chief
representative of the Victorian age in poetry. He was raised to the peerage in 1884.
Tennyson was the fourth of 12 children, born into an old Lincolnshire family, his father a rector.
Alfred, with two of his brothers, Frederick and Charles, was sent in 1815 to Louth grammar
school—where he was unhappy. He left in 1820, but, though home conditions were difficult,
his father managed to give him a wide literary education. Alfred was precocious, and before
his teens he had composed in the styles of Alexander Pope, Sir Walter Scott, and John Milton.
To his youth also belongs The Devil and the Lady (a collection of previously unpublished
poems published posthumously in 1930), which shows an astonishing understanding of
Elizabethan dramatic verse. Lord Byron was a dominant influence on the young Tennyson.
At the lonely rectory in Somersby the children were thrown upon their own resources. All
writers on Tennyson emphasize the influence of the Lincolnshire countryside on his poetry: the
plain, the sea about his home, “the sand-built ridge of heaped hills that mound the sea,” and
“the waste enormous marsh.”
In 1824 the health of Tennyson’s father began to break down, and he took refuge in drink.
Alfred, though depressed by unhappiness at home, continued to write, collaborating with
Frederick and Charles in Poems by Two Brothers (1826; dated 1827). His contributions (more
than half the volume) are mostly in fashionable styles of the day.
In 1827 Alfred and Charles joined Frederick at Trinity College, Cambridge. There Alfred made
friends with Arthur Hallam, the gifted son of the historian Henry Hallam. This was the deepest
friendship of Tennyson’s life. The friends became members of the Apostles,
an exclusive undergraduate club of earnest intellectual interests. Tennyson’s reputation as a
poet increased at Cambridge. In 1829 he won the chancellor’s gold medal with a poem
called Timbuctoo. In 1830 Poems, Chiefly Lyrical was published; and in the same year
Tennyson, Hallam, and other Apostles went to Spain to help in the unsuccessful revolution
against Ferdinand VII. In the meantime, Hallam had become attached to Tennyson’s sister
Emily but was forbidden by her father to correspond with her for a year.
In 1832 Tennyson published another volume of his poems (dated 1833), including “The Lotos-
Eaters,” “The Palace of Art,” and “The Lady of Shalott.” Among them was a satirical epigram
on the critic Christopher North (pseudonym of the Scottish writer John Wilson), who had
attacked Poems, Chiefly Lyrical in Blackwood’s Magazine. Tennyson’s sally prompted a
scathing attack on his new volume in the Quarterly Review. The attacks distressed Tennyson,
but he continued to revise his old poems and compose new ones.

Themes in The Lady of Shalott

The Victorian Ideal of Womanhood: In many ways, the Lady’s situation is evocative of the
status of women in Victorian England and subtly criticizes their lack of agency. The image of
a lady in a tower acts as a metaphor for the woman who is locked away from society in order
to protect her purity. The Lady’s options in the poem amount to either remaining in the tower,
lonely and “half-sick of shadows,” or risking a curse through interacting with society. The scene
where the Lady looks out at Lancelot can be read as her proverbial “fall from grace.” Just as
the slightest rumor of impropriety would have resulted in social ruin for a Victorian woman,
the Lady dies for her small exertion of choice and curiosity.
The Isolated Artist and Society: The place of the artist in society has long been debated, and
one recurring trope is that art thrives in isolation and is sullied by social interaction and
obligation. The Lady of Shalott can be seen as an artist, for she creates a “magic web,” or
tapestry, based on the sights she sees in her mirror. At the beginning of the story, she “delights”
in this work and has no other cares but her art. However, as the story progresses, she begins to
express her dissatisfaction with her isolation and grows “half-sick of shadows”—sick of
creating images of life without actually participating in it. She eventually looks out at Camelot
only to have her art fly out the window, symbolizing the central conflict between the artist’s
need for solitude and the human desire for connection.
The Supernatural: Though the source is never explicitly defined or acknowledged, the poem
contains a supernatural undercurrent. The Lady’s life is ruled by a curse of unknown origin that
forbids her from interacting with the world outside of her tower. She spends her days weaving
a “magic web” based on the sights she sees in her mirror, a kind of supernatural craft. In both
instances in which someone directly reacts to the Lady, it is with a sense of fear or awe: the
reapers dub her a “fairy” and the knights of Camelot cross themselves out of fear. The
perception of the supernatural serves as a barrier between the Lady and human connection,
isolating her not only physically but also conceptually.
Freedom Comes at a Cost: Regardless of the lens with which readers approach “The Lady of
Shalott,” the concept of freedom is a recurrent end goal. The Lady is isolated in a tower and
subject to a curse that tells her she cannot look at Camelot except in her mirror. The essential
idea is that she is restricted, unable to pursue something that she wants. The price of looking
out the window at Camelot, as the Lady finds out, is death. Whether it is the Victorian woman
seeking social agency, the artist reaching for human connection, or an ostracized person looking
for social acceptance, the choice is the same: remain safely ensconced in the lonely tower, or
chase freedom at the cost of life itself.
Part I: The poem begins with a description of a river and a road that pass through long fields
of barley and rye before reaching the town of Camelot. The people of the town travel along the
road and look toward an island called Shalott, which lies further down the river. The island of
Shalott contains several plants and flowers, including lilies, aspens, and willows. On the island,
a woman known as the Lady of Shalott is imprisoned within a building made of “four gray
walls and four gray towers.” Both “heavy barges” and light open boats sail along the edge of
the river to Camelot. But has anyone seen or heard of the lady who lives on the island in the
river? Only the reapers who harvest the barley hear the echo of her singing. At night, the tired
reaper listens to her singing and whispers that he hears her: “ ‘Tis the fairy Lady of Shalott.”
Part II: The Lady of Shalott weaves a magic, colorful web. She has heard a voice whisper that
a curse will befall her if she looks down to Camelot, and she does not know what this curse
would be. Thus, she concentrates solely on her weaving, never lifting her eyes. However, as
she weaves, a mirror hangs before her. In the mirror, she sees “shadows of the world,” including
the highway road, which also passes through the fields, the eddies in the river, and the peasants
of the town. Occasionally, she also sees a group of damsels, an abbot (church official), a young
shepherd, or a page dressed in crimson. She sometimes sights a pair of knights riding by, though
she has no loyal knight of her own to court her. Nonetheless, she enjoys her solitary weaving,
though she expresses frustration with the world of shadows when she glimpses a funeral
procession or a pair of newlyweds in the mirror.
Part III: A knight in brass armor (“brazen greaves”) comes riding through the fields of barley
beside Shalott; the sun shines on his armor and makes it sparkle. As he rides, the gems on his
horse’s bridle glitter like a constellation of stars, and the bells on the bridle ring. The knight
hangs a bugle from his sash, and his armor makes ringing noises as he gallops alongside the
remote island of Shalott. In the “blue, unclouded weather,” the jewels on the knight’s saddle
shine, making him look like a meteor in the purple sky. His forehead glows in the sunlight, and
his black curly hair flows out from under his helmet. As he passes by the river, his image flashes
into the Lady of Shalott’s mirror and he sings out “tirra lirra.” Upon seeing and hearing this
knight, the Lady stops weaving her web and abandons her loom. The web flies out from the
loom, and the mirror cracks, and the Lady announces the arrival of her doom: “The curse is
come upon me.”
Part IV: As the sky breaks out in rain and storm, the Lady of Shalott descends from her tower
and finds a boat. She writes the words “The Lady of Shalott” around the boat’s bow and looks
downstream to Camelot like a prophet foreseeing his own misfortunes. In the evening, she lies
down in the boat, and the stream carries her to Camelot. The Lady of Shalott wears a snowy
white robe and sings her last song as she sails down to Camelot. She sings until her blood
freezes, her eyes darken, and she dies. When her boat sails silently into Camelot, all the knights,
lords, and ladies of Camelot emerge from their halls to behold the sight. They read her name
on the bow and “cross...themselves for fear.” Only the great knight Lancelot is bold enough to
push aside the crowd, look closely at the dead maiden, and remark “She has a lovely face; God
in his mercy lend her grace.” Form The poem is divided into four numbered parts with discrete,
isometric (equally-long) stanzas. The first two parts contain four stanzas each, while the last
two parts contain five. Each of the four parts ends at the moment when description yields to
directly quoted speech: this speech first takes the form of the reaper’s whispering identification,
then of the Lady’s half-sick lament, then of the Lady’s pronouncement of her doom, and finally,
of Lancelot’s blessing. Each stanza contains nine lines with the rhyme scheme AAAABCCCB.
The “B” always stands for “Camelot” in the fifth line and for “Shalott” in the ninth. The “A”
and “C” lines are always in tetrameter, while the “B” lines are in trimeter. In addition, the
syntax is line-bound: most phrases do not extend past the length of a single line. Commentary
Originally written in 1832, this poem was later revised, and published in its final form in 1842.
Tennyson claimed that he had based it on an old Italian romance, though the poem also bears
much similarity to the story of the Maid of Astolat in Malory’s Morte d’Arthur. As in Malory’s
account, Tennyson’s lyric includes references to the Arthurian legend; moreover, “Shalott”
seems quite close to Malory’s “Astolat.” Much of the poem’s charm stems from its sense of
mystery and elusiveness; of course, these aspects also complicate the task of analysis. That
said, most scholars understand “The Lady of Shalott” to be about the conflict between art and
life. The Lady, who weaves her magic web and sings her song in a remote tower, can be seen
to represent the contemplative artist isolated from the bustle and activity of daily life. The
moment she sets her art aside to gaze down on the real world, a curse befalls her and she meets
her tragic death. The poem thus captures the conflict between an artist’s desire for social
involvement and his/her doubts about whether such a commitment is viable for someone
dedicated to art. The poem may also express a more personal dilemma for Tennyson as a
specific artist: while he felt an obligation to seek subject matter outside the world of his own
mind and his own immediate experiences—to comment on politics, history, or a more general
humanity—he also feared that this expansion into broader territories might destroy his poetry’s
magic.
Part I and Part IV of this poem deal with the Lady of Shalott as she appears to the outside
world, whereas Part II and Part III describe the world from the Lady’s perspective. In Part I,
Tennyson portrays the Lady as secluded from the rest of the world by both water and the height
of her tower. We are not told how she spends her time or what she thinks about; thus we, too,
like everyone in the poem, are denied access to the interiority of her world. Interestingly, the
only people who know that she exists are those whose occupations are most diametrically
opposite her own: the reapers who toil in physical labor rather than by sitting and crafting
works of beauty.
Part II describes the Lady’s experience of imprisonment from her own perspective. We learn
that her alienation results from a mysterious curse: she is not allowed to look out on Camelot,
so all her knowledge of the world must come from the reflections and shadows in her mirror.
(It was common for weavers to use mirrors to see the progress of their tapestries from the side
that would eventually be displayed to the viewer.) Tennyson notes that often she sees a funeral
or a wedding, a disjunction that suggests the interchangeability, and hence the conflation, of
love and death for the Lady: indeed, when she later falls in love with Lancelot, she will
simultaneously bring upon her own death. Whereas Part II makes reference to all the different
types of people that the Lady sees through her mirror, including the knights who “come riding
two and two” (line 61),
Part III focuses on one particular knight who captures the Lady’s attention: Sir Lancelot. This
dazzling knight is the hero of the King Arthur stories, famous for his illicit affair with the
beautiful Queen Guinevere. He is described in an array of colors: he is a “red-cross knight”;
his shield “sparkled on the yellow field”; he wears a “silver bugle”; he passes through “blue
unclouded weather” and the “purple night,” and he has “coal-black curls.” He is also adorned
in a “gemmy bridle” and other bejeweled garments, which sparkle in the light. Yet in spite of
the rich visual details that Tennyson provides, it is the sound and not the sight of Lancelot that
causes the Lady of Shalott to transgress her set boundaries: only when she hears him sing “Tirra
lirra” does she leave her web and seal her doom. The intensification of the Lady’s experiences
in this part of the poem is marked by the shift from the static, descriptive present tense of Parts
I and II to the dynamic, active past of Parts III and IV.
In Part IV, all the lush color of the previous section gives way to “pale yellow” and “darkened”
eyes, and the brilliance of the sunlight is replaced by a “low sky raining.” The moment the
Lady sets her art aside to look upon Lancelot, she is seized with death. The end of her artistic
isolation thus leads to the end of creativity: “Out flew her web and floated wide” (line 114).
She also loses her mirror, which had been her only access to the outside world: “The mirror
cracked from side to side” (line 115). Her turn to the outside world thus leaves her bereft both
of her art object and of the instrument of her craft—and of her very life. Yet perhaps the greatest
curse of all is that although she surrenders herself to the sight of Lancelot, she dies completely
unappreciated by him. The poem ends with the tragic triviality of Lancelot’s response to her
tremendous passion: all he has to say about her is that “she has a lovely face” (line 169). Having
abandoned her artistry, the Lady of Shalott becomes herself an art object; no longer can she
offer her creativity, but merely a “dead-pale” beauty (line 157).

Themes
Artistic Isolation: “The Lady of Shalott” is often taken as a metaphor for artistic isolation—the idea
that an artist must distance themselves from the world in order to truthfully depict it in their work.
Here, the titular Lady is confined to a fairy-tale tower, where she endlessly weaves a gorgeous tapestry
and watches the world go by in a magic mirror. She’s under a mysterious curse, and only finds out what
it is when she looks away from her work and out her window into the real world. The things she sees
there—the gorgeous Sir Lancelot and the bustling, commercial, everyday world of Camelot—spell her
doom. The Lady’s curse, which demands that she focus all her attention on images, is the curse of the
artist, for whom observing the world can make fully experiencing the world impossible.

The Lady is not any old knitter, but an adept weaver who makes beautiful tapestries of the
images she sees in a magic mirror that indirectly shows her the world passing by outside. She
seems to take pleasure in her artistry, but feels trapped by it, too; while she “delights” in making
her tapestries, she is also “half sick of shadows,” tired of only seeing the world through the lens
of her artistic vision. In creating woven images of reflected images, she is at once deeply
engaged with the world and painfully cut off from it.
And while she knows she’s cursed, she has no idea what her curse actually is (though she knows
it will take hold if she looks toward Camelot). She thus stays at her loom, reveling in her skill,
but also imprisoned by it.
It’s only when she looks out her window to see the handsome knight Sir Lancelot, rather than
an image of him, that her mirror cracks and her weaving tears itself off its loom.
Connecting with the solid, physical world—even from a distance—is thus enough to break the
Lady’s vision-granting mirror and to destroy her artistry. The Lady’s desire for Lancelot (who
might represent not only the normal human pleasures of sex, but the lure of glory and fame),
can’t coexist with the Lady’s pure art-making.
The mirror and tapestry also seem to be a part of the Lady herself: as soon as they’re broken,
she feels herself beginning to die. Her final act is to get out of her tower and arrange herself in
a boat so her corpse will drift downriver to Camelot. Yet even in this last effort to put herself
into the world, the Lady still works like an artist: she inscribes her name on the boat like a title,
arranges her own body like an artwork, and sings as she dies. The curse keeps her trapped
within a world of distanced art-making even as she leaves her cloistered tower.
The Lady of Shalott’s gift is thus also her tragedy. She is able to represent the truth and beauty
of the world through gorgeous images, but can’t touch the glories her images represent. Her
life is so bound up in art-making that she can’t survive reality. Some of Tennyson’s own anxiety
about being an artist might appear here, of course. He, too, was a weaver—of words rather than
threads.

Victorian Women's Sexuality: It’s not just plain curiosity that at last pulls the Lady away from
her loom, but also sexuality—in the form of the dreamy Sir Lancelot riding by. Sexuality here
is presented as an image of deep involvement in the world, and therefore as the strongest
possible temptation. It’s also something dangerous, the poem suggests, destroying not just the
Lady herself but also the art she makes.
Of course, that the Lady is a lady speaks to a particularly Victorian anxiety
about women’s sexuality, which was heavily policed: for Victorian women, virginity was
idealized, and desire demonized. The poem suggests that such repression is fated to fail,
however, and that restrained sexuality becomes a destructive force when it inevitably breaks
through.
Even before Lancelot’s arrival, there are hints that the Lady feels the absence of sexuality in
her life as the greatest burden of her isolation. While she’s described as taking “delight” in her
solitary weaving, the poem also notes that there’s no lover for her. When she finally declares
that she’s “half-sick of shadows,” it’s a vision of two young newlyweds that provokes her. The
sight of joyful lovers, presumably dashing off to consummate their marriage, is the outer-world
vision that has the strongest power over the Lady.
Sir Lancelot’s appearance is described with loving care. He’s both an idealized and an
eroticized vision of masculinity, and it’s his beauty that moves the lady to action. The Lady
observes, not just his shining armor (representing his chivalrous virtues) and his lovely singing
voice, but also his long curling hair. He seems to her to emit light like a meteor.
The instant he appears in the mirror, the Lady springs to her feet and rushes to the window.
Lancelot physically compels her, making her body act before her mind can slow her down.
Women’s bodies, this scene suggests, won’t accept unnatural restraints forever—and may break
loose of the cultural superego's mental grip, expressing a destructive power.
The “curse” that falls on the Lady might thus be read as the curse of sexuality itself. The Lady
never gets to fulfill her love for Lancelot. He only meets her after her death, when he remarks
on her “lovely face.” In this, she’s rather like a classic Sleeping Beauty—a woman whose
sexuality is utterly passive and frozen. However, considering that “dying” can be a euphemism
for orgasm, there may be a hint here that the Lady is fulfilled—but that her fulfillment destroys
her artistry and everything she’s known.
The poem’s anxiety about sexuality is thus stuck in the tension between the pain of sexual
starvation and the destructiveness of sexual fulfillment. The Lady—like Victorian
Englishwomen in general—is damned if she does and damned if she doesn’t. The speaker’s
sympathy for her provides a critique of this dilemma at the same time as it links restrained,
virginal sexual energy with purity of artistic intent.

Poetic Devices
Alliteration
Alliteration is a common device in poetry, and it draws attention to itself; the more alliterative
a poem gets, the more deliberately crafted it feels. The heavy use of alliteration in "The Lady
of Shalott" (so heavy we haven't marked anything close to every instance of it in this guide)
thus fits right in with the poem's interest in the nature of art itself. All those repeated sounds
never let the reader forget that they're reading a poem, woven artfully from words as the Lady's
tapestry is woven artfully from threads.
There's a particularly strong example in the first stanza of Part II, lines 37-45, where the speaker
first introduces the Lady to the reader directly. These lines use heavy alliteration on the /w/
sound with words like "weave," "web," and "whisper," linking together the hushed secrecy of
the curse with the repetitive hushed sounds of weaving. The poem here also uses hard /k/
sounds to connect the tapestry's "colours" with the Lady's "curse," and with "Camelot" itself.
Here, alliteration evokes the rhythmic, repetitive quiet of the Lady's weaving, and at the same
time gives the reader the sense that the Lady's artistic gifts and her curse of isolation are tangled
up together. The echoing sounds are both evocative and meaningful.
Something similar happens in the beginning of Part III, when Sir Lancelot makes his
appearance. Lines 73-108 are riddled with alliterative /b/, /g/, and /r/ sounds: the
"gemmy bridle" that "glitter'd" like a "branch" of the "golden Galaxy" is just one example. The
description of the knight is seductively gorgeous, but the sounds are punchy, evoking both the
knight's effect on the Lady and his eventual effect on her magic mirror. Lancelot's beauty is a
full-force KO, and its sounds echo its power.

Structure and Form

‘The Lady of Shalott‘ is structured into 19 stanzas, each containing 9 lines, and divided into
four parts. This segmented structure helps to methodically narrate the tale of the Lady of
Shalott, from her isolated life to her tragic demise. The form is unique, not adhering to any
conventional pattern, yet it evokes the ballad tradition, which aligns with its storytelling nature.
The poem employs a distinctive AAAABCCCB rhyme scheme throughout its stanzas. This
unique pattern, devised by Tennyson, creates a sense of imbalance and tension, mirroring the
Lady’s isolation and eventual fate. The rhyme scheme’s regularity contrasts with the
unpredictability of the meter, contributing to the poem’s haunting musicality and sense of
inevitability.
This poem holds significant critical acclaim in Tennyson's oeuvre and Victorian literature. It
draws from the Italian novelette 'Donna di Scalotta,' fairy tale books while containing numerous
allusions to other texts. The Lady cursed to view the world only through a mirror symbolizes
artistic confinement and isolation as Tennyson explores artists' role in Victorian society. The
poet distinguishes himself from the Lady by ending the poem with Lancelot's voice, showing
artists' ability to isolate and mingle in society. The poem exemplifies Tennyson's mastery of
rhythm, meter, language, and presentation of myth with deeper personal and societal concerns,
solidifying his reputation as a preeminent Victorian poet.

