“Alfred, first Baron Tennyson of Abworth and Freshwater (1809-92), was an English poet, Poet laureate from 1850.”

(cf. Rosenthal, Tennyson )

He was born in Somersby in Linconshire, 1809, where his father was rector. Cambridge is the place where he meets Arthur Hallam, his best friend, who became the Muse of Tennyson in his work. He together with his brothers (Frederick and Charles) published Poems by Two Brothers in 1827. His father died in 1831, and his friend Arthur Hallam died in 1833. We can say that in most of his best poetry, “In Memoriam” , “Ulysses”, “Tithonus”, “Morte d'Arthur”, “Tears, Idle Tears” , etc., the subject is the sense of loss of Hallam. Tennyson became so popular that some of his poems were found in most of the genteel Victorian houses.

(cf. Trilling, Alfred, Lord tennyson , 395.)

“Hallam's gift to Tennyson, his liberating virtue, was to give the poet enough confidence in the value of his own imagination to allow him to indulge it, for a time.”

(cf. Trilling, Alfred, Lord tennyson , 395.)

Tennyson wrote poems about love, the old stories of King Arthur (stories full of the moral of the Victorian society), etc. He had a lot of melancholy (to the past time) and he gave expression to this in his poems. Some of his most important and popular works were:

-Poems by Two Brothers (1827),

- Timbuctoo (1829),

- Poems , Chiefly Lyrical (1830)

- Poems (1832): “The Lotus-Eaters,” “A Dream of Fair Women,” and “ The Lady of Shalott. ”,

- Poems (1842): “Locksley Hall,” “ Ulysses ,” “ Morte d'Arthur ,” and “Break, Break, Break.”,

- The Princess (1847),

- In Memoriam (1850),

- “ Ode on the Death of the Duke of Wellington ” (1852),

- “ The Charge of the Light Brigade ” (1855),

- Idylls of the King (1859),

- Maud (1855),

- Enoch Arden (1864),

- Becket (1879; produced 1893),

- Ballads and Other Poems (1880),

- Demeter and Other Poems (1889): “Crossing the Bar.”

(cf. < http://www.bartleby.com/65/te/Tennyson.html > 22/04/07)

Tennyson has a lot of important works in poetry, but we have made a selection of some of his most representative poems and a comparison with the topic that concerns us “Love and Worship of Nature”.

This poem is included in the book Poems (1832), that contains: “The Lotus-Eaters,” “A Dream of Fair Women,” and “ The Lady of Shalott. ”. This poem talks about a Lady, The Lady Of Shalott, she is a mysterious lady who all people have heart about, but who nobody has seen. She lives apart from the town of Camelot , but near, so near that the inhabitants of Camelot can hear her voice when she sings. “ The Lady of Shalott ” has a lot of references to Nature when Tennyson explains and describes to the readers where the Lady of Shalott lives:

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I On either side the river lie
Long fields of barley and of rye,
That clothe the wold and meet the sky ;
And through the field the road runs by
5 To many-tower'd Camelot;
And up and down the people go,
Gazing where the lilies blow
Round an island there below,
The island of Shalott .

10 Willows whiten , aspens quiver ,
Little breezes dusk and shiver
Through the wave that runs for ever
By the island in the river
Flowing down to Camelot.
15 Four grey walls, and four grey towers,
Overlook a space of flowers,
And the silent isle imbowers
The Lady of Shalott. [...]

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The inhabitants of Camelot can hear the voice of the lady, who they call: “ 'Tis the fairy The Lady of Shalott ”, (line 35-36), she is a magic lady, like the fairy of Nature:

[...] 28 Only reapers, reaping early,
In among the bearded barley
30 Hear a song that echoes cheerly
From the river winding clearly;
Down to tower'd Camelot;
And by the moon the reaper weary,
Piling sheaves in uplands airy,
35 Listening, whispers, " 'Tis the fairy
The Lady of Shalott." [...]

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Sir Lancelot is a very important character in Tennyson's poetry because the poet likes very much the stories of the King Arthur and of his time. Sir Lancelot is a gentleman of the Middle Age and in this age human beings lived very near to Nature:

[...] III 73 A bow-shot from her bower-eaves,
He rode between the barley sheaves,
75 The sun came dazzling thro' the leaves ,
And flamed upon the brazen greaves
Of bold Sir Lancelot.
A red-cross knight for ever kneel'd
To a lady in his shield,
80 That sparkled on the yellow field ,
Beside remote Shalott.

The gemmy bridle glitter'd free,
Like to some branch of stars we see
Hung in the golden Galaxy .
85 The bridle bells rang merrily
As he rode down to Camelot:
And from his blazon'd baldric slung
A mighty silver bugle hung,
And as he rode his armor rung
90 Beside remote Shalott . [...]