Alfred, Lord Tennyson's The Lady of Shalott is a lyrical ballad that tells the tragic story of a
woman trapped in a tower, cursed to only observe the world through a mirror and weave what
she sees into a tapestry. The poem explores themes of isolation, art, love, and the tension
between reality and perception. It is rich in symbolism and offers a lot to analyze, especially
for undergraduate students.
Summary of The Lady of Shalott (1832, 1842):
The Lady of Shalott lives in a tower on an island in a river, isolated from the world. She is
cursed, and the curse dictates that she can only view the world through a mirror and must weave
what she sees into a tapestry. She is forbidden from directly looking out of the window at the
outside world.
One day, she sees Sir Lancelot riding by and is so captivated by his beauty that she forgets the
curse and looks directly out of the window. As soon as she does this, the mirror cracks, and the
curse is triggered. She leaves her tower, gets into a boat, and drifts down the river to Camelot,
where she dies. Lancelot, seeing her lifeless body, remarks on her beauty but does not recognize
her or her tragic fate.
Themes:
1. Isolation and Confinement: The Lady of Shalott is physically isolated in her tower,
and her curse keeps her mentally and emotionally detached from the world. This theme
of isolation could be seen as a metaphor for the creative artist who is separated from
the real world in order to create. It also reflects the role of women in Victorian society,
constrained by societal expectations and roles.
2. Art, Creation, and Reality: The Lady's curse forces her to only experience the world
indirectly through a mirror, and she can only create art (her tapestry) based on this
limited view. This can be interpreted as a comment on the nature of art, creativity, and
the limits of an artist's ability to truly capture reality. The tension between imagination
and reality, and the idea of art as a reflection of the world, is central to the poem.
3. The Forbidden Desire and Consequences: The Lady’s decision to look directly out
of the window at Lancelot represents the moment she allows herself to experience life
beyond her artistic creation, stepping out of the passive role dictated by her curse. Her
decision to follow her desire leads to her downfall, illustrating the Victorian tension
between repressed desire and the consequences of breaking societal norms.
 4. Death and Beauty: The Lady’s death is a key part of the poem’s tragic resolution.
Tennyson uses death as a symbol of the consequences of disobedience and the
unattainable nature of true love. Her beauty is emphasized in her death, which further
raises questions about the superficial and fleeting nature of both beauty and love.
5. The Role of Women: The Lady of Shalott is a character who is confined by society’s
expectations of women in the Victorian era. She is expected to remain passive, isolated,
and removed from direct participation in the world. Her ultimate decision to break free
from these confines can be read as a critique of the restrictive roles women were often
forced into.
6. The Heroic and the Idealized: Sir Lancelot represents the idealized, unattainable hero.
His beauty and nobility captivate the Lady, but he is unaware of her existence, which
speaks to the theme of unattainable desires and the idealized nature of romantic figures
in the Victorian era.
Character Analysis:
• The Lady of Shalott: The central character is an enigmatic figure. She is both passive
and active, confined by her curse but eventually taking action by defying it. The Lady
represents the artist, isolated from the real world, and her decision to act can be seen as
an attempt to escape her confined role. She is a tragic figure, whose beauty and desire
for freedom lead to her downfall.
• Sir Lancelot: Lancelot represents the idealized male hero, distant and unattainable. He
does not notice the Lady or her tragic fate, embodying the idea of unattainable love and
the indifference of the world to the suffering of individuals.
Literary Devices:
1. Imagery: Tennyson uses vivid and detailed imagery to create a sense of the Lady’s
environment, her isolation, and her eventual departure. The contrast between the bright
world outside the tower and the dull, confined space inside her room is stark and adds
to the poem’s atmosphere of entrapment.
2. Symbolism:
o The Mirror: The mirror symbolizes the limited and distorted view of reality
that the Lady experiences. It also represents the boundary between the passive
and active, as she can only experience life through reflection and not directly.
o The Tapestry: The tapestry represents the Lady’s artistic creation, a reflection
of the world she can never fully experience. It is a symbol of both her creativity
and her passive role in society.
o The River: The river symbolizes the flow of life, and the Lady’s journey down
the river represents her transition from isolation to her tragic end.
3. Repetition: The poem uses repetition to create rhythm and emphasize key ideas, such
as the Lady's fate and the consequences of looking out the window. The refrain of "The
Lady of Shalott" and the repeated references to the mirror help reinforce the theme of
isolation.
 4. Alliteration and Assonance: Tennyson uses alliteration and assonance to create
musicality and a sense of flow. These devices also enhance the mood of the poem,
making it more lyrical and haunting.
5. Ballad Form: The poem is written in a narrative ballad form, with quatrains that
alternate between iambic tetrameter and iambic trimeter. The form helps to convey a
sense of storytelling and gives the poem a rhythmic, flowing quality.
Approaching The Lady of Shalott for Undergraduates:
1. Historical and Literary Context: The poem was written during the Victorian period,
a time when the roles of women were heavily restricted. Understanding the social
context of the era, particularly the idealization of womanhood and the limitations placed
on women, will help in analyzing the themes of isolation and freedom in the poem.
2. Thematic Exploration: You can focus on the themes of desire, isolation, and the
conflict between art and reality. The Lady’s fate can be linked to the consequences of
breaking free from societal constraints and the tension between artistic creation and the
experience of life.
3. Symbolism: Analyzing the symbolism in the poem can be fruitful. What do the mirror,
tapestry, and river represent in the context of the Lady’s life and her eventual death?
How does Tennyson use these symbols to explore larger themes?
4. Gender and Victorian Expectations: The poem provides an interesting lens through
which to explore the expectations placed on women in Victorian society. The Lady of
Shalott’s fate is often interpreted as a critique of the limited roles available to women
during this period. Her ultimate act of defiance could be seen as a metaphor for the
struggle for autonomy and self-expression.
 ULYSSES
Alfred, Lord Tennyson’s Ulysses (1833, published in 1842) is one of the most famous dramatic
monologues in English literature. It reflects the voice of the aging Greek hero Ulysses (the
Latin name for Odysseus) as he looks back on his past adventures and expresses his desire for
continued exploration and purpose, despite his old age. The poem offers rich material for
analysis, particularly in terms of its themes of heroism, desire for action, and existential
purpose.
Summary of Ulysses (1842):
In Tennyson’s Ulysses, the speaker is Ulysses himself, now an old king who has returned to his
homeland of Ithaca after his long journey, as told in Homer’s Odyssey. He reflects on his
previous adventures and expresses discontent with the mundane and passive life he now leads.
Ulysses speaks with longing for the days of his heroic exploits and the thrill of adventure. His
inner conflict emerges as he acknowledges the responsibilities of ruling Ithaca and caring for
his son, Telemachus, but he ultimately yearns for action, for the sea, and for the pursuit of
knowledge and experience.
Ulysses addresses his comrades and declares his intention to set out again, emphasizing that he
will not live a life of complacency. He rejects the quiet life of old age and declares that “It is
not too late to seek a newer world.” Ulysses insists that “life is not about sitting idle” and that
"death" should be met while striving for a goal. The poem ends with Ulysses proclaiming that
he will die seeking new horizons and new adventures.
Themes:
1. The Quest for Meaning and Purpose: A major theme in the poem is Ulysses’ continual
search for meaning. Even in his old age, he is dissatisfied with the passive life of a ruler.
His desire to journey again, to experience and seek knowledge, represents the human
yearning for purpose and fulfillment. Tennyson explores the idea that life should not
simply be about growing old in a state of passivity, but about pursuing something
greater and continuing to strive.
2. Heroism and the Spirit of Adventure: Ulysses embodies the archetype of the heroic
figure, and in the poem, his desire for adventure is central. His heroic past is a source
of pride, and he contrasts this with the dull, predictable life he now faces. He rejects the
idea that old age should stop him from pursuing challenges, representing the timeless
human desire for adventure and discovery.
3. Old Age and Mortality: Ulysses’ reflection on his own aging is poignant. He is fully
aware of his physical limitations, but he remains unwilling to accept a life of retirement
or quietude. The tension between the inevitability of aging and the refusal to accept it
leads to his decision to continue seeking new horizons. The poem grapples with the idea
of mortality and the human desire to maintain agency and purpose despite the approach
of death.
4. Generational Conflict: Ulysses acknowledges that his son, Telemachus, is better
suited to rule Ithaca, as he is steady, just, and responsible. However, Ulysses shows
little interest in the quiet, stable life of governance. The contrast between father and son
highlights the generational difference in attitudes towards leadership and purpose.
 Ulysses represents the restless, adventurous spirit, while Telemachus embodies the
more traditional, stable, and dutiful qualities of leadership.
5. The Power of the Will: Ulysses’ declaration that he will continue seeking adventure
“to the end” suggests a belief in the strength of the human will. Even in the face of
death, Ulysses asserts that it is the pursuit of knowledge and experience that gives life
its value. This speaks to the Victorian ethos of the importance of individual willpower
and determination.
Character Analysis:
• Ulysses: In this poem, Ulysses is portrayed as a complex character—a hero who has
lived through incredible challenges but refuses to settle into old age. He is dissatisfied
with the stability of life in Ithaca and seeks meaning in further adventures. Ulysses is a
character driven by an insatiable desire for knowledge, discovery, and achievement. His
boldness and refusal to accept age as a limit make him a symbol of the human longing
for perpetual growth and experience.
However, his rejection of the present in favor of a mythical past also raises questions about the
cost of heroism and the consequences of unrelenting ambition. Ulysses’ refusal to rest might
be seen as a refusal to accept the full passage of time and its effects.
• Telemachus: Although Telemachus is mentioned only briefly, his role as Ulysses’ son
represents the stable, responsible life that Ulysses rejects. Telemachus is seen as the
ideal ruler of Ithaca, someone who has the virtues necessary for leadership. He contrasts
with his father in terms of his ability to govern and his temperament. While Ulysses
seeks excitement, Telemachus seeks duty and responsibility.
Literary Devices:
1. Dramatic Monologue: The poem is a dramatic monologue, where Ulysses speaks
directly to the reader. Through his speech, Tennyson reveals Ulysses’ personality,
thoughts, and desires. The dramatic monologue form allows readers to understand
Ulysses’ inner conflict and his deep dissatisfaction with his current life.
2. Imagery: Tennyson uses vivid imagery to convey Ulysses’ restless nature and his
longing for adventure. For example, the image of the "sail" in the line “It is not too late
to seek a newer world” creates an image of Ulysses setting out on a new journey. The
description of “the long day wanes” brings to mind the inevitability of aging,
contrasting with Ulysses’ desire to continue living with vigor.
3. Metaphor: The “road” or "sail" metaphor in the poem suggests a journey, both literal
and metaphorical. The image of seeking a "newer world" emphasizes the constant quest
for personal fulfillment and discovery that defines Ulysses’ character.
4. Repetition: The repetition of the idea of “seeking a newer world” and the phrase "To
strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield" at the end of the poem serves to emphasize
Ulysses’ determination. It echoes the idea of life as a continuous quest for meaning,
knowledge, and growth.
5. Allusion to Homer’s Odyssey: Tennyson’s Ulysses alludes to Homer’s Odyssey, where
Ulysses’ long voyage home is central to the narrative. In Tennyson’s poem, however,
 the journey is not physical but psychological and emotional, reflecting Ulysses’ longing
for further experiences, even after his return.

“Ulysses” Introduction
"Ulysses" was written in 1833 by Alfred Lord Tennyson, the future Poet Laureate of Great
Britain. The poem takes the form of a dramatic monologue spoken by Ulysses, a character who
also appears in Homer's Greek epic The Odyssey and Dante's Italian epic the Inferno (Ulysses
is the Latinized name of Odysseus). In The Odyssey, Ulysses/Odysseus struggles to return
home, but in Tennyson's "Ulysses," an aged Ulysses is frustrated with domestic life and yearns
to set sail again and continue exploring the world. Dante seems to condemn Ulysses's
recklessness as an explorer, but in Tennyson's poem, there is nobility and heroism in Ulysses'
boundless curiosity and undaunted spirit.

Themes:
Mortality and Aging: From the poem’s beginning, Ulysses unhappily confronts his old age and
impending death. He responds not by settling down to rest, but by striving to relive his adventurous
younger days. While he admits by the poem's end that age has weakened him, he resolves to use
whatever is left of his youthful heroism as he sets out on one last journey. For Ulysses, the honorable
response to time and mortality is not to calmly accept old age and death, but rather to resist them—
to wring every last drop of knowledge and adventure out of life, even if doing so may result in dying
sooner.

Ulysses begins by reflecting discontentedly on the fact that he is now an old man, stuck ruling
at home rather than traveling the world. Ulysses finds no joy in being king. It “little profits”
him. Rather than finding meaning in serving his people, he merely feels “idle.” He is also less
than happy, it seems, to be growing old. He speaks of his wife dismissively as “aged,” and if
he dislikes her growing older, he probably dislikes growing older himself. Finally, he is
discontented because he “cannot rest from travel.” Rather than embracing his duties as king—
essentially, putting away his youthful ambitions—he wishes he was still exploring the world as
he did when he was a young man. For Ulysses, settling down isn’t restful and restorative but
rather stifling, an unwelcome reminder of his impending mortality.
Common wisdom would suggest that the aging Ulysses take it easy in order to prolong his life,
but this isn’t what he wants. Ulysses declares that it is disgraceful to “store and hoard” himself,
sitting safely in one place just to extend his life “[f]or some three suns.” Such a dull life isn’t
worth living. Thus although Ulysses’s spirit is “gray,” or aged, he still wishes to travel and
“follow knowledge” as much as ever.
At the poem’s end, Ulysses calls on his former crewmates to join him on a final, dangerous
voyage to see the “untravell’d world.” He admits that they are older and weaker but insists that
the only noble response to time and mortality is to defy them both. If he must die, he will die
with as much of his youthful heroism as he can. Ulysses acknowledges, “you and I are old,”
but insists that age does not mean the end of heroism: “Old age hath yet his honor.” Honor
doesn’t come from accepting a new way of life in old age, he argues; it comes from doing all
you can to recapture your youth. These men “strove with Gods” when they were young, and
Ulysses now wants to find “[s]ome work of noble note” that is similarly heroic.
Likewise, although he acknowledges that “much is taken” from their abilities, Ulysses
emphasizes more that “much abides.” He and his crew members have lost some of their
strength, but their character is still the same: “that which we are, we are.” And that character is
defined by their determination to “strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.” Ulysses is
determined to remain the heroic figure that he was as a young man, even if, on this voyage, the
gulfs may “wash them down.” Still, Ulysses implies, it is better to die trying to reclaim one’s
youthful bravery, than to accept old age and live an idle, sheltered life. He refuses to yield, not
just to enemies on the battlefield, but to time and age itself.

Adventure and Knowledge: In Homer’s Odyssey, Odysseus/Ulysses struggles for years to return to
Ithaca. In Tennyson’s poem, however, Ulysses has discovered that home is not enough to make him
happy. Paradoxically, his years spent traveling to return home did not make him love that home; it
made him love travel and adventure. Ulysses urges his crewmates to join him a last, great voyage so
he can reclaim what he considers his true identity: an explorer who is continually striving for more,
especially to learn more. In this way, Ulysses recognizes that the quest for knowledge is never
complete. In spite of this—or perhaps because of this—it is the quest for new experiences and new
knowledge that, for Ulysses, defines a meaningful life.

When the poem begins, Ulysses is agitated and discontent in Ithaca. He is restless for adventure.
Ulysses feels “idle,” even though he rules as king, because this role keeps him trapped by a
“still hearth.” He feels he “cannot rest from travel” and is also frustrated that his people do not
“know” him. This frustration suggests that, in Ulysses’s mind, his true identity is an explorer
rather than king of Ithaca. Indeed, when he says he has become famous—“I am become a
name”—for “roaming,” he suggests that his entire sense of self does not come from his life on
Ithaca but rather from his travels. Merely being alive—simply “breath[ing]”—is not enough to
make his life meaningful, if he has “pause[d]” and “ma[de] an end” in one place.
For Ulysses, the yearning for adventure and exploration can never really be sated, because there
are seemingly endless things to discover; he realizes that his knowledge of the world—all
human knowledge, really—touches on just a small piece of all that there is to know. His years
spent trying return home only increased his appetite to travel more, because each experience
he has had reminded him that there are still “untravell’d world[s]” to explore. And in particular,
Ulysses hopes to learn more from his explorations. His desire is to “follow knowledge like a
sinking star / Beyond the utmost bound of human thought.” The point of going where no one
else has gone is to understand things no one else has understood.
Ulysses urges his crewmates to join him in one final voyage to unknown lands, reclaiming their
identity as explorers who never stop searching. His quest for knowledge can never be
completed, but that, he argues, is part of what makes it worth pursuing. Ulysses wants to do
some “work of noble note,” and, for him, that means finding some “newer world.” This newer
world may even include “the Happy Isles,” where the souls of the blessed dead reside. Here he
could truly gain knowledge beyond what (living) humans know. Ulysses intends to keep
searching for newer worlds “until [he] die[s].” The fact that Ulysses will never complete his
quest for knowledge also means he will never again pause and “make an end.” He will always
be on a journey, and that, for him, is what defines a meaningful life.
At the poem’s end, Ulysses articulates what he sees as his true identity: a man determined
always “To strive, to seek, to find.” Only when you have a goal that can never be fully
accomplished can you spend the rest of your life striving for it. Seeking new worlds and new
knowledge is that kind of goal, one that allows Ulysses to be the kind of man he wishes to be.

Caution vs. Recklessness

Ulysses describes his son, Telemachus, as a cautious and conservative man. Ulysses seems to
scorn his son for lacking the daring, curiosity, and imagination that Ulysses has himself.
However, Telemachus’s prudence might seem more admirable when contrasted with Ulysses’s
irresponsibility and recklessness. Although a king, Ulysses shows little respect for his people
and is willing to abandon his responsibilities as ruler to go on a voyage with his former
crewmates. And even for those beloved crewmates, Ulysses does not express much concern;
he admits that the journey might kill them. But because he would rather die adventuring abroad
than quietly at home, he is willing to put them all at risk. Thus even while the poem portrays
Ulysses as a heroic figure, it also reminds the reader of the recklessness and selfishness that
can go along with his brand of heroism.
At the start of the poem, Ulysses shows little respect for the people of Ithaca. He describes
them in terms that would describe a herd of grazing animals: they are “savage[s]” who do
nothing but “hoard, and sleep, and feed.” Ulysses does not see it as important or ennobling to
serve as their king—it “little profits” him. Similarly, when Ulysses introduces his son,
Telemachus, he shows little respect for Telemachus’s character. Telemachus takes his duties to
the people seriously; he is determined to “fulfill this labour” of ruling, however long and “slow”
the process might be. In this, he shows “prudence” and reliability in “common duties,” rather
than imagination and boldness. Yet Ulysses does not respect Telemachus very highly for his
prudent devotion to duty. His terms of praise are faint: Telemachus is “blameless” rather than
praiseworthy; rather than succeed, he will “not … fail.” Ulysses does not see Telemachus as
carrying on his own legacy but as taking a different path: “He works his work, I mine.”
Ulysses shows more daring and imagination than Telemachus, but these qualities also lead
Ulysses to act recklessly and irresponsibly as a ruler. Ulysses relates how he has traveled the
world “hungry” to see and know things and found “delight” in battle. He still wishes to explore
the “untravell’d world” where no one else has gone. When Ulysses asks his former crewmates
to join him on another voyage, though, he shows that he is willing to abandon his
responsibilities as ruler of Ithaca to fulfill his own personal goals.
Ulysses is also reckless and irresponsible towards his crewmates. He is willing to expose them
to the risks of danger and death—risks that became real in Tennyson’s source texts,
Homer's The Odyssey and Dante's Inferno. In the poem, Ulysses tells his crewmates that “the
gulfs [may] wash us down,” meaning it’s possible that this journey may kill them all. The risk
of death seems all the greater if readers know other stories of Ulysses. In The Odyssey, several
of Odysseus’s crewmates do indeed die because of Odysseus’s ambition and pride. In
the Inferno, Ulysses also urges his crewmates to join him on a voyage into unknown seas, and
the sea does swallow the ship and drown them all. These source texts suggest to the reader that
in this poem, too, Ulysses’s dreams of travel and glory could cause the deaths of his men. He
is not just brave and daring, then: he can also be selfish and reckless with others’ lives.

Heroism and Overcoming Limitations

Ulysses shows frustration with the limitations imposed on him by his role as a ruler and by old
age. He misses the glory days of his youth when he fought heroically in battles and traveled
the world. He urges his former crewmates to set out on a voyage with him to overcome the
limitations imposed by time and age and reclaim some of their youthful heroism. But
throughout the poem, it becomes clear that their heroism actually emerges from these
limitations. What makes Ulysses and his men admirable is the fact that they are older and
weaker than they used to be and yet are still willing to undertake tasks as difficult and dangerous
as the ones they faced in their prime. It is because they see their own limitations and persist in
spite of them that they emerge as heroic figures at the poem’s end.
Ulysses is impatient with the constraints of life on Ithaca. Ulysses finds no joy in living among
people who do nothing but “hoard, and sleep, and feed.” Being king of such a people offers no
mental stimulation—certainly no opportunity for heroic deeds. Worse, his role as king keeps
him in one place so that he almost falls into the same trap as his people, tempted to do nothing
but “store and hoard [himself].” Ulysses then reflects on his younger days and how he “enjoy’d
/ Greatly” his early days spent traveling and found “delight” in the heroic deeds of battle. If he
can escape Ithaca and go on one more voyage, it will be like reliving the glorious heroism of
his youth.
As such, Ulysses invites his former crewmates to go on a last voyage with him. He
acknowledges that they are older and weaker, but believes that they can still accomplish heroic
tasks. In fact, their courage and bravery are due, at least in part, to being are older and weaker,
as they continue to strive in spite of these limitations. Even as he wishes they could return to
their younger, heroic days, Ulysses acknowledges they cannot: “you and I are old,” he admits,
and are “made weak by time and fate.” But these very limitations make possible a new kind of
heroism. They do not have that strength that they had in “old days” but they have another kind
of strength: the weakness of their bodies reveals that they are “strong in will,” because they
refuse to let their limitations stop them. In spite of age and weakness, they will continue “To
strive, to seek, to find.” It is when you have limits that might tempt you to yield and give up
the fight that it becomes most heroic, as Ulysses says, “not to yield.”

Poetic Devices
Allusion
Tennyson’s “Ulysses” is about a character who features prominently in two other great works
of Western European literature: Homer’s Greek epic The Odyssey and Dante's Inferno, the first
part of Dante’s Italian epic the Divine Comedy. Tennyson adds layers of meaning to his poem
by alluding to what the reader may already know and expect about the character of Ulysses.
Sometimes the poem reinforces the reader’s existing impression of Ulysses, sometimes it goes
against it.
Tennyson’s Ulysses has certain key features in common with Homer’s Ulysses (called
“Odysseus” in the Greek poem). Both are clever, adventurous men who are defined by their
travels around the world. At the opening of Homer’s Odyssey, the narrator says, “Many cities
of men [Odysseus] saw and learned their minds” (Book I, trans. Robert Fagles). Tennyson
seems to allude to this line when he has his Ulysses say, “Much have I seen and known; cities
of men / And manners, climates, councils, governments.”
But the two stories differ about what Ulysses/Odysseus most desires. In Homer’s story,
Odysseus has been gone from home for 20 years, fighting in the Trojan War and then getting
lost at sea, and his greatest desire is to return home to Ithaca, to his wife and his son. At one
point, the goddess Calypso holds Odysseus captive on her island and offers to make Odysseus
immortal and allow him to stay with her as her lover, saying that Odysseus’s wife cannot be
nearly as beautiful as she is. Odysseus replies, "All that you say is true … Look at my wise
Penelope. She falls far short of you, / your beauty, stature. She is mortal after all / and you, you
never age or die ... / Nevertheless I long—I pine, all my days— / to travel home and see the
dawn of my return.” Odysseus shows affection and loyalty to his wife; he doesn’t seem
bothered by the fact that she will have aged. He rejects Calypso's offer because his greatest
desire is to return home.
In Tennyson’s poem, by contrast, Ulysses dismisses Penelope as “an aged wife” and Ithaca as
“barren crags.” Far from desiring to be home, he declares, “I cannot rest from travel.” He even
misses the days of the Trojan War, when he “drunk delight of battle.” Readers most familiar
with Homer’s version of Ulysses will be surprised at these changes in Tennyson’s version.
Readers might be less surprised, however, if they are most familiar with the version of Ulysses
in Dante’s Inferno. In this poem, Dante and his guide Virgil travel through the nine circles of
Hell. In Canto XXVI, they come to the Eighth Circle, where fraud is punished, and find
Ulysses. Ulysses’s soul has been condemned for the fraud that he perpetrated during the Trojan
War. But Ulysses may also have been condemned for wishing to have knowledge beyond what
is appropriate for human beings. In explaining how he died, Dante’s Ulysses says, “not
tenderness for a son, nor filial duty / toward my agèd father, nor the love I owed / Penelope that
would have made her glad, / could overcome the fervor that was mine / to gain experience of
the world / and learn about man's vices, and his worth” (trans. Robert Hollander). These lines
reflect the sentiments of Tennyson’s Ulysses, who wishes “[t]o follow knowledge like a sinking
star.”
In Dante’s story, as in Tennyson’s, Ulysses then urges his former crewmates to join him on
another voyage, telling them, “do not deny yourselves the chance to know — / following the
sun — the world where no one lives … you were not made to live like brutes or beasts, / but to
pursue virtue and knowledge.” Tennyson’s Ulysses also rejects the beast-like lifestyle of the
Ithacans who do nothing but “hoard, and sleep, and feed.” He urges his crewmates in similar
terms to accompany him to “untravell’d world,” sailing “beyond the sunset,” in his quest for
knowledge.
But just as Tennyson’s Ulysses wishes to follow knowledge “[b]eyond the utmost bound of
human thought,” Dante’s Ulysses also trespasses past the pillars of Hercules, a landmark at the
Strait of Gibraltar which was understood in antiquity to “mark[] off the limits, / warning all
men to go no farther.” Both men want to test the limits of human possibility. In Dante’s version,
this leads to disaster: after sailing past the pillars, Ulysses and his men encounter a storm, and
the sea sucks their ship down. In Tennyson’s version, the reader does not see the outcome of
Ulysses’s voyage, but Ulysses does say, “It may be that the gulfs will wash us down.”
For a reader familiar with Dante’s story, this line is an ominous foreshadowing of the death that
Ulysses and his men may very well encounter on this voyage. The reader may also wonder if
Ulysses will end up condemned, as in Dante, for his recklessness, or whether he will be honored
in “the Happy Isles” (a realm like heaven in Greek mythology) for his courage and daring.
These allusions add layers of meaning and interest as readers question Ulysses’s values: is it
better to cherish home and family, or to seek glory and adventure abroad? Is it admirable or
pridefully ambitious to test human limits? Is it reckless or heroic to risk your life and others’ in
a quest to test those limits? The different stories of Ulysses suggest different answers, and so
Tennyson’s allusions force readers to struggle with these questions for themselves.
The entire poem constitutes an extended allusion to other works of literature, in that the
character of the speaker is drawn from those other works. We have highlighted those portions
of the poem discussed here, which provide particularly important parallels to the source texts.

The Reconciliation of Religion and Science

Tennyson lived during a period of great scientific advancement, and he used his poetry to work
out the conflict between religious faith and scientific discoveries. Notable scientific findings
and theories of the Victorian period include stratigraphy, the geological study of rock layers
used to date the earth, in 1811; the first sighting of an asteroid in 1801 and galaxies in the
1840s; and Darwin’s theory of evolution and natural selection in 1859. In the second half of
the century, scientists, such as Fülöp Semmelweis, Joseph Lister, and Louis Pasteur, began the
experiments and work that would eventually lead to germ theory and our modern understanding
of microorganisms and diseases. These discoveries challenged traditional religious
understandings of nature and natural history.
For most of his career, Tennyson was deeply interested in and troubled by these discoveries.
His poem “Locksley Hall” (1842) expresses his ambivalence about technology and scientific
progress. There the speaker feels tempted to abandon modern civilization and return to a savage
life in the jungle. In the end, he chooses to live a civilized, modern life and enthusiastically
endorses technology. In Memoriam connects the despair Tennyson felt over the loss of his
friend Arthur Hallam and the despair he felt when contemplating a godless world. In the end,
the poem affirms both religious faith and faith in human progress. Nevertheless, Tennyson
continued to struggle with the reconciliation of science and religion, as illustrated by some of
his later work. For example, “Locksley Hall Sixty Years After” (1886) takes as its protagonist
the speaker from the original “Locksley Hall,” but now he is an old man, who looks back on
his youthful optimism and faith in progress with scorn and skepticism.

The Virtues of Perseverance and Optimism

After the death of his friend Arthur Hallam, Tennyson struggled through a period of deep
despair, which he eventually overcame to begin writing again. During his time of mourning,
Tennyson rarely wrote and, for many years, battled alcoholism. Many of his poems are about
the temptation to give up and fall prey to pessimism, but they also extol the virtues of optimism
and discuss the importance of struggling on with life. The need to persevere and continue is the
central theme of In Memoriam and “Ulysses” (1833), both written after Hallam’s death.
Perhaps because of Tennyson’s gloomy and tragic childhood, perseverance and optimism also
appear in poetry written before Hallam’s death, such as “The Lotos-Eaters” (1832, 1842).
Poems such as “The Lady of Shalott” (1832, 1842) and “The Charge of the Light Brigade”
(1854) also vary this theme: both poems glorify characters who embrace their destinies in life,
even though those destinies end in tragic death. The Lady of Shalott leaves her seclusion to
meet the outer world, determined to seek the love that is missing in her life. The cavalrymen in
“The Charge of the Light Brigade” keep charging through the valley toward the Russian
cannons; they persevere even as they realize that they will likely die.
The Glory of England
Tennyson used his poetry to express his love for England. Although he expressed worry and
concern about the corruption that so dominated the nineteenth century, he also wrote many
poems that glorify nineteenth-century England. “The Charge of the Light Brigade” praises the
fortitude and courage of English soldiers during a battle of the Crimean War in which roughly
200 men were killed. As poet laureate, Tennyson was required to write poems for specific state
occasions and to dedicate verse to Queen Victoria and her husband, Prince Albert.
Nevertheless, Tennyson praised England even when not specifically required to do so. In
the Idylls of the King, Tennyson glorified England by encouraging a collective English cultural
identity: all of England could take pride in Camelot, particularly the chivalrous and capable
knights who lived there. Indeed, the modern conception of Camelot as the source of loyalty,
chivalry, and romance comes, in part, from Tennyson’s descriptions of it in the Idylls of the
King and “The Lady of Shalott.”

Alfred Lord Tennyson: A Literary Life

More than any other Victorian writer, Tennyson (1809-1892) has seemed the embodiment of
his age, both to his contemporaries and to modern readers. In his own day he was said to be—
with Queen Victoria and Gladstone—one of the three most famous living persons, a reputation
no other poet writing in English has ever had. As official poetic spokesman for the reign of
Victoria, he felt called upon to celebrate a quickly changing industrial and mercantile world
with which he felt little in common, for his deepest sympathies were called forth by an
unaltered rural England; the conflict between what he thought of as his duty to society and his
allegiance to the eternal beauty of nature seems peculiarly Victorian. When he was not quite
eighteen his first volume of poetry, Poems by Two Brothers (1827), was published. Alfred
Tennyson wrote the major part of the volume, although it also contained poems by his two
elder brothers, Frederick and Charles. It is a remarkable book for so young a poet, displaying
great virtuosity of versification and the prodigality of imagery that was to mark his later works;
but it is also derivative in its ideas, many of which came from his reading in his father’s library.
Few copies were sold, and there were only two brief reviews, but its publication confirmed
Tennyson’s determination to devote his life to poetry. Most of Tennyson’s early education was
under the direction of his father, although he spent nearly four unhappy years at a nearby
grammar school. His departure in 1827 to join his elder brothers at Trinity College, Cambridge,
was due more to a desire to escape from Somersby than to a desire to undertake serious
academic work. At Trinity he was living for the first time among young men of his own age
who knew little of the problems that had beset him for so long; he was delighted to make new
friends; he was extraordinarily handsome, intelligent, humorous, and gifted at impersonation;
and soon he was at the center of an admiring group of young men interested in poetry and
conversation. It was probably the happiest period of his life.

In this poem, written in 1833 and revised for publication in 1842, Tennyson reworks the figure
of Ulysses by drawing on the ancient hero of Homer’s Odyssey (“Ulysses” is the Roman form
of the Greek “Odysseus”) and the medieval hero of Dante’s Inferno. Homer’s Ulysses, as
described in Scroll XI of the Odyssey, learns from a prophecy that he will take a final sea
voyage after killing the suitors of his wife Penelope. The details of this sea voyage are described
by Dante in Canto XXVI of the Inferno: Ulysses finds himself restless in Ithaca and driven by
“the longing I had to gain experience of the world.” Dante’s Ulysses is a tragic figure who dies
while sailing too far in an insatiable thirst for knowledge. Tennyson combines these two
accounts by having Ulysses make his speech shortly after returning to Ithaca and resuming his
administrative responsibilities, and shortly before embarking on his final voyage. However,
this poem also concerns the poet’s own personal journey, for it was composed in the first few
weeks after Tennyson learned of the death of his dear college friend Arthur Henry Hallam in
1833. Like In Memoriam, then, this poem is also an elegy for a deeply cherished friend.
Ulysses, who symbolizes the grieving poet, proclaims his resolution to push onward in spite of
the awareness that “death closes all” (line 51). As Tennyson himself stated, the poem expresses
his own “need of going forward and braving the struggle of life” after the loss of his beloved
Hallam. The poem’s final line, “to strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield,” came to serve as a
motto for the poet’s Victorian contemporaries: the poem’s hero longs to flee the tedium of daily
life “among these barren crags” (line 2) and to enter a mythical dimension “beyond the sunset,
and the baths of all the western stars” (lines 60–61); as such, he was a model of individual self-
assertion and the Romantic rebellion against bourgeois conformity. Thus for Tennyson’s
immediate audience, the figure of Ulysses held not only mythological meaning, but stood as
an important contemporary cultural icon as well. “Ulysses,” like many of Tennyson’s other
poems, deals with the desire to reach beyond the limits of one’s field of vision and the mundane
details of everyday life. Ulysses is the antithesis of the mariners in “The Lotos-Eaters,” who
proclaim “we will no longer roam” and desire only to relax amidst the Lotos fields. In contrast,
Ulysses “cannot rest from travel” and longs to roam the globe (line 6). Like the Lady of Shallot,
who longs for the worldly experiences she has been denied, Ulysses hungers to explore the
untraveled world. As in all dramatic monologues, here the character of the speaker emerges
almost unintentionally from his own words. Ulysses’ incompetence as a ruler is evidenced by
his preference for potential quests rather than his present responsibilities. He devotes a full 26
lines to his own egotistical proclamation of his zeal for the wandering life, and another 26 lines
to the exhortation of his mariners to roam the seas with him. However, he offers only 11 lines
of lukewarm praise to his son concerning the governance of the kingdom in his absence, and a
mere two words about his “aged wife” Penelope. Thus, the speaker’s own words betray his
abdication of responsibility and his specificity of purpose.
Homer's Odyssey
The speaker and content of Tennyson’s poem 'Ulysses' are based on the ancient Greek epic
poem the Odyssey (1616) by Homer. In Homer’s Odyssey (written between 725–675
BCE), Odysseus (whose Latinized name is Ulysses) is the King of Ithaca. He journeys home
for ten years after fighting in the Trojan war. Throughout his journey, he and his mariners face
danger and perils of all kinds. Because he had been gone for many years, his wife Penelope
and son Telemachus presume Odysseus is dead. When Odysseus finally returns home, he and
Telemachus must slay the suitors who have taken over his land. Once they do so, he is reunited
with Penelope. Ithaca is at peace once again, but Odysseus must leave on another brief journey
to appease Poseidon, the god of the sea and waters.

Death of Arthur Henry Hallam

Tennyson wrote much of his best work following the sudden death of his beloved friend Arthur
Henry Hallam in 1833. At the time, Tennyson was also living at home to help his mother and
eight siblings after the death of their father in 1831. With increasing domestic duties — and
mounting grief — Tennyson penned 'Ulysses.' In fact, Tennyson said that Ulysses’s brave
defiance of his household circumstances got him interested in the Greek myth in the first place.

Themes
Perhaps the most central theme in Tennyson’s poem relates to the value of pursuit. Indeed,
“Ulysses” as a whole may be read as espousing a philosophy of life where the most important
meaning lies in the pursuit of achievement. The speaker first introduces this philosophy in the
opening stanza. There, he frames all forms of idleness in negative terms (lines 22–24):
How dull it is to pause, to make an end,
To rust unburnish’d, not to shine in use!
As tho’ to breathe were life!
These lines reflect Ulysses’ frustration with his life as king of Ithaca, where he does little more
than preside over a community he derides for their idle complacency. It’s in implicit judgment
of his own people that the speaker declares, with exasperation, “As tho’ to breathe were life!”
Against this negative image of idleness, Ulysses offers his own “hungry heart” (line 12) as an
example of what life should really be about. Rather than rest on his laurels, Ulysses longs for
new adventures. Such adventures will push him “to follow knowledge like a sinking star, /
Beyond the utmost bound of human thought” (lines 31–32). Crucially, the pursuit of
achievement is more important than the achievement itself. It may be impossible to reach that
“beyond,” but the striving is itself noble, meaningful, and hence life-giving.
The Primacy of the Individual over the Collective
For Ulysses, the will of the individual takes precedence over the needs of the collective. This
theme can be seen in the way the speaker dismisses other people while presenting his own
personal desires as noble and all-important. Consider how Ulysses talks about his family. He
offers eleven lines of lukewarm praise for his son, and he devotes just two words to Penelope,
his “aged wife” (line 3). He’s similarly dismissive of his community, which he deems “a savage
race” (line 4). Meanwhile, he spends twenty-seven lines celebrating the adventurous life, and
another twenty-six lines exhorting his mariners to ready the sails for his next voyage. This
imbalance clearly shows some egotism on the speaker’s part. More importantly, though, it
demonstrates the extent to which he conceives of achievement as an individual pursuit. Ulysses
doesn’t consider his public service a real achievement, since all he does is “mete and dole /
Unequal laws” that he had no hand in establishing (lines 3–4). Furthermore, public service has
an alienating effect, since he remains distanced from his subjects. To resist the alienation and
lack of agency he feels as king, Ulysses must abandon his responsibility to the collective and
reassert his individual will.
Experience Shapes the Person
Ulysses has seen a lot in his life. Not only did he spend ten years of his life fighting in the
Trojan War, but then he went on to spend another ten years struggling to make his way home.
Ulysses recalls some of these experiences in the poem’s first stanza, where he recalls “the rainy
Hyades” (line 10) and the “ringing plains of windy Troy” (line 17). His reason for making these
references isn’t simply to indulge in nostalgia for a time when he was young and active. Instead,
he wants to emphasize the degree to which his experience has shaped him. As he puts the matter
in lines 18–21:
I am a part of all that I have met;
Yet all experience is an arch wherethro’
Gleams that untravell’d world whose margin fades
Forever and forever when I move.
This passage begins with a simple statement about how his experiences have made him the
man he is. But Ulysses complicates this idea in the lines that follow, where he develops an
intriguing metaphor for experience. The speaker links experience to an “arch” through which
the viewer can see the glittering ocean and imagine what it’s like to sail it. This metaphor
implies that experience isn’t just something that happened in someone’s past. Instead, it’s a lens
that frames how a person sees the world in the present.

POEM
The poem, published in a collection titled Poems in 1842, is a dramatic monologue delivered
by the now-aged hero, Ulysses (the Latin form of the Greek name Odysseus). In the poem,
Ulysses reflects on the time he spent as an adventurous, seafaring leader and tries to come to
terms with his present, less exciting life. Tennyson succeeds masterfully in conveying Ulysses'
passion for new experiences. His powerful word choice and expert pacing deliver a poem that
is both lyrical and epic.

Tennyson's poem begins with Ulysses, now an old man, lamenting the idleness of his present
life in Ithaca. He is restless. He cannot fully appreciate his wife or the people he governs.
Instead, he finds himself thinking back to his adventures at sea. Then his thoughts shift. He
begins to think about how his Odyssey brought him fame, and he worries that fame has
somehow reduced him to a legend. He explains that in becoming a legend, he has ceased to be
a person: "I am become a name." He begins to reflect on all the experiences that have shaped
him. Each time he experienced something new, it made him crave more new experiences. He
has not lost his thirst for adventure, but he is unable to quench that thirst. Ulysses feels that he
is wasting the time that he has left as he languishes in Ithaca. As Ulysses reflects on his desire
for adventure, his thoughts wander to his son, Telemachus. Ulysses plans to leave his kingdom
to Telemachus, whom he believes is capable but somewhat mild in nature. Ulysses vacillates
between thinking of Telemachus as a committed, virtuous leader, and Telemachus as a less
robust, forceful leader than he himself was. He thinks about how his legacy will continue with
Telemachus; then, he abruptly decides that his legacy will be separate from that of Telemachus:
"He works his work, I mine."

At this point in the poem, Ulysses catches a glimpse of the port and is once again transported
to memories of his past journey. He begins to think fondly about his crew of sailors. Just as he
recalls their adventurous spirits, he realizes that they, like he, are old now. Ulysses accepts that
he is old, and that death is not far away, but he also feels that he has something left to
accomplish. He wants to return to his life at sea: "'It is not too late to seek a newer world." He
yearns to venture into the unknown with his crew and to make new discoveries. The poem ends
with Ulysses acknowledging that he has grown old but refusing to give up on the prospect of
adventure: "Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will/ To strive, to seek, to find, and not
to yield."
BACKGROUND TO DRAMATIC MONOLOGUE, THE WRITER AND SOCIETY,
FAITH AND DOUBT