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Tennyson is describing the landscape where Sir Lancelot is riding, going to Camelot, and the way he dresses and rides:

[...] 91 All in the blue unclouded weather
Thick-jewell'd shone the saddle-leather,
The helmet and the helmet-feather
Burn'd like one burning flame together,
95 As he rode down to Camelot .
As often thro' the purple night ,
Below the starry clusters bright,
Some bearded meteor , burning bright,
Moves over still Shalott.

100 His broad clear brow in sunlight glow'd;
On burnish'd hooves his war-horse trode;
From underneath his helmet flow'd
His coal-black curls as on he rode ,
As he rode down to Camelot.
105 From the bank and from the river
He flashed into the crystal mirror ,
"Tirra lirra," by the river
Sang Sir Lancelot. [...]

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The lady of Shalott feels that something is happening and then she looks at Camelot. Yes, something is happening, Sir Lancelot is crossing the way to go to Camelot. But when it seams that all is going well, then wrong things happen to the lady and she thinks "The curse is come upon me," (line 116):

[...] She left the web, she left the loom,
110 She made three paces through the room,
She saw the water-lily bloom,
She saw the helmet and the plume,
She look'd down to Camelot.
Out flew the web and floated wide ;
115 The mirror crack'd from side to side ;
" The curse is come upon me ," cried
The Lady of Shalott. [...]

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The lady of Shalott decides go to Camelot to know what is happening there, and why the curse has come upon her:

[...] IV In the stormy east-wind straining ,
The pale yellow woods were waning,
120 The broad stream in his banks complaining .
Heavily the low sky raining
Over tower'd Camelot;
Down she came and found a boat
Beneath a willow left afloat,
125 And around about the prow she wrote
The Lady of Shalott.

And down the river 's dim expanse
Like some bold seer in a trance,

Seeing all his own mischance --
130 With a glassy countenance
Did she look to Camelot.
And at the closing of the day
She loosed the chain, and down she lay;
The broad stream bore her far away,
135 The Lady of Shalott.

Lying, robed in snowy white
That loosely flew to left and right --
The leaves upon her falling light --
Thro' the noises of the night ,
140 She floated down to Camelot:
And as the boat-head wound along
The willowy hills and fields among,
They heard her singing her last song,
The Lady of Shalott. [...]

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But during the way to Camelot she is feeling bad and while she is singing the inhabitants of Camelot know that something is happening, and then the lady dies:

[...] 145 Heard a carol, mournful, holy ,
Chanted loudly, chanted lowly,
Till her blood was frozen slowly,
And her eyes were darkened wholly ,
Turn'd to tower'd Camelot .
150 For ere she reach'd upon the tide
The first house by the water-side,
Singing in her song she died ,
The Lady of Shalott. [...]

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The people of Camelot could see the body of the lady, but nobody knew her by her face and her body until someone could read in the boat The Lady of Shalott . And then they discovered the face of the beautiful voice that they were hearing time ago:

[...] Under tower and balcony,
155 By garden-wall and gallery,
A gleaming shape she floated by,
Dead-pale between the houses high,
Silent into Camelot.
Out upon the wharfs they came,
160 Knight and Burgher, Lord and Dame,
And around the prow they read her name,
The Lady of Shalott.

Who is this? And what is here?
And in the lighted palace near
165 Died the sound of royal cheer;
And they crossed themselves for fear,
All the Knights at Camelot;
But Lancelot mused a little space
He said, "She has a lovely face;
170 God in his mercy lend her grace,
The Lady of Shalott."

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  •  Bartleby. The Columbia Encyclopedia . Sixth Edition. 2001-05. Home:

< http://www.bartleby.com >

< http://www.bartleby.com/65/te/Tennyson.html > 22/04/07

•  Rosenthal, M. L. Poetry in English. An Anthology . Oxford University Press. New York . 1987.

•  Soanes, Catherine and Angus stevenson. Oxford Dicctionary of English . Second Edition. Oxford University Press. 2003.

•  Tennyson, Alfred. La Dama de Shalott y otros poemas . (Trad. Antonio Rivero Taravillo.) Ed. Pre-Textos. Madrid-Buenos Aires-Valéncia. 2002.

•  The Tennyson Page . Home:

<http://charon.sfsu.edu/TENNYSON/tennyson.html>

< http://charon.sfsu.edu/TENNYSON/ULYSSES.HTML > 22/04/07

< http://charon.sfsu.edu/TENNYSON/poems/chargeofthelightbrigade.shtml > 22/04/07

<http://charon.sfsu.edu/tennyson/inmemoriam.html>22/04/07

< http://charon.sfsu.edu/TENNYSON/poems/mortedarthur.shtml > 22/04/07

<http://charon.sfsu.edu/TENNYSON/TENNLADY.HTML>22/04/07

•  Trilling, Lionel and Harold Bloom. The Oxford Anthology of English Literature . Oxford University Press. New York . 1973.