Background to Dramatic Monologue: The Writer and Society, Faith and Doubt
(Victorian Period)
The Victorian period (1837-1901) in British history, named after Queen Victoria, was a time
of profound social, political, and intellectual changes. The era was marked by industrialization,
urbanization, the expansion of the British Empire, and the rise of the middle class. These
changes created tensions between traditional values and modern developments, leading to
significant shifts in social structures, attitudes, and cultural norms. The Victorian literature
reflects these transitions, providing insight into the complex relationship between individuals,
society, and the questions of faith and doubt that arose during this period.
Dramatic Monologue: An Overview
The dramatic monologue is a type of poem in which a single speaker, often in a specific
situation or moment of crisis, reveals their thoughts and emotions to an implied audience. This
literary form is associated with poets like Robert Browning and Alfred Lord Tennyson. In a
dramatic monologue, the speaker’s personality is developed through their speech, and readers
are invited to interpret the character’s motivations, values, and conflicts.
Key Features of a Dramatic Monologue:
1. Single Speaker: The poem is delivered by one character, who typically speaks at length
without interruption. This speaker reveals key elements of their personality and
situation.
2. Implied Audience: The audience or listener is often implied but never directly
addressed. The speaker may be unaware of the impact of their words or might be
speaking to someone who is either physically present or imagined.
3. Revelation of Character: The speaker’s inner thoughts and emotions come to the
surface, sometimes revealing their flaws, contradictions, or moral ambiguities.
4. Tension and Conflict: There is often an inherent tension in the speaker’s words, such
as an internal struggle, a moral dilemma, or a conflict with society.
The Dramatic Monologue and Its Function in Victorian Literature:
The dramatic monologue serves as a vehicle for exploring the complexity of individual
identity, morality, and the social expectations placed on people during the Victorian period. It
often portrays characters facing difficult choices, reflecting personal or social crises, or
grappling with psychological and emotional conflict. It also enables poets to probe the darker
or less idealized sides of human nature, challenging the often idealized or conventional
depictions of individuals in earlier literature.
Robert Browning, one of the most famous practitioners of the form, used dramatic
monologues to explore complex psychological states, individual motivations, and moral
ambiguity. Browning's works, such as My Last Duchess and The Ring and the Book, showcase
the diversity of voices and perspectives in Victorian society. These poems reveal the tensions
between personal desires and the broader expectations of social order.
Tennyson, while also known for dramatic monologues, is more famous for works like Ulysses
and The Lady of Shalott, which focus on existential themes and human striving against the
constraints of time and mortality.
The Victorian Writer and Society
Victorian writers grappled with the impact of rapid societal changes, from the industrial
revolution to colonial expansion. As society became more industrialized and urbanized,
traditional agricultural and rural life faded, and a growing middle class began to define social
norms. Victorian literature, therefore, often addresses the tension between the emerging modern
world and older values such as faith, duty, and morality.
Key Themes in Victorian Literature:
1. Industrialization and Urbanization: Writers observed the rise of factory systems,
mechanized labor, and growing cities, which led to questions about the alienation of
individuals from nature, from each other, and from their own sense of purpose.
2. Class Struggles and Social Reform: As industrialization progressed, the disparity
between the wealthy elite and the poor working class became more pronounced. Writers
such as Charles Dickens and Elizabeth Barrett Browning depicted the plight of the
poor and critiqued the injustices of industrial capitalism.
3. The Role of Women: The role of women in Victorian society was also a critical issue.
Women were often confined to domestic spaces and denied equal rights, but this period
also saw the rise of feminist discourse and the early suffragette movement.
4. Morality and Ethics: Many Victorian writers explored questions about morality,
justice, and personal responsibility. The tension between individual desires and social
expectations often led to psychological and moral dilemmas in literature.
The Victorian Writer’s Role:
Victorian writers were not just creators of art but also social commentators. They used their
writing as a means of influencing public opinion, often addressing the pressing moral, social,
and political issues of the time. Many were deeply engaged with questions of faith, religion,
and the role of science, especially in light of Darwin’s theory of evolution (1859), which
undermined traditional religious beliefs.
Faith and Doubt in the Victorian Period
The Victorian era was marked by a conflict between traditional religious beliefs and the rise of
scientific reasoning. This conflict between faith and doubt played a significant role in the
literature of the time, as writers navigated the changing landscape of religious belief, scientific
discovery, and moral uncertainty.
Faith:
1. Victorian Religious Faith: The early part of the Victorian era was characterized by
strong religious convictions, which were intertwined with social and moral norms. The
 Church played a central role in regulating public and private life, and many Victorians
adhered to the Christian faith as an essential aspect of their identity.
2. The Evangelical Movement: During the early part of the Victorian era, evangelical
Protestantism was influential. This movement emphasized personal salvation, moral
behavior, and a strong connection to the Bible. Many writers, including Elizabeth
Barrett Browning in her poetry, were shaped by evangelical ideals.
3. Christianity and Moral Order: Many Victorians believed in a world governed by a
moral order that was shaped by divine principles. Writers like Matthew Arnold
celebrated the idea of a moral society based on Christian values, while others, like John
Henry Newman, were concerned with reconciling faith and reason.
Doubt:
1. Scientific Revolution: The publication of Charles Darwin’s On the Origin of Species
(1859) had a profound impact on Victorian society. Darwin's theory of evolution
contradicted the literal interpretation of the Bible and challenged long-held beliefs
about the creation of life and the nature of humanity. The rise of scientific naturalism
began to replace religious explanations of the world.
2. The Decline of Traditional Religious Beliefs: As science and reason began to offer
alternative explanations for the universe, many Victorians began to question their faith.
The tension between traditional religion and the growing acceptance of scientific
thought created a sense of doubt and uncertainty for many individuals.
3. Philosophical Doubt: The works of John Stuart Mill, Herbert Spencer, and Thomas
Huxley contributed to the growing skepticism toward religious doctrines and the rise
of secularism. This philosophical shift was accompanied by a critique of religious
authority and dogma.
Faith and Doubt in Victorian Literature:
Victorian writers frequently addressed the theme of faith versus doubt in their works. This
conflict is particularly evident in the works of Matthew Arnold, whose poem Dover Beach
reflects a sense of loss of faith and the search for meaning in a world that seemed increasingly
indifferent to religious certainties. The speaker in Dover Beach is disillusioned with the erosion
of religious faith and laments the loss of an anchoring moral framework in a changing world.
In contrast, writers like Robert Browning used the dramatic monologue form to explore
personal belief systems, with characters struggling between faith and doubt, often showing
their inner conflicts and the complexity of human belief. For instance, in poems like The Bishop
Orders His Tomb at Saint Praxed’s Church, Browning reflects on the tension between
materialism and religious faith, as well as the flaws of religious leaders.
Tennyson's In Memoriam, a long elegiac poem, also delves into faith and doubt. The poem
records Tennyson’s own grief over the death of his close friend Arthur Hallam and explores
how faith is challenged by personal tragedy. The poem moves from doubt and despair to a
renewed understanding of faith and the divine.
Key Writers and Their Engagement with Faith and Doubt:
 1. Alfred Lord Tennyson: Tennyson’s poetry often explores the tension between faith
and doubt. His In Memoriam grapples with the loss of faith in the face of personal
tragedy, while his other works, such as Ulysses, reflect an ongoing quest for meaning
and purpose in a world that is not always comforting.
2. Matthew Arnold: Arnold’s works, particularly Dover Beach, articulate a sense of loss
and confusion in the face of the decline of religious certainty. He critiques the
secularization of society but also suggests that the search for truth must continue, even
in the absence of clear religious answers.
3. Robert Browning: Browning’s dramatic monologues, such as My Last Duchess and
The Ring and the Book, engage with themes of human nature, morality, and personal
belief. His works often present characters who wrestle with their own moral and
spiritual doubts.
Conclusion:
The Victorian period was a time of deep intellectual and social change. Writers engaged with
the tension between faith and doubt as they responded to the challenges posed by scientific
progress, industrialization, and evolving social structures. The dramatic monologue form
provided a powerful tool for exploring complex personal and moral dilemmas, reflecting the
conflict between individual desires and the expectations of society. Through their works,
Victorian writers offered a nuanced portrayal of human identity, faith, and the quest for
meaning in a rapidly changing world.
This period’s literature is particularly valuable for undergraduate students, as it allows them to
explore the interplay between societal shifts, personal belief systems, and individual
psychology. It also offers insight into how writers navigate the profound shifts in moral and
philosophical thought that marked the transition from the 19th to the 20th century.
Detailed Background to Prose Reading
Prose reading is an essential part of literature studies, especially for undergraduate English
Honours students. It allows students to explore the broader literary landscape and engages them
with various genres and styles. Prose is written in ordinary, everyday language, and is often
contrasted with poetry, which typically employs verse and rhythm. Unlike poetry, prose doesn’t
have a specific metrical structure but still relies on storytelling, character development, and
thematic exploration to engage its readers.
This guide will provide an in-depth background to prose reading, including the evolution of
prose as a genre, key forms of prose, notable writers and movements, and the role of prose in
literature and culture. This is a foundational framework for 4th semester UG English Honours
students, providing the tools for understanding and analyzing prose texts.
1. Definition of Prose
Prose is the form of written or spoken language that follows the natural flow of speech, without
metrical structure. Unlike poetry, which is often composed of lines, stanzas, and rhythmical
patterns, prose is written in paragraphs and sentences, typically without any formal constraints
like rhyme or meter. Prose can be both fictional and non-fictional, depending on the nature of
the text.
Key Features of Prose:
• Natural Flow: Prose follows the natural flow of speech, without rhythmic or metrical
restrictions.
• Sentences and Paragraphs: It is structured in sentences and paragraphs.
• No Fixed Form: There is no set structure or rhyme scheme, making it flexible in
conveying ideas.
• Expressive Flexibility: Prose can be formal or informal, depending on the purpose of
the writing.
2. Types of Prose
Prose can be broadly categorized into two main types:
Fictional Prose:
Fictional prose refers to narrative texts that are made-up or imaginary, often created for
entertainment or reflection. This includes:
• Novels: Long fictional prose narratives that explore complex characters and intricate
plots. Examples include Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice (1813) or Charles
Dickens' Great Expectations (1860).
• Short Stories: Brief works of fiction that typically explore a single theme or idea, with
fewer characters and a more concise plot. Examples include Edgar Allan Poe’s The
Tell-Tale Heart (1843) and Anton Chekhov’s The Lady with the Dog (1899).
Non-fictional Prose:
Non-fictional prose refers to works that are based on fact and reality, including:
• Essays: Short, non-fiction works that often reflect on philosophical, political, or social
issues. Examples include Michel de Montaigne’s Essays (1580) and Virginia Woolf’s
A Room of One’s Own (1929).
• Biographies and Autobiographies: Accounts of a person's life, written by someone
else (biography) or the person themselves (autobiography). Examples include
Plutarch’s Lives (c. 100 CE) and Nelson Mandela’s Long Walk to Freedom (1994).
• Articles and Reports: Non-fiction prose that provides factual information or analysis
on various topics. Newspapers and journals are typical platforms for such prose.
Examples of Key Subgenres of Prose:
• Narrative Prose: This includes novels and short stories. The focus is on telling a story.
• Descriptive Prose: Used to describe characters, events, and settings in vivid detail.
Often found in travel writing or in literary works to build atmosphere.
• Expository Prose: Seeks to explain, inform, or describe something in a clear,
straightforward manner. Common in academic writing, how-to books, and
encyclopedias.
• Argumentative Prose: Involves presenting an argument and supporting it with
evidence and reasoning. Found in essays, debates, and speeches.
3. Historical Development of Prose
The development of prose can be traced from ancient literature to modern times. Here is a brief
overview of key developments:
Ancient and Classical Prose:
• Ancient Greece and Rome: Early forms of prose were seen in the works of
philosophers, historians, and orators such as Plato, Aristotle, and Cicero. These figures
developed prose as a tool for rational discourse and argumentation. Philosophical
dialogues, speeches, and histories, such as Herodotus’ Histories (c. 430 BCE) and
Plato’s Dialogues (c. 380 BCE), are some of the first examples of prose.
• The Bible: The King James Bible (1611) is another early example of prose that shaped
Western literature, combining narrative storytelling with moral teachings.
Medieval Prose:
• In medieval Europe, prose was often used for religious and moral instruction, as seen
in the works of Saint Augustine or Geoffrey Chaucer in his prose works, though much
of the literature of the time was written in verse.
• The Arthurian Legends and other historical chronicles were also written in prose.
The Renaissance and Early Modern Period:
• During the Renaissance, prose began to gain prominence as a literary form. Michel de
Montaigne, a French philosopher, is credited with creating the modern essay in his
 Essays (1580), which gave writers a new format to reflect on personal experiences and
philosophical questions.
• In England, prose was used for scientific and philosophical writing. For example,
Francis Bacon’s Essays (1597) and John Milton’s Areopagitica (1644) are key works
from this period that showcased prose as a powerful medium for intellectual
argumentation and political discourse.
The 18th and 19th Centuries:
• In the 18th century, the novel began to emerge as the dominant form of prose. Writers
like Daniel Defoe with Robinson Crusoe (1719) and Samuel Richardson with Pamela
(1740) helped establish the novel as a central literary genre.
• The Romantic period (late 18th to early 19th century) saw prose flourish in the form
of personal diaries, letters, and autobiographies. Writers like William Wordsworth,
Samuel Taylor Coleridge, and Mary Wollstonecraft explored philosophical and
political ideas in prose.
• Victorian prose (1837–1901) continued to develop the novel, with writers like Charles
Dickens, George Eliot, and Thomas Hardy focusing on social issues, moral
dilemmas, and character development.
Modern and Contemporary Prose:
• The 20th century saw the proliferation of diverse prose forms, including stream-of-
consciousness writing, modernist novels, and existential works. Virginia Woolf’s Mrs.
Dalloway (1925) and James Joyce’s Ulysses (1922) are key examples of modernist
prose that experimented with narrative style.
• Postmodern prose, often characterized by self-referential and fragmented narrative
styles, was championed by writers like Thomas Pynchon and Don DeLillo in the latter
half of the century.
4. Prose as a Reflector of Society
Prose literature often reflects the society in which it is written, providing insight into the social,
cultural, and political norms of the time. Here are a few ways prose relates to society:
• Social Issues: Prose writers often address social issues such as class inequality, gender
roles, and moral dilemmas. For instance, Charles Dickens’ Oliver Twist (1837)
critiques the social conditions of the poor in Victorian England.
• Philosophical Thought: Writers use prose to express philosophical ideas and grapple
with questions of morality, existence, and reason. Jean-Paul Sartre’s Nausea (1938)
and Albert Camus’ The Stranger (1942) delve into existential themes.
• Political Engagement: Prose has often been a tool for political and social commentary.
George Orwell’s 1984 (1949) critiques totalitarian regimes, while John Locke’s Two
Treatises of Government (1689) provided a foundation for modern liberal political
thought.
5. Key Writers and Movements in Prose
 • The Romantic Period: Writers like Wordsworth, Coleridge, and Keats used prose to
explore individual emotion, nature, and the sublime. Their letters and essays became a
significant form of introspective expression.
• Victorian Prose: In the Victorian era, writers like Charles Dickens, George Eliot, and
Thomas Hardy used novels and essays to critique social conditions and explore human
psychology.
• Modernist Prose: Writers like Virginia Woolf, James Joyce, and Franz Kafka used
prose to explore the subjective experience and fragmented consciousness.
• Postmodern Prose: Writers like Thomas Pynchon, Don DeLillo, and Margaret
Atwood pushed the boundaries of traditional narrative form, often incorporating
metafiction, irony, and non-linear storytelling.
6. Prose Reading in UG English Honours Curriculum
For 4th semester UG English Honours students, prose reading is an essential component of
understanding the development of literary forms and genres. Students are expected to:
• Analyze Themes: Understand the thematic concerns of the prose works they study,
whether those themes involve society, morality, or human experience.
• Appreciate Style and Form: Focus on the stylistic choices made by writers, including
narrative voice, character development, and structure.
• Understand Historical Context: Examine the historical and cultural context in which
a prose work was written to gain a deeper understanding of its significance.
Conclusion
Prose reading is a central aspect of the English Honours curriculum, offering students the
opportunity to engage with a wide range of works that have shaped literature and culture.
Understanding the history, forms, and social roles of prose helps students to analyze texts more
critically and appreciate the ways in which writers use prose to reflect and shape society.

A dramatic monologue is a literary device where a single character delivers a long speech to
an audience (either real or implied) revealing their thoughts, feelings, and motivations, often
providing insight into their personality and the context of the story.
Here's a more detailed breakdown:
Definition:
• Long Speech:
A dramatic monologue is characterized by its length, allowing the speaker to delve into their
thoughts and emotions.
• Single Character:
The speech is delivered by only one character, who is the focus of the monologue.
 • Audience:
While the speaker may be addressing another character or the audience directly, the primary
purpose is to reveal the speaker's inner world to the reader/listener.
• Revealing:
The monologue serves as a vehicle for character development and reveals important
information about the speaker's personality, motivations, and the circumstances surrounding
the story.
• Dramatic Context:
The monologue is often set within a larger dramatic context, such as a play, poem, or story, and
contributes to the overall narrative.
Examples:
• "My Last Duchess" by Robert Browning:
In this poem, an Italian Duke addresses an envoy, revealing his feelings about his deceased
wife in a way that exposes his possessive and controlling nature.
• "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock" by T.S. Eliot:
This poem presents a monologue by a character grappling with existential questions and
anxieties, revealing his insecurities and indecisiveness.
• "Porphyria's Lover" by Robert Browning:
This poem depicts a monologue by a man who murders his lover, revealing his twisted and
possessive nature through the speaker's actions and words.
• "Ulysses" by Alfred, Lord Tennyson:
This poem presents a monologue by the mythical hero Ulysses, expressing his restlessness and
desire for adventure as he faces the challenges of old age.
• "Mrs. Midas" by Carol Ann Duffy:
This poem presents a monologue by a woman whose husband turns everything into gold,
revealing her feelings of isolation and loss.
• "Lady Lazarus" by Sylvia Plath:
This poem is a powerful dramatic monologue where the speaker grapples with themes of death,
rebirth, and identity.
• "Soliloquy of the Spanish Cloister" by Robert Browning:
This poem is a dramatic monologue where a friar expresses his anger and frustration with his
fellow monks.

History of the Dramatic Monologue  While elements of the dramatic monologues can be
seen in the theater of ancient Greece, as well as the work of Romantic poets like William
Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge, the form as it is understood today was invented in
the Victorian era. Robert Browning, Alfred Lord Tennyson, Dante Gabriel Rossetti, and
Christina Rossetti were early pioneers. In their dramatic monologues, a fictional character
speaks without interruption to an audience, revealing important information about their
personality, situation, actions, or emotional state.  The form remained popular in the 20th
century. In the Modernist era, T. S. Eliot and Ezra Pound wrote persona poems, including
Eliot’s famous “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” and Pound’s Personae, a collection of
short poems written in the voice of different characters or “masks.” In the 1950s and 1960s,
despite the prevailing trend of confessionalism in poetry, Gwendolyn Brooks, John Berryman,
and Sylvia Plath all made notable contributions by writing dramatic monologues that grappled
with subjects like the African American urban experience, mental illness, addiction, and
suicidal ideation.  While, for the most part, the dramatic monologue was written in the voice
of a fictional character, the form sometimes makes use of a character who is already well-
known so the poet can explore larger themes. Since the latter half of the 20th century, the form
has taken on a political dimension as poets began writing dramatic monologues in the voices
of misunderstood historical figures (as in Robert Hayden’s “A Letter from Phillis Wheatley,

Features of a Dramatic Monologue

A dramatic monologue has these common features in them.
1. A single person delivering a speech on one aspect of his life
2. The audience may or may not be present
3. Speaker reveals his temperament and character only through his speech
Types of Dramatic Monologue
There are three major types of dramatic monologues such as:
1. Romantic monologue
2. Philosophical and psychological monologue
3. Conversational monologue

History of Dramatic Monologue

Although some ruminations and expressions of thoughts are founded in Greek plays and
Roman literature, they cannot be categorized as dramatic monologues and have some
constraints. Victorians, especially Robert Browning is stated to have created this literary genre.
For example, ‘My Last Duchess’ and ‘Porphyria’s Lover’ are his best dramatic monologues.
Alfred Tennyson and Dante Rossetti are two famous authors, known as their contemporaries
who wrote amazing dramatic monologues in their work. Hence, it could be termed a distinct
Victorian genre.
Dramatic Monologue Examples from Literature:
My Last Duchess by Robert Browning
The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock by T. S. Eliot
Lady Lazarus by Sylvia Plath
Dover Beach by Matthew Arnold
Hawk’s Monologue by Ted Hughes
 THE DEFENCE OF LUCKNOW: ALFRED TENNYSON
HISTORICAL BACKGROUND Grand-daughter of King George III when Victoria became
queen in 1837 at the tender age of eighteen it was due to the death of her uncle William IV. The
death of all the male heirs in the family had put her in line for the throne. She was the longest
reigning queen in the history of British Monarchy to have ruled so long being second only to
Queen Elizabeth II.

With the accession of Victoria to the throne the long struggle of the Anglo Saxons for personal
liberty was rewarded. Monarchy became a figurehead only with the divine right of rulers
becoming a thing of the past. Democracy was firmly established with the extension of suffrage
to the common man to choose his representatives. Education became accessible to all, a general
feeling of harmony prevailed along with social unrest. There was a growing realization of
ameliorating the condition of women and children employed in factories and mines deserving
a better life. Slavery had already been abolished in 1834 and in the year 1838 through ‘The
People’s Charter’, a product of the political and social reform protest movement demand was
made for the right to vote with suffrage being extended to men age 21 and older; for annual
elections; for equal representation and voting by secret ballot. The ideal of peace and harmony
to prevail worldwide, the desire for an egalitarian society and a peaceful world were harboured
by the society. W.J Long opines, ‘Tennyson, who came of age when the great Reform Bill
occupied attention, expresses the ideals of the Liberals of his day who proposed to spread the
gospel of peace. Till the war-drum throbb'd no longer, and the battle-flags were furled/ In the
Parliament of Man, the Federation of the world.’

The spirit of Industrial revolution, political reform and social change informed the age. There
was rapid progress in arts and sciences with spinning looms, steam boats, matches and electric
lights being some interesting ones. Railways as an established means of transport was ruling
the day. The Victorian empire was one of the biggest global empires commanding almost one
fourth of the global civilization in its sixty three year of dominion from 1837- 1901 The era
saw the end of the rural way of life with rapid growth and expansion of cities, mushrooming
of industries and cities with long working hours. At the political front the Crimean War had
begun. This was an age of innovation and human progress in all walks of life. In 1837 the first
electric telegraph was sent between English inventor William Fothergill Cooke and scientist
Charles Wheatstone. The year 1838 saw the introduction of the steam engine revolutionizing
transport. Communication received a boost with the world’s first postage stamp, the Penny
Black being sold in 1840 and 70 million letters sent within next year. A number that would
triple in two years. In 1840 the royal family saw expansion with Queen Victoria marrying her
first cousin Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha.

In 1843 Charles Dickens, one of the era’s most celebrated writers, published A Christmas Carol.
Other works from the author during this period: Oliver Twist, Great Expectations, David
Copperfield and Nicholas Nickleby, among others. The royal family would see the birth of nine
children in the next seventeen years till Albert’s death in 1861.The Irish Potato Famine that
was to last a period of our years began with the rotting of potato crops in in 1845 leading to
one million deaths and exodus of people from Ireland to North America and Great Britain. With
Prince Albert’s encouragement the Great Exhibition took place in London where thousands of
exhibitors displayed their technological innovations ranging from farm machinery to
telescopes. The exhibition was attended by six million visitors.

The field of medicine took a giant leap with vaccination act of 1853 making it mandatory for
children to be vaccinated against small pox. Strict compliance was sought. At the political front
in 1854 France and Britain declared war on Russia, launching the Crimean War. The war also
gave to the world it’s most famous nurse, Florence Nightingale, who was actively involved in
improving hygiene in camps and saving lives. Charles Darwin published On the Origin of
Species in 1859 presenting his theory of natural selection. Conservative candidate Benjamin
Disraeli to become the prime minister, a position that he was to hold for four terms. Gladstone
successfully introduced reform for Ireland. He also established an elementary education
program and strengthened democracy by instituting the secret ballot voting system. Under the
direction of Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli in 1876 the British colony India, being governed
since 1858, declares Queen Victoria its empress. In 1876 Alexander Graham made the first
phone call in the annals of history. It was to his assistant, Thomas Watson.

The Victorian Era ended with the death of the queen at the age of 81 in 1901. She was succeeded
by her son Edward VII.

Works of Tennyson When he was seventeen years old Tennyson collaborated with his elder
brother Charles in Poems by Two Brothers (1827) His Poems, (1830), chiefly Lyrical was
published while he was an undergraduate His volume of Poems (1833), which is often referred
to as Poems-(1832), because, in spite of its official title, it appeared in December of the earlier
year contains notable poems as The Lady of Shalott, Enone, The Lotos-Eaters, and The Palace
of Art. In 1842 he produced two volumes "of poetry. The first volume consists mainly of revised
forms of some of the numbers published previously, the second is entirely new. It opens with
Morte d''Arthur, and contains Ulysses, Locksley Hall, and several other poems that stand at the
summit of his achievement. The later stages of his career boast much longer poems as The
Princess (1847) which is a serio-comic attempt to handle the theme that was then known as 'the
new woman.

"The Defence of Lucknow" dramatizes the traditional ballad theme of wartime bravery, while
emphasizing the importance of national strength and unity, but it also highlights…the great risk
associated with foreign campaigns. (Sylvia 36). As is evident in the opening lines, "Banner of
England, not for a season, O banner of Britain, hast thou / Floated in conquering battle or flapt
to the battle-cry!" (1-2). The poem rooted in Victorian imperial history is spoken by a survivor
of the defense of Lucknow against Indian mutiny. The survivor unravels the ballad theme which
is the unwavering adherence to a moral code as represented by the flag of England. The British
unity, however is not strong enough to prevent the blood shed of the mutiny. ‘Between the
graphic details of battle in the beseiged fort and mutiny, ‘the poem subtly suggests that on
Indian soil, the British troop is dangerously out of place’ (Sylvia 36). Tennyson catches the
tone of wistfulness with which the familiar, but distant breezes of the English countryside are
remembered as a contrasting locale in the following lines: ‘ Ever the mine and assault, our
sallies, their lying alarms .Ever the night with its coffinless corpse to be laid in the ground/Heat
like the mouth of a hell, or a deluge of cataract skies/Stench of old offal decaying, and infinite
torment of flies/Thoughts of the breezes of May blowing over an English field/Cholera, scurvy,
and fever, the wound that would not be healed .... (75-84)’ The Defence of Lucknow is a war
poem set in the background of the Indian Mutiny of 1857 that saw the siege of Lucknow,
sustained assault and eventual relief of the British "Residency" i.e British governmental
headquarters in India’s northern city of Lucknow, part of 1857–58 Indian Mutiny against
British rule. The relief of Lucknow entailed two attempts by the British to rescue Sir Henry
Lawrence and a contingent of British and Indian troops, along with several hundred British
civilians, from the center of Lucknow where they held out under siege conditions for six
months. With widespread mutinies underway, Commander Lawrence ordered all the British
women and children of Lucknow to take cover in the Residency, the city’s chief fortress, on
May 25, and Lawrence himself retreated there on June 30. Though protected by the battery
positions the Residency was vulnerable as the surrounding buildings were occupied by rebel
snipers and artillery. The first relief attempt took place on September 25 when a force under
the command of Major General Sir Henry Havelock fought its way to Lucknow only to realize
that he had lost so many troops that it was evacuating the civilians was a risky idea. On
November 16, a much larger force approached Lucknow, led by Lieutenant General Sir Colin
Campbell. It ruthlessly stormed the Secundra Bagh, a walled enclosure blocking Campbell’s
route to the Residency. The British reached the Residency on November 19 and began
evacuations. By November 27, the residents had been relocated to safe destinations. Campbell
would return in March to recapture Lucknow. In the process 2,500 British and 8,000 Indian
army men would lose their lives with an, unknown number of casualties of around 30,000
Indian rebels.1 At this point of time Lucknow was the capital of Awadh. It had been annexed
by the British East India Company and the state’s Nawab, Wajid Ali Shah, was exiled to
Calcutta. There was a widespread resentment among Indian soldiers during this period working
under the British commandment who were outraged with the introduction of new cartridges
apparently greased with beef and pork hurting religious sentiments of both Hindus and
Muslims. On May 1857, the 7th Oudh Irregular Infantry declined to bite the cartridges and on
May 3, the Infantry was neutralized by other regiments. The disarmament could not pacify the
angry soldiers and on May 10, they attacked Meerut and moved towards Delhi. When the news
reached the Commissioner of Awadh, Sir Henry Lawrence, he began fortifying the Residency.2
In his essay “Reading Tennyson's "Ballads and Other Poems" in Context” Richard A. Sylvia
opines that British society was shocked by reports of the atrocities perpetrated by Indian
‘sepoys’ against British people in India. The Victorians as a society were incensed by the
brutality and ruthlessness of an ‘ungrateful’ and ‘unpredictable’ Indian population against what
was believed to be a benevolent overlordship. The violence of the British response was widely
seen as a fitting response to the actions of those who, employed and trusted by the British, had
proven themselves treacherous (82). Indian difference and unknowability were also themes for
Augusta Becher, whose memoirs of Anglo-Indian life were published posthumously in 1930.
Becher had gone to India in 1849 with her army officer husband, Septimus, and remained until
she was repatriated, along with her children, to Britain during the revolt of 1857 (Allbrook 90).
In Britain India of 1857 to 1859 and its people were described using polarised and racially
determined depictions of ‘good’, ‘innocent’, ‘just’, ‘moral’ and ‘civilised’ British, against
‘evil’, ‘guilty’, ‘lawless’, ‘depraved’ and ‘barbaric’ Indians. British literature on India
underwent a fundamental change after 1857, assuming the flavour of ‘self-conscious,
drumbeating jingoism’ popularly associated with British militarism and superiority in the
Victorian period (Allbrook 94) Ironically the duality of Tennyson’s perspective is revealed in
"Locksley Hall," where the speaker having been disappointed in love, curses the materialistic
society and ‘imagines a future in which nations are peacefully united, ‘In the Parliament of
man, the Federation of the world.’ But this vision, the speaker emphatically tells us, is a dream
from his youth, from an "earlier page. . . .before the strife." ( Sypher 107).

The later part of Nineteen Century is called Victorian age and Tennyson is a representative
voice of this age. The literature of this period represent the gross realities of emerging Industrial
expansion. In the background of prosperity, scientific development and Industrialization, there
was a dreadful exposure to doubts, despair, loss of faith, loss of relationship and divided values.
Common masses were in the grip of disease, dirt and darkness. Creative writers were inspired
to take up the issues related to human suffering of common masses resisting the flourishing
class struggle. Lylle’s Principles of Geology, Darwin’s Origin of Species revolutioned the
established patterns of human imagination. The paradigms of artistic appreciations and the
application of rational scientific vision created doubts about existing faiths and divine shelter.
Matthew Arnold, Tennyson, Robert Browning, Charles Dickins, Thomas Hardy and others
presented the different aspects of Victorian life and sensibility. Tennyson in his poetry presented
a fine blending of contradictory elements of Romanticism and Classicism, Reality and
Imagination, doubt and faith, religion and rationalism. T.S. Eliot appreciates him for his
abundance, variety, and competence.

Tennyson : Biographical Sketch and Literary Career

In the realm of Victorian poetry, Tennyson was hailed as the representative poet of Victorian
age. He was born in August 1809 in Lincolnshire. At the age of seven he was sent to a Grammar
School Louth. In 1828, with this Brother Charles, he went to Cambridge University. At
Cambridge, he won Chancellor’s Gold Medal for the poem Timbucktoo. He formulated his
literary career and intellectual stature under the inspiration of his friend Arthur Hallam. His
first collection of poems appeared in 1830 under the title Poems Chiefly Lyrics. His relationship
with Hallam could not continue for long. After Hallam’s death his poetic creed took a serious
and sublime turn. Ulysses was published in 1842. Tennyson’s life and poetry was governed by
the qualities of self imposed discipline, consummate skill and intellectual force. In 1842, two
major volumes of poetry appeared.

His interest in Arthurian legend is expressed in the poems The Lady of Shalott, Morte
d’Arthur and Sir Lancelot and Queen Guinevere. The poem Lotos Eaters was published in the
volume of 1832 but Tennyson subsequently revised it and added to the volume 1842. The
poems of this volume are remarkable for lyrical sweep, musical cadence, craftsmanship,
catholic spirit and uncompromising humanity. His patriotic impulse coupled with political zeal
is reflected in the poems Locksley Hall, The Two Voices, The Palace of Art and The Vision of
Sin. The poems of 1842 after a pause of ten years reflect the maturity of Tennyson in though
and metrical skills.

After 1842, Tennyson published his long narrative masterpieces like The Princess (1849), In
Memoriam (1850), Maud (1853), Idylls of King (1859). The poem The Princess that came out
in 1847 represents Tennyson’s vision of New Woman Movement. He exposes the educational
revolt on the part of women. Princess Ida was “All wild to find a University, For Maidens”.
The poem is a mixture of modern thinking and medieval romance. In Memoriam is a personal
elegy written in memory of his friend Hallam who died in 1833. He composed this poem at the
time when he was going through the troubles of life. The mystery of death and the quest for
life after death are the main themes. It is not composed as a compact whole. It is collection of
loose songs with one Prologue and Epilogue. It is composed in stanza form suitable to his mood
and purpose, “The slow movement of the verse suits the brooding thoughts.” It is remarkable
for the sincerety and sublimity of thought with the undertone of philosophical realization of
human conditions. The contemplations on soul prepared the ground for Maud. In Maud,
Tennyson presents the story of the anguished soul of a man. Regarding the unconventional
nature of this poem, Tennyson comments, “The peculiarity of Maud is that different phases of
passion in one person takes the place of different characters.” Tennyson’s vision to explore
King Arthur legend is found in Morte d’ Arthur and Idylls of the King. The Idylls are composed
in allegorical mode. They are the examples of Tennyson’s use of blank verse. The first
four Idylls were published in 1859. The twelve Idylls were composed in 1885. The idea
of Idylls is borrowed from medieval legends but Tennyson has presented them in modern light.

In Tennyson’s closing years came the volumes Ballads and Other Poems (1880), Locksley
Hall, Sixty Years After (1886), Demeter (1889), The Death of Oemon (1892). Tennyson also
wrote plays – Harold, Queen Mary and Becket. After a promising career, Tennyson died on 6th
October 1892. He anticipated his death in his famous Crossing the Bar which remains his final
legacy to the literary world.

In Defense of Lucknow : An Introduction

The poem In Defense of Lucknow is based on a real incident of mutiny during the war of
independence occurred in the city of Lucknow. In this poems Tennyson endeavours to expose
the anguish and suffering of the British soldiers and their uncompromising faith in the glory of
the British flag. Tennyson borrowed the idea of the poem from Outram’s account and that of
colonel Inglis. Inglis presented the detailed account of the incident in The Defense of
Lucknow by a staff officer and Tennyson used to have a copy of this book in his office. He was
requested by Jowett to compose a suggestive poem in memory of the soldiers who died in India.
Tennyson, in this poem, presents a suggestive account of the feeling of loss and pain in the
heart of British soldiers and their families trapped in India. The poem is composed from the
point of view of British soldiers who sacrificed their lives in the process of revolt. In the process
of the presentation of their struggle, Tennyson maintains exceptional vehemence appropriate
to maintain their position with bravery and patriotism.
At the back of the poem In Defense of Lucknow is an exposure on a major incident of Indian
history. The state of Awadh has annexed by East India Company and the Nawab Wajid Ali Shah
was exiled to Calcutta. Coverley Jackson was appointed the first British Commissioner to the
state. he proved a failure and Sir Henry Lawrence took the charge of state. Lawrence with his
skilled administrative abilities took the rebellions mood of the Indian troops. He decided to
transfer certain troops to other provinces. Lawrence began fortifying residency to curve down
the rebellion of Indian troops. The rebellion broke out from Meerut and spread to Lucknow and
from Lucknow to Sitapur and Faizabad. Within a span of ten days, British authority of Oudh
vanished resulting in the torment of British soldiers. Lawrence took personal responsibility to
organize the expedition. Soldiers were commanded to work sincerely even if they had to bear
the crisis of water and food. The rebel exhausted the energy of Lawrence’s sepoys but in the
process of retreat, some died of heat stroke and such other fatal sufferings. However some
British soldiers even at the risk of their life, tried to save their wounded men who were cut to
pieces by rebellions Indian soldiers. However on July 16, Major General Henry Havelock
recaptured the state of Cawnpur and made further efforts for the release of Lucknow. Havelock
marched to gain Unno and ultimately defeated rebel force at Bithur. Havelock’s retreat caused
the rebellion in Oudh and it subsequently took the form of a national revolt.

In Defense of Lucknow : A Critical Summary

The poem In Defence of Lucknow is based on the incident of the siege of Lucknow. It was a
terrible and significant event of the so-called Indian Sipahi Mutiny. It covers a struggle of about
87 days and came to an end after action undertaken by General Campbell on Nov. 6, 1857. The
poem is divided into seven sections and written as free expressions.

Para I : In the first para of the poem Tennyson celebrating the immense glory of British
Empire. The speaker defends how British soldiers sacrificed themselves to protect the pride of
British flag during the Revolt of 1857 at Lucknow. The speaker makes a confession, “Never
with mightier glory than when we had reared thee on high, flying at top of the roofs in the
ghostly siege of Lucknow.”

Para II : In this section, Tennyson presents the horrible condition of people who were trapped
in British residences. In this mutiny, Henry Lawrence, the representative of British armed force,
inspire his soldiers not to surrender in cowardice but fight bravely for the respect of British
empire. There were all pervasive impact of death and wound. Still he implored them to protect
fellow soldiers with their best efforts. In this passage also, there is an assertion and affirmation
of uncompromising pride of British Empire.
Para III : In this passage, Tennyson exposes the crisis of water and heat stroke that increased
the possibilities of the death of British soldiers. There were the apprehensions of attack
on Redan – the storage unit of water. Its destruction must have been the cause of flood and
chaos. Still the speaker advices to sustain the British flag safe. He comments, “Flying and foiled
at last by the handful. They could not subdue and ever upon the topmost roof our banner of
England blew.” The facts are presented with the union of force echoing the situation of mutiny.

Para IV : In this passage, the speaker tries to inculcate the spirit o “self preservation” in the
stooping spirit of soldiers. He tries to make them aware of their pride and power. They were
trained to “command, to obey, to endure.” The patriotism reflects when he exhorts that it is
better to die in the hands of their own men, than that of being ruined in the hands of enemy. He
encourages them to muster the physical and mental strength, “true is your heart, but be sure
that your hand is as true?

Para V : In this passage there is a detailed account of the killing of British men by Indians. It
resulted in the terrible death of innumerable Britishers. However, the British instead of being
subdued, gather their strength to retaliate. It made Indian soldiers to run away. The passage
ends with a feeling of consolation, “Fought with the bravest among us and drove them, and
smote them and slow.”

Para VI : In this passage, Tennyson with a pathetic Irony tries to reveal the sensibility of
soldiers. They have scarified their lives in Lucknow. The revolt will be remembered but no
body will care for the struggle and suffering of these soldiers. They were limited in number
still they tried their best to save the honour of their nation. People will count their deaths but
will ignore their struggle and sensibility. They were forced to hide rotten corpses. Women
nursed the sick and wounded. They invested their lives only in the hope of the days of good
news. The re-establishment of their own authority in Lucknow with a deep felt pain, speaker
admits, “Men will forget what we suffer and not what we do. We can fight but to be soldier all
day be sentinal all through the night.”

Para VII : In this passage, there is a description of the victory of British flag. Outram and
Havelock came to inform them of the victory of the British over Indian rebels. The news stirred
joy, excitement and delight. They were requested to fight for fifteen days but they survived for
eighty seven days.

In Defence of Lucknow : Critical Appreciation

Alfred Lord Tennyson, a representative voice of Victorian era, with his versatile genius
represented the different phases and aspects of Victorian life and sensibility. In Defence of
Lucknow, is an unconventional poem based on a major incident of Victorian History. During
the reign of Queen Victoria, the soldiers for England underwent different experiences. They
inflicted tortures on Indians but during the shadows of war underwent different experience of
pair, violence and disorder. Even against these odds, they tried their best to sustain the glory
and pride of English flag and English tradition. It is based on the terrible incident of the siege
of Lucknow. It was a terrible event of Indian mutiny. This struggle continued for 87 days and
it was ultimately relieved by General Campbell.
The poem The Defence of Lucknow is divided in seven sections. They are separate but they
collectively contribute to a common enthusiastic spirit of British soldiers who make struggle
with the dream “And even upon the topmost roof our banner of England blew.” The thoughts
in the poem develops in the background of delight, enthusiasm and uncompromising passion
for national dignity. The poem is constructed in the form of monologue where the speaker
addresses the fighting soldiers and tries to make them realize their duty for their national flag.
There is an exceptional vehemence in his call, “Never surrender, I charge you.” In the first lines
of second section, there is forceful address to death that vitalizes the phenomenon of death. The
all pervasive phenomenon is evident in the declaration.

HomeSummary of The Defence of Lucknow by TennysonIn Depth Analysis of The Poem "The
Defence of Lucknow" by Tennyson
In Depth Analysis of The Poem "The Defence of Lucknow" by Tennyson
Parishmita RoyFebruary 05, 2024
In Depth Analysis of The Poem "The Defence of Lucknow" by Tennyson

Also visit : Literary Sphere

Alfred Lord Tennyson's poem "The Defence of Lucknow" captures the harrowing experiences
of the defenders during the Indian Rebellion of 1857. Composed by Tennyson in 1857, the
poem reflects the broader historical context of the Indian Mutiny, a significant event in British
colonial history. The narrative unfolds through various sections, each portraying different
aspects of the siege.
In this structured scrutiny, we will explore the in depth analysis of the poem "The Defence of
Lucknow" by Tennyson.

Alongwith it the poem's structure, themes, and literary devices are also discussed.

𝘽𝙍𝙄𝙀𝙁 𝙊𝙑𝙀𝙍𝙑𝙄𝙀𝙒

"The Defense of Lucknow" by Alfred Lord Tennyson is a narrative poem that provides a
gripping account of the siege of Lucknow during the Indian Rebellion of 1857. The poem
delves into the multifaceted experiences of the besieged garrison, emphasizing themes of
resilience, heroism, sacrifice, and unity.

The narrative unfolds with the English banner flying defiantly over Lucknow, serving as a
symbol of endurance. Tennyson meticulously details the prolonged siege, emphasizing the
physical and emotional toll on the defenders. The poem introduces key figures like Lawrence,
embodying individual acts of heroism, and explores the moral dilemmas faced by the besieged,
adding depth to their characterization.

The verses vividly portray the relentless assaults faced by the defenders—cannonades,
fusillades, and constant threats. Tennyson employs powerful imagery to convey the harsh
realities of war, describing the stifling heat, the stench of decay, and the torment of flies. The
defenders, portrayed as a diverse group including English and Indian allies, women, and
children, unite against a common enemy, highlighting the theme of unity in diversity.

One of the central moments in the poem is the arrival of General Outram and General Havelock.
Tennyson builds anticipation, capturing the sounds of battle and the sudden jubilation among
the defenders as reinforcements break through. The relief and gratitude are palpable in the lines,
symbolizing the triumph of resilience over adversity.

Throughout the poem, the English banner atop the palace roof serves as a poignant symbol of
defiance. Its continuous fluttering becomes a visual motif representing the enduring spirit of
the defenders. The pibroch, a Scottish martial music associated with Havelock's Highlanders,
adds an auditory layer, enhancing the cultural richness of the narrative.

Tennyson skillfully employs literary devices such as alliteration for rhythmic effect and
emphasis. Repetition is strategically used to intensify pivotal moments, creating a sense of
urgency and elation. The poet's use of vivid imagery, symbolism, and structured sections
contributes to the poem's emotive and evocative nature.

The historical context of the Indian Rebellion of 1857 adds depth to the narrative, as Tennyson
captures the sentiments and experiences of the defenders during this tumultuous period. The
poem provides a literary lens through which to explore the human aspects of war and conflict,
highlighting the complexities of heroism and sacrifice.

"The Defense of Lucknow" is a masterfully crafted narrative poem that encapsulates the
experiences of the besieged garrison in Lucknow. Through its structured sections, vivid
imagery, and exploration of various themes, the poem offers a nuanced portrayal of resilience
and unity in the face of adversity. Tennyson's artful use of language and historical context
enriches the narrative, making it a compelling and enduring piece of literature.

𝙎𝙏𝙍𝙐𝘾𝙏𝙐𝙍𝙀 𝙊𝙁 𝙏𝙃𝙀 𝙋𝙊𝙀𝙈 "𝙏𝙃𝙀 𝘿𝙀𝙁𝙀𝙉𝘾𝙀 𝙊𝙁 𝙇𝙐𝘾𝙆𝙉𝙊𝙒

Tennyson divides the poem into distinct sections, each portraying a specific episode in the
defense of Lucknow. This structured approach allows for a comprehensive exploration of the
multifaceted experiences of the defenders. The poem moves chronologically, detailing the
prolonged siege, the challenges faced by the defenders, and culminating in the arrival of
reinforcements.
𝙏𝙃𝙀𝙈𝙀𝙎 𝙊𝙁 𝙏𝙃𝙀 𝙋𝙊𝙀𝙈 "𝙏𝙃𝙀 𝘿𝙀𝙁𝙀𝙉𝘾𝙀 𝙊𝙁 𝙇𝙐𝘾𝙆𝙉𝙊𝙒"

Resilience:

The overarching theme of resilience pervades the poem. The defenders of Lucknow endure a
prolonged and relentless siege, facing physical, emotional, and psychological challenges. The
continuous fluttering of the English banner atop the palace roof becomes a symbol of
unwavering resolve and endurance against overwhelming odds. Tennyson captures the
indomitable spirit of the besieged garrison, emphasizing their ability to persist in the face of
adversity.

Heroism and Sacrifice:

Individual acts of heroism and sacrifice are recurrent motifs. Figures like Lawrence and the
unnamed soldiers exhibit valor in the midst of battle. The poem explores the moral dilemmas
faced by the defenders, contemplating the sacrifice of their lives for the greater good. The
willingness to confront danger and make personal sacrifices underscores the heroic nature of
the besieged garrison.

Unity in Diversity:

A significant theme is the unity among the defenders, transcending racial and cultural
differences. Tennyson acknowledges the contribution of Indian allies, emphasizing the
camaraderie among the diverse group defending Lucknow. The term "kindly dark faces"
signifies the collective commitment and shared purpose of the defenders, highlighting unity in
the face of a common enemy.

Human Cost of War:

The poem delves into the human cost of war, portraying the physical and emotional toll on the
besieged garrison. Descriptions of the stifling heat, the stench of decay, and the torment of flies
create a visceral representation of the harsh realities of conflict. Tennyson captures the internal
conflicts and dilemmas faced by the defenders, adding a poignant layer to the narrative.

Arrival of Reinforcements:
A pivotal moment in the poem is the arrival of General Outram and General Havelock. This
theme marks the turning point in the narrative, emphasizing the relief and jubilation
experienced by the defenders as reinforcements break through. The arrival of support
symbolizes hope and salvation, providing respite to those who have endured the prolonged
siege.

Symbolism of the English Banner:

The English banner atop the palace roof serves as a powerful symbol throughout the poem. Its
continuous fluttering represents defiance, resilience, and the enduring spirit of the defenders.
Tennyson employs the banner as a visual motif, reinforcing its symbolic significance and the
collective determination of those it represents.

In the context of the historical events surrounding the Indian Rebellion of 1857, these themes
intertwine to provide a comprehensive exploration of the human experience during times of
conflict. Tennyson's meticulous portrayal of the siege of Lucknow captures the complexity of
war, emphasizing both the valor and the human cost borne by those who defended against the
uprising.

𝙇𝙄𝙏𝙀𝙍𝘼𝙍𝙔 𝘿𝙀𝙑𝙄𝘾𝙀𝙎

Alfred Lord Tennyson employs a variety of literary devices in "The Defense of Lucknow" to
enhance the poem's emotional impact, create vivid imagery, and contribute to its rhythmic flow.
Here are several literary devices used in the poem along with examples:

1. Imagery:

- *Example:* "Frail were the works that defended the hold that we held with our lives." The
use of "frail" and "defended" conjures an image of vulnerable fortifications under attack.

2. Alliteration:

- *Example:* "Never surrender, I charge you, but every man die at his post!" The repetition
of the "d" sound in "defend" and "die" adds a rhythmic quality and emphasis to the command.
3. Metaphor:

- *Example:* "Dark thro’ the smoke and the sulphur like so many fiends in their hell." The
comparison of the enemy advancing through smoke and sulphur to fiends in hell creates a vivid
and ominous metaphor.

4. Personification:

- *Example:* "Death from their rifle-bullets, and death from their cannon-balls." The
attribution of death to inanimate objects humanizes the weapons, intensifying their impact.

5. Repetition:

- *Example:* "And ever upon the topmost roof our banner of England blew." The repetition
of "ever" emphasizes the enduring nature of the English banner.

6. Symbolism:

- *Example:* The English banner symbolizes resilience and national identity. Its continuous
fluttering becomes a symbolic representation of the defenders' unwavering spirit.

7. Allusion:

- *Example:* "Surely the pibroch of Europe is ringing again in our ears!" The reference to
the pibroch, a Scottish martial music, alludes to the arrival of Havelock's Highlanders, adding
cultural depth to the poem.

8. Assonance:

- *Example:* "Cleave into perilous chasms our walls and our poor palisades." The repetition
of the long "e" sound in "cleave," "perilous," and "chasm" creates a melodic quality.
9. Enjambment:

- *Example:* "Storm at the Water-gate! storm at the Bailey-gate! storm, and it ran Surging
and swaying all round us..." The continuation of the sentence without a pause at the end of a
line creates a sense of urgency and momentum.

10. Anaphora:

- *Example:* "Death from ten thousand at once of the rebels that girdled us round— Death
at the glimpse of a finger from over the breadth of a street." The repetition of "Death" at the
beginning of successive lines emphasizes the omnipresence of danger.

11. Onomatopoeia:

- *Example:* "Hark cannonade, fusillade!" The words "cannonade" and "fusillade" imitate
the sounds of gunfire, contributing to the auditory experience of the poem.

12. Irony:

- *Example:* "Better to fall by the hands that they love, than to fall into theirs!" The irony
lies in the difficult choice the defenders face—falling by friendly hands is presented as the
preferable option.

These literary devices collectively enrich the poem, contributing to its aesthetic appeal and
effectively conveying the complex emotions and experiences of the besieged garrison during
the Indian Rebellion.

𝘾𝙍𝙄𝙏𝙄𝘾𝘼𝙇 𝙑𝙄𝙀𝙒𝙋𝙊𝙄𝙉𝙏

A critical viewpoint of "The Defense of Lucknow" by Alfred Lord Tennyson allows for an
examination of its strengths and potential shortcomings, shedding light on its artistic, historical,
and thematic dimensions.
Tennyson employs a narrative style that effectively captures the intensity of the siege. The
structured sections and vivid imagery contribute to a compelling storytelling experience.

The effective use of symbolism, particularly the English banner and the pibroch, adds layers of
meaning to the narrative. Vivid imagery brings the scenes to life, allowing readers to visualize
the challenges faced by the defenders.

Tennyson's poem provides a literary lens through which the events of the Indian Rebellion can
be viewed. It offers insight into the experiences of the besieged garrison and contributes to the
understanding of historical complexities.

The emphasis on resilience, unity among defenders, and sacrifice are laudable themes. The
poem highlights the human spirit's ability to endure and stand united in the face of adversity.

Tennyson delves into the moral dilemmas faced by the defenders, adding depth to the narrative.
The exploration of internal conflicts contributes to a nuanced portrayal of the human cost of
war.

Some critics may argue that the poem reflects a Eurocentric perspective, as it primarily focuses
on the experiences of the English defenders. The contributions of Indian allies are
acknowledged but might be seen as somewhat peripheral.

While repetition is effective in creating emphasis, it may be perceived by some as slightly

overused. The frequent recurrence of certain phrases, though serving a rhythmic purpose, might
be criticized for potential monotony.

The poem, while accessible, uses relatively straightforward language. Some critics may argue
that a more complex or nuanced linguistic approach could enhance the depth of the narrative.

The poem succeeds in eliciting emotional responses from readers, particularly in portraying the
sacrifices made by the defenders. The evocative language and poignant scenes contribute to
the poem's overall impact.

While the poem acknowledges the presence of Indian allies, some critics may scrutinize
whether their role is adequately represented. A more comprehensive exploration of their
experiences could contribute to a more inclusive narrative.
In conclusion, Tennyson's "The Defense of Lucknow" showcases artistic prowess in its
narrative technique, symbolism, and exploration of themes. While the poem is generally well-
received for its emotional resonance and historical relevance, potential criticisms may center
on Eurocentrism, repetition, simplicity of language, and the representation of Indian allies.
Examining the poem critically allows for a nuanced appreciation of its strengths and areas that
might be subject to interpretation and debate.
 ROBERT BROWNING: THE LAST RIDE TOGETHER
“The Last Ride Together” Introduction
"The Last Ride Together" is Robert Browning's tale of heartbreak, imperfection, and hope.
Disappointed in love, this dramatic monologue's speaker asks his beloved to go on one final
ride with him (perhaps on horseback, perhaps in a carriage). Along the way, he reflects that life
rarely lives up to one's dreams—but that life's failings might, at least, leave people something
to hope for from heaven. Browning first published this poem in his major 1855 collection Men
and Women.

• “The Last Ride Together” Summary

o I said: "Well, my darling, if that's the way things are—since now, at last, I know
what's going to happen to me; since my love has had no effect; since I've failed
in my life's very purpose; since this is my inescapable fate—I bless you
wholeheartedly, proud and grateful to have loved you. I return to you all the
hopes you gave me and ask only that I will be allowed to remember those
hopes. But I'd also like to ask one more thing: please go for one final horseback
ride with me."
My beloved tilted her lovely head, and her big dark eyes—full of the pride that made her turn
me down, when they could have been soft with pity for me—looked directly at me for a few
moments. I felt that my very life was at stake until she nodded: yes! Then, I felt my frozen
blood moving in my veins again; at least I'd get this one last wish fulfilled. My beloved and I
will be together, alive and breathing, for one more horseback ride—and so, for one more day,
I feel like a god. And who knows? Maybe the world will end this very evening and our ride
together will be my last experience on earth.
Listen quietly: imagine that you saw a cloud floating in the western sky, curvy as a woman's
breast, illuminated and blessed by the lovely lights of the sun, the moon, and Venus all at
once. And imagine that you, watching this cloud in adoration, realized that your love for it was
pulling it (and all the beautiful lights captured in it) down toward you, nearer and nearer, until
you felt you might leave your body behind and enter heaven itself, dying of bliss. That's just
how she leaned toward me, filling me with delight and terror at once; that's just how she
embraced me for one short moment.
So we set out for our ride. I felt my soul, which had been packed tightly away for so long,
uncrumpling itself and flying like a flag behind me in the breeze. My earlier hopes were lost
now. So what good would it do for me to struggle against my unfortunate fate? If I'd done this
or that, things might have been better, or they might have been worse. Would she have loved
me if I'd done something differently? She might just as easily have hated me—who knows! And
how much worse would my situation have been if she refused even to go on this ride with
me? For look: here we are, riding together.
Am I the only person whose efforts fail? Certainly not: do anyone's efforts completely
succeed? As my beloved and I rode on, I felt as if my soul were flying over far-off lands, while
the world rushed past around us. I thought: everyone works hard at something, and everyone
is forced to reckon with failure. Compare results with intentions; contrast the little things
people manage to accomplish with all the greatness they hoped to achieve, or their present
reality with what they once dreamed might happen! Me, I hoped my beloved would love me
back; and here we are, instead, on this final ride.
When was a person ever able to do just what they dreamed of? Who ever both conjured up a
brilliant plan and completed it perfectly? What action ever lived up to hopes? Whose willpower
was never thwarted by the imperfect reality of mortal life? (My beloved and I keep riding, and
I see her breast rise and fall.) Oh, sure, there are plenty of triumphs and rewards in the world
for the people who pursue them. But a great leader's glory amounts to nothing more than ten
short lines in an old history book. And all that remains of heroic soldiers is a pile of bones with
a flag stuck into them. And what makes up for such a fate? The soldier just gets his name
written on the walls of Westminster Abbey. No offense to them, but I think my ride is a better
reward.
Well, you poet: what do you have to say about these questions? Your mind taps out a beat, you
record the things that most people only feel—and you've said that you think beauty is the best
thing in the world. You line beauties up in rhymed lines, one after the other. Such an
achievement isn't nothing, it's a lot more than nothing: but do you, poet, actually lead the best
possible life? Or are you—impoverished, ill, and old before your time—any closer to the
beauties you celebrate than those of us who never wrote a single poem? You can go ahead and
write poems that say, "Riding is a delight!" Me, I just ride.
And what about you, oh great sculptor? You sacrificed 20 years of your life to the goddess Art,
making yourself her servant. The result is a lovely statue of Venus—which we all turn away
from as soon as an ordinary pretty girl crossing a stream catches our eye. You willingly make
your sacrifice—and would I wish you to do otherwise? And you, you musician, prematurely
gray-haired, with nothing to say for yourself but a few songs: the only thing your friends have
to say about you is, "Well, he's an ambitious composer, but we all know how musical tastes
change...." I, like you artists, sacrificed my best years to a thankless cause: but, after it all, at
least my beloved and I are riding together.
Who can say what's best? If Fate had decreed that I should get what I wanted, and requited love
should make my very soul overflow with bliss—if I had been able to marry her—well, everyone
needs to have something left to aspire to in heaven. We all need an idea of perfection that we
can only barely imagine; if I'd achieved my idea of perfection on earth, and found my soul
wrapped in the celebratory wreaths of fulfilled love, would I have any dream left over to hope
for? There would be only one way to find out! But the thought makes me fall back in fear. If I
achieved the absolute height of joy on earth, would I even care about heaven any more? Now,
at least, both my beloved and heaven itself are alluringly out of my grasp, somewhere beyond
this ride.
But—my beloved has been quiet for so long! What if heaven itself only meant that the very
best and most beautiful moment of our life (the moment when we look up into the heavens and
feel as if we're seeing the whole point of life blossoming like a flower) would last
forever? What if the two of us were to ride on forever, always doing the same thing and always
feeling it to be fresh and new? What if we never did anything but ride—except that we got to
do it eternally, one second stretching out into infinity? What if heaven was just the two of us
riding on forever?
 • “The Last Ride Together” Themes

The Pains and Consolations of Love

“The Last Ride Together” suggests that intense love can inspire bliss even in the middle of
heartbreak. The speaker, a man whose proposal has just been declined by his beloved, makes a
final request: that she go for one last horseback ride with him. Even if his love for her is
unrequited, it’s still so strong that this devastating final outing with her feels to him like heaven
itself. Love, in this poem, doesn’t need to be reciprocated to be meaningful; on the contrary,
the speaker suggests that thwarted love can be beautiful, worthwhile, and even sacred.
The speaker’s love for the woman he wanted to marry is so huge and so fundamental to him
that, without it, he feels he doesn’t have much left to live for. The speaker’s adoration of his
beloved has made her the center of his life—and when she doesn’t love him back, he feels as
if “all [his] life seemed meant for” has “fail[ed].” In other words, he feels that winning his
beloved’s affection was his only purpose in life. And now that she’s turned him down, his life
itself seems like a failure.
But even unrequited love, the poem says, can feel almost divine. When the speaker goes on his
“last ride” with his beloved, the simple joy of being in her company is so huge that he can think
of no greater pleasure, even though he knows that pleasure must come to an end. He even
speculates that heaven might be nothing more than an eternal version of this ride: perhaps
paradise itself could offer no deeper joy than this “instant” of his beloved’s company becoming
“eternity.” Beside her, he himself even feels “deified,” almost made into a god himself. He
wouldn’t trade this single moment for any other triumph the world could offer him.
The poem thus suggests that love can crush people’s hearts and offer a glimpse of paradise at
the same time. The speaker’s loss and disappointment might be devastating, but he’s still had
the profound experience of adoring someone so much that even an hour or two in her company
gives him the greatest imaginable pleasure. Love, the poem says, is deeply worthwhile, life-
giving, and spiritually meaningful even when one’s love isn’t returned.

Hope and Expectations vs. Reality

Life, the poem’s speaker reflects, never lives up to dreams. From disappointed love to
disappointed ambitions, life doesn’t ever seem to reach the glory that people can conjure up in
their imaginations: “all men strive” for something perfect, the speaker says, but no one
“succeed[s].” That doesn’t mean that ambitious hopes and dreams have no place in life,
however: earthly failures and disappointments can help people to imagine (and strive to reach)
a perfect afterlife. If people never get what they want on earth, in other words, then they always
have a heavenly ideal to quest for.
Mourning an unrequited love, the speaker philosophically reflects that he’s far from alone in
his suffering: people’s hopes are never completely fulfilled by what actually happens. “What
act,” the speaker asks, ever “proved all the thought had been?”—in other words, when did
anything ever come out exactly the way a person meant it to? Even the greatest “poet” or
“sculptor,” for instance, might celebrate ideal beauties in their work, but that doesn’t mean that
they’ll get anywhere near the perfection they imagine in either their flawed art or their flawed
lives. Reality just isn’t perfect, plain and simple.
And when people do achieve something great, the speaker mourns, their triumph is short-lived.
Even grand victories are marred by death: the noblest “statesman” or “soldier” ends up nothing
more than a “ten line[]” entry in the history books and a “heap of bones.” The speaker himself
feels this sorrow acutely. On a final horseback ride with his beloved, he speculates that heaven,
for him, might be an eternal version of these few moments with her—all the while knowing
that, here on earth, this ride has to end sometime. Perhaps the world’s greatest imperfection, in
other words, is that even its highest delights don’t last.
But perhaps, the speaker reflects, life’s imperfection can also inspire people’s hopes for “a life
beyond”: all the disappointments of reality might help people to dream of a heavenly
afterlife. Not getting exactly what you want in exactly the way you want it means that there’s
always something more to hope for: if “Earth” offered perfection, he asks, “would heaven seem
best?” The world’s flaws, in other words, leave room for the imagination, and keep people
questing for ideals that they can reach only in a heavenly eternity.
 o

Art vs. Experience

In this dramatic monologue, the speaker gets in a few jabs at the people who devote their lives
to capturing the ideal in art—like the guy writing this poem, just for instance! Because art can
never perfectly capture life, the speaker suggests, it’s ridiculous to waste the best years of one’s
life on trying: the only thing to do is to live life rather than describe it.
Attempting to capture life’s deepest moments of feeling in art, the poem suggests, distracts
artists from living. While poetry, for instance, might be meaningful and consoling, it also
doesn’t bring the poet “nearer one whit” to their “own sublime”: since poetry can never fully
capture experience, writing about “things beautiful” is a far cry from experiencing beauty in
the moment.
The speaker himself has no time for living life at a remove this way: he tells poets, “Sing,
riding’s a joy! For me, I ride.” In other words, the poets can go ahead and write about how
wonderful it is to go riding with one’s beloved, but he himself would much rather be actually
riding, thank you very much.
The big irony here, of course, is that the speaker is saying so in a poem. That irony invites
readers to reflect that art and life might have a more complicated relationship than the speaker
claims. All through the poem, the speaker regrets that life itself always falls a little short of
dreams; his own heartbreak is the proof. If that’s the case, then art and life might actually have
a lot in common: both are full of failed grasps at perfection. Imperfect art is thus a fitting tribute
to imperfect life.

In this dramatic monologue, the speaker, first of all, presents a background of the story. The
speaker is taking leave from his beloved. Before parting, he just requests his beloved to go on
a ride with him for the last time. The lady accepts the invitation. It seems that she is also
interested in passing a few more moments with the person for whom her hearts leaped up in
joy at once. Being the last chapter of their journey, both the speaker and the lady want to make
that moment precious. However, throughout the poem, she doesn’t speak a word. Only the
speaker muses on his feelings only and presents several comparisons to prove the fact that they
are, in fact, in a better position. Their love is momentary but sublime. They won’t be meeting
in near future yet they can look back to this episode forever and ever.

Structure
‘The Last Ride Together’ is a love lyric and told from the perspective of the lover. It is also a
dramatic monologue as there is only a single speaker who describes the “last ride” with his
beloved. There are a total of 10 stanzas in this poem and each stanza contains 11 lines in it. The
rhyme scheme of the text is AABBCDDEEEC. This scheme is not a conventional one.
However, using such a rhyming scheme, the poet creates an internal rhyming between the lines.
Apart from that, Browning wrote this poem in iambic tetrameter. Hence, each line consists of
four iambs. It means there are four beats per line and the stress falls on the second syllable of
each foot. However, there are a few metrical variations in the text.

Literary Devices
Being a long poem of 110 lines, one can find numerous literary devices here. Likewise, the
first stanza contains anaphora in the four consecutive lines after the first one. The poet
uses hyperbole by using the word “dearest” in the first line. There is a personification in the
line, “My whole heart rises up to bless”. Thereafter, in the second stanza, the poet
uses alliteration in the phrase “deep dark eyes”. This stanza ends with a rhetorical question.
An oxymoron is there in “joy and fear”. In the fourth stanza, the last line contains irony. Here,
the poet indirectly refers that the worst befell on him as he is with his beloved for the last time.
The poet also uses a transferred epithet in “hopeful past”. Here, the adjective rightly belongs
to “theirs” or the people.
Thereafter, “fleshly screen” is a metaphor for the human body. The poet uses sarcasm in the
last two lines of the sixth stanza. However, the last line of the poem contains a repetition of the
word “ride”. This device is called palilogy.
Themes
There are several themes present in Browning’s poem ‘The Last Ride Together’. The poet
makes use of themes such as love, eternity, time, physicality, spirituality, and life. The major
theme of the poem love. Here, the poet touches on different aspects of love. The poet presents
physical love, eternal love, and selfless love through the attitude of the speaker which changes
according to the pace of the poem. Firstly, it’s about physical love that makes the speaker
rejuvenated. Thereafter, the speaker talks about a selfless kind of love that doesn’t lie in the
past or future. It lies in the present moment. Moreover, as the poem progresses, the concept of
love reaches an eternal level. In the end, the speaker wishes for riding eternally with his beloved
by crossing the limitations of time and death.

Historical Context
The poet utilizes the form of dramatic monologue while illustrating a lover’s state of mind
during the last ride with his beloved. Concerning the subject matter of the poem, it is innovative
yet some motifs appeared in the poems written before ‘The Last Ride Together’. Whatsoever,
it was written in the Victorian period that represented the high point of the dramatic monologue
in English poetry.
Whereas in the romantic period, there are very few poems written using this form. Poems such
as ‘Tintern Abbey’ by William Wordsworth and ‘Mont Blanc’ by Percy Bysshe Shelley closely
resemble the form. The conversational poems of Samuel Taylor Coleridge are a better example
of the dramatic monologue form. Felicia Hemans and Letitia Elizabeth Landon developed
this genre, beginning in Landon’s case with her long poem ‘The Imrpovisatrice’.
Later in the Victorian era, poets such as Alfred Lord Tennyson, Matthew Arnold, and Robert
Browning took this form to new heights. Poems such as ‘Ulysses’ by Tennyson, ‘Dover
Beach’ by Arnold, and ‘My Last Duchess’ by Browning are taken as some best-
known dramatic monologues.

"The Last Ride Together" is a dramatic monologue written by Robert Browning. It explores
themes of love, desire, and the acceptance of fate. The poem takes the perspective of the
speaker, a rejected lover who requests her mistress for a final ride with him. His mistress
accepts the offer and they embark upon the final ride. The speaker feels elated when he rides
with his mistress. The speaker reflects on his rejection in love, his final ride, a trivial success,
and compares it with the achievements of other people in the society. He finds that there are
many people who keep on working very hard in spite of little success obtained through a
mountain of hard work. A brave soldier gets nothing for his sacrifice except for a flag and his
name scratched on his tomb. No reward of this world can compensate for the sacrifice of a
brave soldier. A statesman gets only ten lines on his tomb. People like poets, sculptors and
musicians devote their whole lives to art, ruin their lives by working hard but their achievement
is not any inch greater than that of an ordinary man. The speaker finds that he is enjoying his
ride and this achievement of his is better than all the above achievements. He reflects over
several possibilities. Even if he had won the hand of mistress and married her, would that
amount to the end of all his aspirations? Would he not aspire for more achievements after
marriage? Can a person get all that he wants? Nobody can guarantee it. The only way is to try
and test but the results may vary. His ride is better than all the above. He wishes that the present
moment be turned to eternity so that he may keep on riding with his mistress forever. Overall
the poem focuses on the present which is the most successful and most important time of life.

About The Author, Robert Browning

Robert Browning belongs to the Victorian era of the English Literature. He was a prominent
English poet and playwright who is widely recognized for his innovative poetic techniques,
complex psychological insights, and exploration of dramatic monologues.
He was born on May 7, 1812, in Camberwell, London. He was the son of a well-paid Bank
clerk in the Bank of England. His mother Sarrah Anna to whom he was very close was a
talented musician
Browning's early works did not gain much critical acclaim, but he gained recognition and
popularity later in life. He began writing poetry at a young age and was influenced by Romantic
poets such as Percy Bysshe Shelley and William Wordsworth. Browning was also well-versed
in classical and Renaissance literature, which greatly influenced his writing style.
One of Browning's significant contributions to poetry was the development of the dramatic
monologue. His dramatic monologues are characterized by a single speaker who reveals their
thoughts, emotions, and experiences. Browning delved into the depths of the human psyche,
exploring the complexities of human nature and the moral ambiguities of his characters.
One of Browning's most famous works is the collection "Men and Women" (1855), which
includes his renowned dramatic monologues such as "My Last Duchess," "The Bishop Orders
His Tomb at Saint Praxed's Church," and "Fra Lippo Lippi." In these poems, Browning portrays
various characters from different walks of life, capturing their distinctive voices and
psychological nuances.
Another notable work by Browning is the long narrative poem "The Ring and the Book" (1868-
1869). Browning's poetry often tackles complex moral and philosophical themes, such as love,
jealousy, the nature of art, the existence of God, and the role of faith. His writing style can be
dense and intricate, requiring close reading and careful analysis to fully appreciate its richness.
Despite his success as a poet, Browning also faced some criticism during his lifetime. His style
was seen as challenging and unconventional by some, and his subject matter occasionally
pushed the boundaries of Victorian sensibilities. Nevertheless, he remains a highly regarded
figure in English literature, and his works continue to be studied and admired for their depth
and artistic merit. He passed away on December 12, 1889, in Venice, Italy.

Robert Browning: The Last Ride Together - Notes

Introduction to the Poem:
• "The Last Ride Together" is a dramatic monologue by Robert Browning, first
published in 1855 in his collection Men and Women.
 • The poem is spoken by a lover who is reflecting on the final ride he shares with his
beloved. The lover does not receive reciprocation for his love, yet he finds solace in the
beauty of the moment and the emotional intensity of their final interaction.
• The poem reflects Browning’s characteristic style, where he explores complex human
emotions and moral questions, often through monologues that reveal the inner workings
of a character’s mind.
Summary of the Poem:
The speaker, a man deeply in love with a woman, reflects on their final ride together, which he
knows will be their last. Despite the apparent separation or unrequited love, he takes solace in
the fact that he had one final, beautiful moment with her. The poem is a mix of romantic
melancholy and philosophical introspection. He seeks to find meaning in the fleeting moment
of joy they share, and he imagines that this final ride is worth more than a lifetime of ordinary
love. He accepts the inevitable separation and cherishes the intensity of the moment,
understanding that this memory will live on, and that he has experienced something rare and
extraordinary.
Structure and Form:
• Poem Type: The poem is a dramatic monologue – a form that Browning mastered.
The speaker addresses an implied audience (the beloved or perhaps himself) and reveals
his thoughts, emotions, and reflections.
• Stanza Form: The poem consists of six stanzas, each with a regular rhyme scheme
(ABABCC), giving the poem a flowing, meditative rhythm.
• Tone: The tone of the poem is bittersweet, reflective, and philosophical. It combines
romantic longing with acceptance and resignation.
Themes:
1. Love and Separation:
o The primary theme of the poem is the speaker’s contemplation of the separation
from his beloved, who is no longer reciprocating his feelings. Despite the
impending separation, he treasures the intensity of their final moments together.
o The lover’s acceptance of the separation, especially after having experienced
love, is an important aspect of the poem.
2. Time and Transience:
o The speaker reflects on the transient nature of love, human emotions, and life
itself. The last ride, while significant, is just one moment in the grand flow of
time. He appreciates it as a rare and beautiful experience, which he is grateful
for.
o The inevitability of time’s passing and the impermanence of human
relationships are central ideas. However, there is also an understanding that
experiences, even brief ones, hold immense value.
 3. Acceptance and Resignation:
o The speaker comes to terms with the fact that this will be the last ride with his
lover. He meditates on how fleeting the moments of joy are in life and the
importance of cherishing them.
o Browning portrays resignation not as sorrowful defeat but as an
acknowledgment of life’s limits, and the speaker finds comfort in this
acceptance.
4. Memory and the Immortality of the Moment:
o Even though this is the last physical moment shared with his lover, the speaker
finds solace in the idea that the emotional experience will live on. He believes
that memories of their ride together will immortalize this moment in his heart
and mind.
o This theme suggests that while physical unions may end, the emotional and
mental experiences that people have remain significant and form part of their
legacy.
5. Pride and Self-Respect:
o There is a hint of pride in the speaker’s acceptance of his situation. He refuses
to beg or plead for love, instead accepting that he has shared a meaningful
moment. The love he experienced, though unreciprocated, remains something
he values and respects.
o This self-respect and pride in having loved deeply is a form of emotional
maturity, an idea Browning often explores in his dramatic monologues.
Characterization:
• The speaker is a passionate and reflective man who has experienced love with
intensity but is now faced with the painful reality of separation. Despite the rejection,
he maintains a sense of dignity and cherishes the moments he had.
• His thoughts shift from sorrow to a philosophical acceptance of the situation. There’s a
sense of optimism in his acceptance that the love he experienced, even if not returned,
was worthwhile.
• The character is complex in that he displays both vulnerability and strength —
vulnerability in his emotional longing, and strength in his ability to accept the loss
gracefully.
Interpretation of the Poem:
1. Romantic Idealism:
o The speaker’s attitude reflects a form of romantic idealism. Though the love is
unreturned, he views the experience as precious, and in a sense, the value of the
experience transcends the fact that the relationship will not continue.
2. Browning’s Philosophical Exploration:
 o As with many of Browning's dramatic monologues, the poem delves into the
psychological complexity of human emotions. The speaker’s thoughts reveal
not only his personal sense of loss but also a broader meditation on love, time,
and memory.
3. Contrast Between Immediate Joy and Long-Term Suffering:
o The speaker contrasts the joy of the moment with the sadness of future
separation, a theme Browning often explored in his works. The lover’s
momentary happiness, however fleeting, is celebrated as more significant than
a lifetime of ordinary, unremarkable experiences.
Conclusion:
"The Last Ride Together" captures the moment of emotional surrender and philosophical
reflection that comes when love is unreturned or a relationship must end. Robert Browning
explores the human psyche, focusing on the themes of love, memory, time, and self-respect.
The poem demonstrates the speaker's attempt to find solace in a moment that will soon pass,
and how even in the face of heartbreak, one can derive a sense of dignity and worth from
experiencing deep emotions. Ultimately, the poem suggests that the experiences of the heart,
even those that involve pain or separation, are valuable and significant, as they become part of
one's emotional legacy.
This poem is an example of Browning's ability to weave complex psychological states and
philosophical reflections into his dramatic monologues, making it an excellent piece for in-
depth analysis, especially for students exploring Victorian poetry and the human condition.
 CHARLOTTE BRONTE: JANE EYRE
Detailed Notes on Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë
Introduction:
• Jane Eyre (1847) is a novel by Charlotte Brontë, one of the most famous authors of
the Victorian era. The novel is written in the form of a first-person narrative, with
Jane Eyre herself telling the story of her life from childhood to adulthood.
• Jane Eyre is often considered a proto-feminist text because it centers on a young
orphan girl who grows into a strong, self-reliant woman, challenging the traditional
roles of women in Victorian society.
• The novel addresses themes of social class, gender roles, morality, love, and
individual integrity. It is a coming-of-age story and a romantic narrative that also
incorporates elements of Gothic fiction.
Summary of the Plot:
Part 1: Jane’s Early Life
• The novel begins with Jane Eyre, an orphan, living with her cruel aunt, Mrs. Reed, at
Gateshead Hall. Jane is mistreated by her aunt and cousins, and her life is filled with
neglect and isolation. She is sent to the Lowood School, an institution for poor girls
run by the harsh Mr. Brocklehurst.
• At Lowood, Jane befriends Helen Burns, who teaches her the importance of patience
and inner strength. The harsh conditions at the school result in an epidemic that claims
the life of Helen. However, Jane gains education and strength from this experience.
Part 2: Governess at Thornfield Hall
• After completing her education, Jane becomes a governess at Thornfield Hall, where
she is employed to teach Adèle Varens, the ward of Mr. Edward Rochester, the master
of the house. Rochester is an enigmatic, moody, and seemingly cold man who becomes
Jane's employer.
• As Jane and Rochester develop a close relationship, they share numerous intellectual
and emotional exchanges, with Jane gradually falling in love with him. Rochester, in
turn, reveals his attraction to Jane.
• Jane’s status as a governess creates a social divide between her and Rochester. Their
relationship, while intense, is also complicated by the difference in social class and
status. Rochester proposes to Jane, and they are about to marry when the secret of
Rochester’s past is revealed.
Part 3: The Secret of Thornfield
• On their wedding day, it is revealed by Bertha Mason, Rochester's insane wife, who
has been locked away in the attic at Thornfield, that Rochester is already married. Jane
is devastated and flees the estate, leaving behind everything she knew.
 • In her flight, Jane experiences hardship and is eventually taken in by the Rivers family,
where she meets St. John Rivers, a missionary, and his sisters, Diana and Mary. Jane
discovers that she is the heir to a fortune left by her uncle.
• St. John proposes to Jane, suggesting they marry and go to India together as
missionaries. However, Jane does not love him and realizes she cannot marry for duty
alone. She is, however, increasingly drawn back to Rochester.
Part 4: Reunion and Conclusion
• Jane returns to Thornfield, only to find that the estate has been destroyed by fire.
Rochester tried to save his wife, Bertha, but she died in the fire, leaving him physically
injured (losing his eyesight and a hand).
• Jane and Rochester reunite, and despite his physical disabilities, they marry. Jane finds
happiness, and the novel ends with a sense of fulfilled love and equality in their
relationship.
Main Characters:
1. Jane Eyre: The protagonist of the novel, Jane is an orphan who grows into a strong-
willed, independent, and morally steadfast woman. Throughout the novel, she faces
numerous challenges but never compromises her values or sense of self-worth. Her
journey is one of self-discovery, inner strength, and romantic fulfillment.
2. Edward Rochester: The master of Thornfield Hall, Rochester is a complex character
who is brooding, mysterious, and emotionally intense. His past secrets and troubled
marriage to Bertha Mason form the key drama of the novel. Despite his faults and flaws,
he is deeply in love with Jane and seeks redemption through his love for her.
3. Bertha Mason: Rochester’s first wife, whom he married while in Jamaica. She is
locked away in the attic due to her insanity, and her presence casts a shadow over
Rochester and Jane’s relationship. Bertha represents the Gothic element in the novel,
embodying the "madwoman in the attic" trope, which symbolizes the constraints of
Victorian society on women and the repression of desires and emotions.
4. St. John Rivers: A clergyman who is a cousin to Jane. He is self-disciplined, stern, and
duty-bound, and he proposes to Jane for pragmatic reasons. St. John represents the
spiritual and moral side of Jane’s life, in contrast to the passionate and emotional love
she shares with Rochester.
5. Helen Burns: Jane’s close friend at Lowood School. Helen represents the ideal of
Christian forgiveness and patience. Her influence on Jane is profound, teaching Jane
the importance of endurance and humility.
6. Mrs. Reed: Jane’s aunt, who raises her at Gateshead Hall. She is cruel and neglectful
toward Jane, symbolizing the harshness and injustice of the social system, especially
for orphans.
7. Adèle Varens: Rochester’s ward, whom Jane is hired to teach. Adèle is the daughter of
Rochester’s former lover, and though she is initially portrayed as a spoiled child, Jane
develops a deep affection for her.
Themes and Analysis:
1. Social Class and Gender Roles:
o Jane Eyre is a critical examination of the rigid social classes and gender norms
of Victorian society. Jane’s position as a poor orphan and governess reflects the
limitations placed on women, particularly those without wealth or status.
o Jane constantly struggles to assert her autonomy and desires in a world that
expects women to be passive, obedient, and subservient. The tension between
Jane’s love for Rochester and her need for independence is central to the
narrative.
2. Love and Marriage:
o The novel explores the relationship between love and marriage. While Jane falls
deeply in love with Rochester, she is determined not to marry him unless she
can maintain her self-respect and equality in the relationship.
o The theme of true love is also linked to moral integrity. Jane refuses to marry
Rochester when she learns of his previous marriage, even though it causes her
great pain. She values honesty, equality, and respect in relationships.
3. Morality and Integrity:
o Throughout the novel, Jane upholds a strict moral code, refusing to compromise
on her principles, even when faced with personal hardship. Her decisions,
whether rejecting the proposal of St. John Rivers or leaving Rochester when she
believes their relationship is based on deceit, are guided by her moral compass.
o The theme of integrity is also embodied in Jane’s interactions with other
characters. Her refusal to be swayed by social pressure or material gain
underscores her belief in personal responsibility and self-respect.
4. Religion and Spirituality:
o Religion plays an important role in Jane Eyre, particularly through the character
of St. John Rivers, who represents the more ascetic, self-sacrificing aspects of
Christian faith. His proposal to Jane to join him as a missionary reflects his rigid
sense of duty and self-denial.
o In contrast, Jane’s spirituality is more personal and balanced. Her faith is not
about asceticism but about maintaining her personal integrity, seeking justice,
and finding happiness in the relationships she forms.
5. Gothic Elements:
o Jane Eyre incorporates elements of Gothic fiction, especially in the character of
Bertha Mason and the mysterious atmosphere at Thornfield Hall. The gothic
elements, such as the hidden wife, the fires, and the eerie setting, create a sense
of suspense and mystery throughout the novel.
 o The novel contrasts the passionate, often destructive forces represented by
Bertha and the more restrained, rational love that Jane and Rochester share.
6. Feminism and Independence:
o Jane Eyre is often hailed as a proto-feminist text. Jane is an independent, self-
sufficient woman who is not afraid to challenge societal norms and
expectations. She values self-respect and cannot be bought or manipulated, even
by love or marriage.
o Her insistence on equality in her relationship with Rochester and her refusal to
marry St. John Rivers without affection are central to the novel’s feminist
themes.
Symbolism:
1. The Red Room:
o The red room symbolizes Jane’s early suffering and isolation. It is the place
where she is locked as a child, and it represents the oppression she experiences
at the hands of her aunt and society’s rejection of her.
2. The Split in Rochester’s Character:
o Rochester’s character is symbolic of the duality of human nature. His passionate
love for Jane contrasts with his darker past, represented by Bertha. This duality
underscores the novel's exploration of hidden secrets and the consequences of
repression.
3. The Fire:
o The fire at Thornfield symbolizes both destruction and renewal. It destroys the
old order (Rochester’s life and marriage), but it also allows for rebirth and
renewal. The fire leads to Rochester’s physical transformation, but it also allows
Jane to come into her own and gain a deeper understanding of herself.
Conclusion:
Jane Eyre is a novel that explores the themes of love, morality, gender roles, social class, and
personal integrity. It is a rich and complex narrative that deals with emotional growth, personal
independence, and the search for self-respect. Through Jane’s character, Charlotte Brontë
challenges the Victorian ideals of womanhood, demonstrating that a woman can be strong,
independent, and moral while still experiencing deep, passionate love. The novel remains one
of the most beloved and important works of English literature.

Themes
Love Versus Autonomy
Jane Eyre is very much the story of a quest to be loved. Jane searches, not just for romantic
love, but also for a sense of being valued, of belonging. Thus Jane says to Helen Burns: “to
gain some real affection from you, or Miss Temple, or any other whom I truly love, I would
willingly submit to have the bone of my arm broken, or to let a bull toss me, or to stand behind
a kicking horse, and let it dash its hoof at my chest” (Chapter 8). Yet, over the course of the
book, Jane must learn how to gain love without sacrificing and harming herself in the process.
Her fear of losing her autonomy motivates her refusal of Rochester’s marriage proposal. Jane
believes that “marrying” Rochester while he remains legally tied to Bertha would mean
rendering herself a mistress and sacrificing her own integrity for the sake of emotional
gratification. On the other hand, her life at Moor House tests her in the opposite manner. There,
she enjoys economic independence and engages in worthwhile and useful work, teaching the
poor; yet she lacks emotional sustenance. Although St. John proposes marriage, offering her a
partnership built around a common purpose, Jane knows their marriage would remain loveless.
Nonetheless, the events of Jane’s stay at Moor House are necessary tests of Jane’s autonomy.
Only after proving her self-sufficiency to herself can she marry Rochester and not be
asymmetrically dependent upon him as her “master.” The marriage can be one between equals.
As Jane says: “I am my husband’s life as fully as he is mine. . . . To be together is for us to be
at once as free as in solitude, as gay as in company. . . . We are precisely suited in character—
perfect concord is the result” (Chapter 38).
Religion
Throughout the novel, Jane struggles to find the right balance between moral duty and earthly
pleasure, between obligation to her spirit and attention to her body. She encounters three main
religious figures: Mr. Brocklehurst, Helen Burns, and St. John Rivers. Each represents a model
of religion that Jane ultimately rejects as she forms her own ideas about faith and principle, and
their practical consequences.
Mr. Brocklehurst illustrates the dangers and hypocrisies that Charlotte Brontë perceived in the
nineteenth-century Evangelical movement. Mr. Brocklehurst adopts the rhetoric of
Evangelicalism when he claims to be purging his students of pride, but his method of subjecting
them to various privations and humiliations, like when he orders that the naturally curly hair
of one of Jane’s classmates be cut so as to lie straight, is entirely un-Christian. Of course,
Brocklehurst’s proscriptions are difficult to follow, and his hypocritical support of his own
luxuriously wealthy family at the expense of the Lowood students shows Brontë’s wariness of
the Evangelical movement. Helen Burns’s meek and forbearing mode of Christianity, on the
other hand, is too passive for Jane to adopt as her own, although she loves and admires Helen
for it.
Many chapters later, St. John Rivers provides another model of Christian behavior. His is a
Christianity of ambition, glory, and extreme self-importance. St. John urges Jane to sacrifice
her emotional deeds for the fulfillment of her moral duty, offering her a way of life that would
require her to be disloyal to her own self.
Although Jane ends up rejecting all three models of religion, she does not abandon morality,
spiritualism, or a belief in a Christian God. When her wedding is interrupted, she prays to God
for solace (Chapter 26). As she wanders the heath, poor and starving, she puts her survival in
the hands of God (Chapter 28). She strongly objects to Rochester’s lustful immorality, and she
refuses to consider living with him while church and state still deem him married to another
woman. Even so, Jane can barely bring herself to leave the only love she has ever known. She
credits God with helping her to escape what she knows would have been an immoral life
(Chapter 27).
Jane ultimately finds a comfortable middle ground. Her spiritual understanding is not hateful
and oppressive like Brocklehurst’s, nor does it require retreat from the everyday world as
Helen’s and St. John’s religions do. For Jane, religion helps curb immoderate passions, and it
spurs one on to worldly efforts and achievements. These achievements include full self-
knowledge and complete faith in God.
Social Class
Jane Eyre is critical of Victorian England’s strict social hierarchy. Brontë’s exploration of the
complicated social position of governesses is perhaps the novel’s most important treatment of
this theme. Like Heathcliff in Wuthering Heights, Jane is a figure of ambiguous class standing
and, consequently, a source of extreme tension for the characters around her. Jane’s manners,
sophistication, and education are those of an aristocrat, because Victorian governesses, who
tutored children in etiquette as well as academics, were expected to possess the “culture” of the
aristocracy. Yet, as paid employees, they were more or less treated as servants; thus, Jane
remains penniless and powerless while at Thornfield. Jane’s understanding of the double
standard crystallizes when she becomes aware of her feelings for Rochester; she is his
intellectual, but not his social, equal. Even before the crisis surrounding Bertha Mason, Jane is
hesitant to marry Rochester because she senses that she would feel indebted to him for
“condescending” to marry her. Jane’s distress, which appears most strongly in Chapter 17,
seems to be Brontë’s critique of Victorian class attitudes.
Jane herself speaks out against class prejudice at certain moments in the book. For example, in
Chapter 23 she chastises Rochester: “Do you think, because I am poor, obscure, plain, and
little, I am soulless and heartless? You think wrong!—I have as much soul as you—and full as
much heart! And if God had gifted me with some beauty and much wealth, I should have made
it as hard for you to leave me, as it is now for me to leave you.” However, it is also important
to note that nowhere in Jane Eyre are society’s boundaries bent. Ultimately, Jane is only able
to marry Rochester as his equal because she has almost magically come into her own
inheritance from her uncle.
Gender Relations
Jane struggles continually to achieve equality and to overcome oppression. In addition to class
hierarchy, she must fight against patriarchal domination—against those who believe women to
be inferior to men and try to treat them as such. Three central male figures threaten her desire
for equality and dignity: Mr. Brocklehurst, Edward Rochester, and St. John Rivers. All three
are misogynistic on some level. Each tries to keep Jane in a submissive position, where she is
unable to express her own thoughts and feelings. In her quest for independence and self-
knowledge, Jane must escape Brocklehurst, reject St. John, and come to Rochester only after
ensuring that they may marry as equals. This last condition is met once Jane proves herself able
to function, through the time she spends at Moor House, in a community and in a family. She
will not depend solely on Rochester for love and she can be financially independent.
Furthermore, Rochester is blind at the novel’s end and thus dependent upon Jane to be his “prop
and guide.” In Chapter 12, Jane articulates what was for her time a radically feminist
philosophy:
Women are supposed to be very calm generally: but women feel just as men feel; they need
exercise for their faculties, and a field for their efforts as much as their brothers do; they suffer
from too rigid a restraint, too absolute a stagnation, precisely as men would suffer; and it is
narrow-minded in their more privileged fellow-creatures to say that they ought to confine
themselves to making puddings and knitting stockings, to playing on the piano and
embroidering bags. It is thoughtless to condemn them, or laugh at them, if they seek to do more
or learn more than custom has pronounced necessary for their sex.
Home and Belonging
Throughout the novel, Jane defines her idea of home as a place where she both belongs and
can be useful. When the Reeds’ apothecary, Mr. Lloyd, questions whether Jane is happy to live
at Gateshead, Jane emphasizes that it is not her house because she has no right to be there. In
the first chapter, Jane describes herself as “a discord” at Gateshead because her temperament
doesn’t match that of the Reeds, and “useless” because the fact that she doesn’t fit in with the
family keeps her from adding to the happiness of the household. Further, Jane’s sense of
alienation is compounded because no one loves Jane at Gateshead, and she has no one to love
in return. At Lowood, Jane seeks to find work elsewhere after Miss Temple’s departure, mainly
because she believes it was Miss Temple that made Lowood homey. Without the person she
loves most, Jane’s usefulness is no longer enough to constitute Lowood as home. Later, at
Thornfield, Jane shares such a deep emotional connection with Rochester that she declares him
to be her “only home,” but she leaves Rochester because living with him would contribute to
his sin and damage his soul. After learning about Bertha Mason, she feels morally useless
around him. By novel’s end, when Jane finally returns to Rochester, she can at last be useful
him, in part because he now must depend on Jane for his eyesight. Jane’s desire to belong is
connected to her desire to be valuable to another person, and these desires drive her decisions
throughout the entire novel.
Anxiety and Uncertainty
Brontë draws on frightening Gothic imagery to highlight anxiety and uncertainty surrounding
Jane’s place in the world, especially by describing the supernatural. The reader’s first encounter
with the Gothic and supernatural is the terrifying red-room. Uncle Reed may not literally haunt
the room, but his connection to the room haunts Jane as a reminder of the unfulfilled promise
that she would have a home at Gateshead and the reality that Uncle Reed cannot ensure that
she will be loved. Later, the storm that splits the chestnut tree where Rochester and Jane kiss
creates a portentous atmosphere, as if nature itself objects to their marriage. This occurrence
serves to warn Jane that despite appearances, her happiness with Rochester is not truly secure.
Further, many scholars have identified Bertha as a Gothic double of Jane, or a physical
manifestation of the violent passions and anger that Jane possessed in her younger years. This
connection between Bertha and Jane highlights anxieties around Jane becoming Rochester’s
bride. Even without knowledge of Bertha, Jane worries Rochester will tire of her, and their
marriage would upend rigid Victorian social class structure by having a governess marry her
master. In this way, Bertha’s looming presence expresses Jane’s fear about their impending
marriage and the ambiguity of Jane’s social position.
Personal Background At age twenty, Charlotte Brontë sent a sample of her poetry to England’s
Poet Laureate, Robert Southey. His comments urged her to abandon all literary pursuits:
“Literature cannot be the business of a woman’s life, and it ought not to be. The more she is
engaged in her proper duties, the less leisure will she have for it, even as an accomplishment
and a recreation.” His response indicates the political difficulties women faced as they tried to
enter the literary arena in Victorian England; domestic responsibilities were expected to require
all their energy, leaving no time for creative pursuits. Despite a lack of support from the outside
world, Charlotte Brontë found sufficient internal motivation and enthusiasm from her sisters to
become a successful writer and balance her familial and creative needs. Born at Thornton,
Yorkshire on April 21, 1816, Charlotte was the third child of Patrick Brontë and Maria
Branwell. In 1820, her father received a curate post in Haworth, a remote town on the Yorkshire
moors, where Charlotte spent most of her life. In 1821, Mrs. Brontë died from what was thought
to be cancer. Charlotte and her four sisters, Maria, Elizabeth, Emily and Anne, and their brother,
Branwell, were raised primarily by their unpleasant, maiden aunt, Elizabeth Branwell, who
provided them with little supervision. Not only were the children free to roam the moors, but
their father allowed them to read whatever interested them: Shakespeare, The Arabian Nights,
Pilgrim’s Progress, and the poems of Byron were some of their favorites. When a school for
the daughters of poor clergymen opened at Cowan Bridge in 1824, Mr. Brontë decided to send
his oldest four daughters there to receive a formal education. Most biographers argue that
Charlotte’s description of Lowood School in Jane Eyre accurately reflects the dismal conditions
at this school. Charlotte’s two oldest sisters, Maria and Elizabeth, died in 1824 of tuberculosis
they contracted due to the poor management of the school. Following this tragedy, Patrick
Brontë withdrew Charlotte and Emily from Cowan Bridge. Grieving over their sisters’ deaths
and searching for a way to alleviate their loneliness, the remaining four siblings began writing
a series of stories, The Glass-Town, stimulated by a set of toy soldiers their father had given
them. In these early writings, the children collaboratively created a complete imaginary world,
a fictional West African empire they called Angria. Charlotte explained their interest in writing
this way: “We were wholly dependent on ourselves and each other, on books and study, for the
enjoyments and occupations of life. The highest stimulus, as well as the liveliest pleasure we
had know from childhood upwards, lay in attempts at literary composition.” Through her early
twenties, Charlotte routinely revised and expanded pieces of the Angria story, developing
several key characters and settings. While this writing helped Charlotte improve her literary
style, the Angria adventures are fantastical, melodramatic, and repetitive, contrasting with
Charlotte’s more realistic adult fiction. After her father had a dangerous lung disorder, he
decided once again that his daughters should receive an education so they would be assured of
an income if he died. In 1831, Charlotte entered the Misses Wooler’s school at Roe Head. Shy
and solitary, Charlotte was not happy at school, but she still managed to win several academic
awards and to make two lifelong friends: Mary Taylor and Ellen Nussey. Although she was
offered a teaching job at Roe Head, Charlotte declined the position, choosing to return to
Haworth instead. Perhaps bored with the solitary life at Haworth and looking for an active
occupation in the world, Charlotte returned to Roe Head in 1835 as a governess. For her,
governessing was akin to “slavery,” because she felt temperamentally unsuited for it, and
finally, following a near mental breakdown in 1838, she was forced to resign her position.
Unfortunately, governessing was the only real employment opportunity middle-class women
had in Victorian England. Because the family needed the money, Charlotte suffered through
two more unhappy governess positions, feeling like an unappreciated servant in wealthy
families’ homes; she didn’t enjoy living in other people’s houses because it caused
“estrangement from one’s real character.” In an attempt to create a job that would allow her to
maintain her independence, Charlotte formed the idea of starting her own school at Haworth.
To increase her teaching qualifications before beginning this venture, she enrolled as a student,
at the age of twenty-six, at the Pensionnat Heger in Brussels so she could increase her fluency
in French and learn German. Charlotte loved the freedom and adventure of living in a new
culture, and formed an intense, though one-sided, passion for the married headmaster at the
school: Monsieur Heger. After two years in Brussels, suffering perhaps from her love for Heger,
Charlotte returned to England. The plan to open her own school was a failure, as she was unable
to attract a single student. Instead, Charlotte began putting all of her energy into her writing.
After discovering Emily’s poems, Charlotte decided that she, Anne, and Emily should try to
publish a collection of poems at their own expense. In 1846, they accomplished this goal, using
the masculine pseudonyms of Currer, Acton, and Ellis Bell because of the double standards
against women authors. Although their book, Poems, was not a financial success, the women
continued their literary endeavors. Excited to be writing full-time, they each began a novel.
Anne’s Agnes Grey and Emily’s Wuthering Heights both found publishers, but Charlotte’s
somewhat autobiographical account of her experiences in Brussels, The Professor, was rejected
by several publishers. Again refusing to become discouraged, Charlotte began writing Jane
Eyre in 1846, while on a trip to Manchester with her father where he was undergoing cataract
surgery. While he convalesced, Charlotte wrote. The firm of Smith, Elder, and Company agreed
to publish the resulting novel, and the first edition of Jane Eyre was released on October 16,
1847. The novel was an instant success, launching Charlotte into literary fame. It also netted
her an impressive 500 pounds, twenty-five times her salary as a governess. But the pleasures
of literary success were soon overshadowed by family tragedy. In 1848, after Anne and
Charlotte had revealed the true identity of the “Bells” to their publishers, their brother Branwell
died. Never living up to his family’s high expectations for him, Branwell died an opium-
addicted, debauched, alcoholic failure. Emily and Anne died soon after. Although Charlotte
completed her second novel, Shirley in 1849, her sadness at the loss of her remaining siblings
left her emotionally shattered. She became a respected member of the literary community only
when her sisters, her most enthusiastic supporters, were no longer able to share her victory.
Visiting London following the publication of this book, Charlotte became acquainted with
several important writers, including William Thackeray and Elizabeth Gaskell, who was to
write Charlotte’s biography following her death. In 1852, the Reverend Arthur B. Nicholls, Mr.
Brontë’s curate at Haworth beginning in 1845, proposed marriage to Charlotte. Earlier in her
life, Charlotte had rejected several marriage proposals because she was hoping to discover true
love, but loneliness following the death of her last three siblings may have led her to accept
Nicholls’ proposal. Saying she had “esteem” but not love for Nicholls, Charlotte’s relationship
with her husband was certainly not the overwhelming passion of Jane and Rochester. Her
father’s jealous opposition to the marriage led Charlotte initially to reject Nicholls, who left
Haworth in 1853, the year Villette was published. By 1854, Reverend Brontë’s opposition to
the union had abated somewhat, and the ceremony was performed on June 29, 1854. After the
marriage, Charlotte had little time for writing, as she was forced to perform the duties expected
of a minister’s wife and take care of her aging father. In 1854 Charlotte, in the early stages of
pregnancy, caught pneumonia while on a long, rain-drenched walk on the moors. She died on
March 31, 1855, a month before her thirtyninth birthday. The Professor, written in 1846 and
1847, was posthumously published in 1857, along with Mrs. Gaskell’s Life of Charlotte Brontë.
A Postcolonial Approach to Jane Eyre As a theoretical approach, postcolonialism asks readers
to consider the way colonialist and anti-colonialist messages are presented in literary texts. It
argues that Western culture is Eurocentric, meaning it presents European values as natural and
universal, while Eastern ideas are, for example, inferior, immoral, or “savage.” A postcolonial
approach to Jane Eyre might begin by considering the following questions: What does the novel
reveal about the way cultural difference was represented in Victorian culture? How did Britain
justify its colonialist project by imaging the East as “savage” or uncivilized? What idea does
the text create of “proper” British behavior? Tentative answers to these questions can be
discovered by examining the novel’s representation of foreign women, especially Bertha
Mason, and the colonialist doctrines of Jane and of St. John Rivers. One of the colonialist goals
of this novel is to create a prototype of the proper English woman, someone like Jane who is
frank, sincere, and lacking in personal vanity. This ideal is created by Jane’s attempt to contrast
herself with the foreign women in the text. For example, both Céline Varens and her daughter
are constantly criticized in the novel for their supposed superficiality and materialism.
According to Rochester, Céline Varens charmed the “English gold” out of his “British
breeches,” a comment that emphasizes his supposedly British innocence and her wily French
ways. Supporting this idea, Jane comments that Adèle has a superficiality of character, “hardly
congenial to an English mind.” Jane’s final ethnocentric comments in relation to little Adèle
are significant: “a sound English education corrected in a great measure her French defects.”
Only through a good English lifestyle has Adèle avoided her mother’s tragic flaws: materialism
and sensuality, characteristics the novel specifically associates with foreign women. Jane’s
comments imply that the English, unlike their French neighbors, are deep rather than
superficial, spiritual rather than materialistic. But Jane’s position is more conflicted than
Rochester’s: As a woman she is also a member of a colonized group, but as a specifically British
woman, she is a colonizer. When she claims Rochester gives her a smile such as a sultan would
“bestow on a slave his gold and gems had enriched,” she emphasizes the colonized status of all
women. Insisting that he prefers his “one little English girl” to the “Grand Turk’s whole
seraglio,” Rochester points to Jane’s powerlessness, her reduction to sex slave. Rather than
becoming slave, Jane insists she will become a missionary, preaching liberty to women
enslaved in harems. Her comments show the dual position of European women: both colonized
and colonizers. While Rochester reduces her to a colonized “doll” or “performing ape,” her
comments show her Eurocentric understanding of Eastern culture: She implies that she’ll be
the enlightened Englishwoman coming to the rescue of poor, abused Turkish women. All
women are enslaved by male despotism, but the British woman claims a moral and spiritual
superiority over her Eastern sisters. This difference becomes intense in Jane’s representation of
Bertha Mason. Bertha’s vampiric appearance suggests she is sucking the lifeblood away from
the innocent Rochester, who tells Jane he was as innocent as she is until he turned twenty-one
and was married to Bertha: His goodness was taken by this savage woman. An insane Creole
woman, Bertha represents British fears of both foreigners and women. The “blood-red” moon,
a symbol of women’s menstrual cycles, is reflected in her eyes, suggesting her feminine, sexual
potency. Unlike Jane, Bertha refuses to be controlled; a woman whose stature almost equals
her husband’s, she fights with him, displaying a “virile” force that almost masters Rochester.
Post-colonial critics argue that Bertha, the foreign woman, is sacrificed so that British Jane can
achieve self-identity. Their arguments suggest Rochester isn’t as innocent as he claims; as a
colonialist, he was in the West Indies to make money and to overpower colonized men and
women. Notice how both Jane and Rochester emphasize his ability to control Bertha’s brother,
Richard. Much of Rochester’s critique of Bertha hinges on her sexuality and exotic excess.
When he first met her, Rochester’s senses were aroused by her dazzle, splendor, and
lusciousness. But he later found her debauchery to be his “Indian Messalina’s attribute.” Thus,
the characteristics that first attract her to him, her sensual excesses, soon repulse him. The
representation of Bertha presents native peoples in the colonies as coarse, lascivious, and
ignorant, thus justifying St. John’s missionary role: Bertha is a foreign “savage” in need of
British guidance and enlightenment. Just as Jane retrains the minds of her lower-class students
in England, St. John will reform the values of the pagans in India. Both characters perpetuate
a belief in British, Christian-based moral and spiritual superiority. But St. John’s inability to
“renounce his wide field of mission warfare” shows that his colonialist impulse isn’t based on
compassion or mutual understanding, but on violence—violating the minds of native peoples,
if not their bodies. For twenty-first-century readers, St. John’s missionary zeal is morally
suspect, because it shows his participation in the colonialist project, which resulted in violence
against and violation of native peoples. St. John’s coldheartedness suggests the brutality and
self-serving function of colonialism. Jane claims St. John “forgets, pitilessly, the feelings and
claims of little people, in pursing his own large views”; imagine the damage he will inflict on
any native people who resist him. Like Jane, they will be repressed by his merciless egotism.
St. John spends the rest of his life laboring for “his race” in India. A great warrior, St. John
sternly clears the “painful way to improvement” for the natives, slaying their prejudices of
“creed and caste,” though obviously not his own. In his zealous Christianity, he sees the Indians
as an inferior race and hopes to implant British values in their supposedly deficient minds.

A Jungian Approach to Jane Eyre The famous psychologist Carl Jung was interested in the
collective unconscious, or the primordial images and ideas that reside in every human being’s
psyche. Often appearing in the form of dreams, visions, and fantasies, these images provoke
strong emotions that are beyond the explanation of reason. In Jane Eyre, the bounds of reality
continually expand, so that dreams and visions have as much validity as reason, providing
access to the inner recesses of Jane’s and Rochester’s psyches. Their relationship also has a
supernatural component. Throughout the novel, Jane is described as a “fairy.” Sitting in the
red-room, she labels herself a “tiny phantom, half fairy, half imp” from one of Bessie’s bedtime
stories, a spirit-creature that comes out of “lone, ferny dells in moors.” As fairy, Jane identifies
herself as a special, magical creature, and reminds the reader of the importance that imagination
plays in her life. Jane’s dreams have a prophetic character, suggesting their almost supernatural
ability to predict the future. In a dream foreshadowing the direction of her relationship with
Rochester, she is “tossed on a buoyant but unquiet sea.” Jane’s dream warns her that their
relationship will be rocky, bringing chaos and passion into her life. Similarly, her dreams of
infants are prophetic, indicating impending trouble in her life. Not only is Jane a mythical
creature, but the narrative she creates also has a mythic element, mixing realism and fantasy.
We see the first instance of this as Jane sits nervously in the red-room and imagines a gleam of
light shining on the wall; for her, this indicates a vision “from another world. Generally,
supernatural occurrences such as these serve as transition points in the novel, signaling drastic
changes in Jane’s life. As Jane’s departure from Gateshead was marked by her pseudo-
supernatural experience in the red-room, her movement away from Lowood also has a
paranormal component. Meditating upon the best means for discovering a new job, Jane is
visited by a “kind fairy” who offers her a solution. This psychic counselor gives her very
specific advice: Place an advertisement in the local newspaper, with answers addressed to J.E.,
and do it immediately. The fairy’s plan works, and Jane soon discovers the job at Thornfield.
As a gypsy woman, Rochester aligned himself with mystical knowledge. During his telling of
her fortune, Rochester seems to have peered directly into Jane’s heart, leaning her deep into a
dream-state she likens to “a web of mystification.” He magically weaves a web around Jane
with words, and appears to have watched every movement of her heart, like an “unseen spirit.”
During this scene, he wears a red cloak, showing that he has taken over the position of Red
Riding Hood that Jane held earlier. The potion he gives Mason also has mystical powers, giving
Mason the strength he lacks for an hour or so, hinting at Rochester’s mysterious, possibly
supernatural powers. In emphasizing the uniqueness of Jane and Rochester’s love, Brontë gives
their meetings a mythical feel, so that they are depicted as archetypes of true lovers. Her
association of Rochester’s horse and dog with the mythical Gytrash places their initial meeting
in an almost fairytalelike setting. Later, Rochester reveals that at this initial meeting, he thought
Jane was a fairy who had bewitched his horse, and he repeatedly refers to her as a sprite or elfin
character, claiming the “men in green” are her relatives. The lovers’ reunion at the end of the
novel also has a psychic component. As she is about to accept St. John’s wishes, Jane
experiences a sensation as “sharp, as strange, as shocking” as an electric shock. Then she hears
Rochester’s voice call her name. The voice comes from nowhere, speaking “in pain and woe,
wildly, eerily, urgently.” So powerful is this voice that Jane cries, “I am coming,” and runs out
the door into the garden, but she discovers no sign of Rochester. She rejects the notion that this
is the devilish voice of witchcraft, but feels that it comes from benevolent nature; not a miracle,
but nature’s best effort to help her, as if the forces of nature are assisting this very special
relationship. She introduces the ideal of a telepathic bond between the lovers. This psychic
sympathy leads Jane to hear Rochester’s frantic call for her, and for Rochester to pick her
response out of the wind. In fact, he even correctly intuits that her response came from some
mountainous place. Through the novel’s supernatural elements, Jane and Rochester become
archetypes of ideal lovers, supporting Jane’s exorbitant claim that no one “was ever nearer to
her mate than I am.” These mythic elements transform their relationship from ordinary to
extraordinary.

A Marxist Approach to Jane Eyre Based on the ideas of Karl Marx, this theoretical approach
asks us to consider how a literary work reflects the socioeconomic conditions of the time in
which it was written. What does the text tell us about contemporary social classes and how
does it reflect classism? Jane Eyre depicts the strict, hierarchical class system in England that
required everyone to maintain carefully circumscribed class positions. Primarily through the
character of Jane, it also accents the cracks in this system, the places where class differences
were melding in Victorian England. For example, the novel questions the role of the governess:
Should she be considered upper class, based on her superior education, or lower class, because
of her servant-status within the family? What happens when relationships develop between
people of different classes, such as Rochester and Jane? Jane’s ambiguous class status becomes
evident from the novel’s opening chapter. A poor orphan living with relatives, Jane feels
alienated from the rest of the Reed family. John Reed tells Jane she has “no business to take
our books; you are a dependent . . . you ought to beg, and not to live here with gentleman’s
children like us.” In this quote, John claims the rights of the gentleman, implying that Jane’s
family was from a lower class, and, therefore, she has no right to associate on equal footing
with her wealthy cousins. Jane’s lack of money leaves her dependent upon the Reeds for
sustenance. She appears to exist in a no-man’s land between the upper- and servant classes. By
calling her cousin John a “murderer,” “slave-driver,” and “Roman emperor,” Jane emphasizes
her recognition of the corruption inherent in the ruling classes. As she’s dragged away to the
red-room following her fight with John Reed, Jane resists her captors like a “rebel slave,”
emphasizing the oppression she suffers because of her class status. When Miss Abbot
admonishes Jane for striking John Reed, Jane’s “young master,” Jane immediately questions
her terminology. Is John really her “master”; is she his servant? Emphasizing the corruption,
even despotism of the upper classes, Jane’s narrative makes her audience aware that the middle
classes were becoming the repositories of both moral and intellectual superiority. Jane’s
experiences at Thornfield reinforce this message. When Jane first arrives, she is happy to learn
that Mrs. Fairfax is a housekeeper, and not Jane’s employer, because this means they’re both
dependents and can, therefore, interact as equals. Mrs. Fairfax discusses the difference between
herself, as an upper-servant, and the other servants in the house; for example, she says Leah
and John are “only servants, and one can’t converse with them on terms of equality; one must
keep them at due distance for fear of losing one’s authority.” As a governess, Jane is in the
same category as Mrs. Fairfax: neither a member of the family nor a member of the serving
classes. The ambiguity of the governess is especially pronounced, as we see with the example
of Diana and Mary Rivers: the welleducated daughters of upper-class parents who’ve fallen on
hard financial times, the Rivers are better educated than their employers, though treated with
as little respect as the family cook. Victorian society brutally maintained the boundaries
between governesses and the upper-class families, practically prohibiting marriages between
the two groups and attempting to desexualize governesses, who were often accused of bringing
a dangerous sexuality into the family. Blanche, for example, calls governesses “incubi,” and
Lady Ingram believes that liaisons should never be allowed between governesses and tutors,
because such relationships would introduce a moral infection into the household. The
relationship between Jane and Rochester also emphasizes class issues. In a conversation
preceding their betrothal, Rochester treats Jane like a good servant: Because she’s been a
“dependent” who has done “her duty,” he, as her employer, wants to offer her assistance in
finding a new job. Jane confirms her secondary status by referring to Rochester as “master,”
and believing “wealth, caste, custom,” separate her from him. She fears he will treat her like
an “automaton” because she is “poor, obscure, plain and little,” mistakenly believing the lower
classes to be heartless and soulless. Claiming the aristocratic privilege of creating his own rules,
Rochester redefines Jane’s class status, by defining her as his “equal” and “likeness.” Before
she can become Rochester’s wife, Jane must prove her acceptability based on class. Does she
have an upper-class sensibility, despite her inferior position at Thornfield? For example, when
Bessie sees Jane at Lowood, she is impressed because Jane has become “quite a lady”; in fact,
her accomplishments surpass that of her cousins, yet they are still considered her social
superiors based solely on wealth. The conversation emphasizes the ambiguities of Jane’s
family’s class status and of the class system in general: Should a lady be judged based on
academic accomplishments, money, or family name? The novel critiques the behavior of most
of the upper-class characters Jane meets: Blanche Ingram is haughty and superficial, John Reed
is debauched, and Eliza Reed is inhumanely cold. Rochester is a primary example of upper-
class debauchery, with his series of mistresses and his attempt to make Jane a member of the
harem. In her final view of Thornfield, after Bertha has burned it down, Jane emphasizes the
stark contrast between her comforting, flowering, breathtaking dream of Thornfield, and the
reality of its trodden and wasted grounds. The discrepancy emphasizes that the world’s vision
of the upper classes doesn’t always capture the hidden passions that boil under the veneer of
genteel tranquility. One of Jane’s tasks in the novel is to revitalize the upper classes, which
have become mired in debauchery and haughtiness. Just as Rochester sought Jane for her
freshness and purity, the novel suggests that the upper classes in general need the pure moral
values and stringent work ethic of the middle classes. At novel’s end, Rochester recognizes the
error in his lifestyle, and his excessive passions have been quenched; he is reborn as a proper,
mild-mannered husband, happily dependent on his wife’s moral and intellectual guidance.

Background:
Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë, published in 1847 under the pen name "Currer Bell," is one of
the most iconic novels of the Victorian era. It is a Bildungsroman, or coming-of-age novel, that
traces the life of the protagonist, Jane Eyre, from her childhood to adulthood, focusing on her
emotional and moral development. The novel is significant for its exploration of themes such
as social class, gender, religion, and the struggle for self-respect and independence.
Background to Jane Eyre:
1. Historical Context:
o The novel was published during the Victorian era, a time when England was
undergoing significant social, political, and industrial changes. The British
Empire was at its height, and Victorian society was characterized by strict class
divisions, gender roles, and expectations of morality.
o Women, in particular, had limited opportunities for self-expression or
independence, and their primary roles were as wives and mothers. This
backdrop is important because Jane Eyre’s quest for independence and self-
worth challenges societal expectations for women.
2. The Brontë Family:
o Charlotte Brontë was born in 1816 in Yorkshire, England, the third of six
children. The Brontë family faced numerous tragedies, including the deaths of
her mother and two older sisters in childhood. The Brontë children—Charlotte,
Emily, Anne, and Branwell—were highly creative and turned to writing as a
means of coping with their isolated and difficult circumstances.
o Like many of her siblings, Charlotte faced personal hardships, including the
early death of her siblings and struggles with unrequited love, which likely
influenced the emotional depth in Jane Eyre.
3. Writing of Jane Eyre:
o Jane Eyre was Charlotte Brontë's second novel. Her first novel, The Professor,
was never published during her lifetime, but Jane Eyre was a great success and
received widespread acclaim. It was considered radical at the time for its bold
portrayal of a strong-willed, independent female protagonist who resisted
traditional gender roles.
 o The novel is also notable for its use of first-person narration, which gives
readers intimate access to Jane’s thoughts and emotions. This narrative style
was unconventional and added a layer of depth to the portrayal of Jane’s inner
life and struggles.
4. Themes in Jane Eyre:
o Social Class and Class Struggles: The novel critiques the rigid class system of
Victorian England, with Jane constantly navigating social boundaries as she
moves between different classes. Her journey is also one of self-empowerment
as she refuses to marry for convenience or wealth and seeks to maintain her
independence.
o Gender and Feminism: Jane’s resistance to being confined by societal
expectations of women is a central theme. She values self-respect and autonomy
over marriage, and her relationship with Mr. Rochester challenges traditional
gender roles.
o Religion: Religious morality plays a significant role in the novel, particularly
in Jane’s moral development. Several characters represent different views of
Christianity, with Jane seeking a balance between piety and personal integrity.
o Love and Passion: The romantic relationship between Jane and Mr. Rochester
is central to the novel, but it is portrayed as a partnership of equals, rather than
a typical Victorian marriage of social convenience. Their love is complicated by
issues of power, secrets, and personal growth.
5. Impact and Legacy:
o Jane Eyre became an instant success and remains one of the most studied and
celebrated novels in English literature. It has inspired numerous adaptations in
film, television, and stage productions, cementing its place as a classic.
o The novel's exploration of female empowerment, social critique, and emotional
complexity continues to resonate with readers today.