La Belle Dame Sans Merci (1819)
John Keats
I.
O WHAT can ail thee, knight-at-arms,
Alone and palely loitering?
The sedge has wither’d from the lake,
And no birds sing.
II.
O what can ail thee, knight-at-arms! 5
So haggard and so woe-begone?
The squirrel’s granary is full,
And the harvest’s done.
III.
I see a lily on thy brow
With anguish moist and fever dew, 10
And on thy cheeks a fading rose
Fast withereth too.
IV.
I met a lady in the meads,
Full beautiful—a faery’s child,
Her hair was long, her foot was light, 15
And her eyes were wild.
V.
I made a garland for her head,
And bracelets too, and fragrant zone;
She look’d at me as she did love,
And made sweet moan. 20
VI.
I set her on my pacing steed,
And nothing else saw all day long,
For sidelong would she bend, and sing
A faery’s song.
VII.
She found me roots of relish sweet, 25
And honey wild, and manna dew,
And sure in language strange she said—
“I love thee true.”
VIII.
She took me to her elfin grot,
And there she wept, and sigh’d fill sore, 30
And there I shut her wild wild eyes
With kisses four.
IX.
And there she lulled me asleep,
And there I dream’d—Ah! woe betide!
The latest dream I ever dream’d 35
On the cold hill’s side.
X.
I saw pale kings and princes too,
Pale warriors, death-pale were they all;
They cried—“La Belle Dame sans Merci
Hath thee in thrall!” 40
XI.
I saw their starved lips in the gloam,
With horrid warning gaped wide,
And I awoke and found me here,
On the cold hill’s side.
XII.
And this is why I sojourn here, 45
Alone and palely loitering,
Though the sedge is wither’d from the lake,
And no birds sing.
BIBLIOGRAPHY:
55. La Belle Dame Sans Merci. Keats, John. 1884. The Poetical Works of John Keats
bartlebycom@aol.com (1999)
http://www.bartleby.com/126/55.html (10-11-06)
POETIC COMMENTARY
To begin with, we have to say that “‘La Belle Dame Sans Merci’ is a poem written by John Keats (1795-1821), one of the earliest and greatest figures of the Romanticism. This ballad was composed in 1819. He also wrote other poems, sonnets, epistles, etc.” (Index of/fores/poesia)
‘La Belle Dame Sans Merci’ seems to be about a woman who was crazy (of love) about a man (the author) and, after their relationship, she vanished. Then, he is at death’s door because of the sadness that he has when he remembers her. His scars are a constant reminder of the past. She is a mermaid who has charmed him.
The main ideas in the poem are:
- First, Second and Third stanzas: A second “voice” appears, which we don’t know if it’s a soul or a person, and he/she is speaking to the poet. This “voice” asks after the feelings of this devastated knight. In the third line there is a metaphor due to the fact that “the sedge withered from the lake” represents a person that finds himself/herself involved in his pain, and the water is drowning him. In the fourth line, when the birds sing it is a sign of happiness and, in this case, they don’t sing which means sadness.
In the second stanza (line 6) the “voice” goes on describing the state of mind of the poet. In the last two lines, I interpret that he/she refers to that you can’t change the past facts of your life.
In the third stanza, he/she describes the physical state of the poet which is appalling. The “voice” uses the flowers to represent the pain: “a lily” and “a fading rose”. Moreover, “with anguish moist” means “crying” and “fever dew” means “madness”.
- Fourth stanza: The poet appears replying to the questions of the “voice”. He tells him/her the reason of his sorrow. He introduces the woman he loved, the main character who has broken his heart. She is a beautiful woman but with “wild eyes”.
- Fifth stanza: The poet talks about the token of love from him to her. He gave her simple adornments for her clothes. All are symbols which involve the nature, like “garland”, “bracelets”, “fragrant zone”. Moreover, there is one word “moan” which helps us identify that the woman is a mermaid because this is their way of communication. They are “sweet moans” that hypnotizes the poet.
- Sixth stanza: He seems to be who carries the weight of the relationship and she is who follows her beloved. She is happy with him.
- Seventh stanza: They are in idyllic and wild scenery and she told him she loved him. But she doesn’t speak the same language as him because she speaks the mermaid’s language based on groans. Furthermore, he uses the inverted commas to refer to her words.
- Eighth stanza: She is who persuades and transports him to her fantasies, but there is the moment when she decides not to continue with him and it makes her feel sad. The first line “She took me to her elfin grot” is the mermaid’s world. It is a pure love because he kisses her eyes to calm her; he doesn’t kiss another part of her body.
- Ninth stanza: In line 34, the poet shows us the first sign that the story of her beloved could be imaginary. Another option is that after that, he could be dying, because he is in a cold place and a symptom of death is that the body temperature falls.
- Tenth and Eleventh stanzas: He has a dream in which there are a lot of signs of death, the pale and horrible expressions of the “warrior faces” for example. These warriors were other men who were persuaded by the mermaids and were trapped inside their world. They were hypnotized by them.
- Twelfth stanza: The poet returned to the beginning of the conversation with the “voice” and he has a conclusion. It finishes as it has started but with the difference of stress because now it is affirming and justifying his behaviour.
About the title, I suppose that it is in French because the French Women were more demure. They had a romantic beauty and they represented the sensuousness. ‘La Belle Dame Sans Merci’ is a poem immersed in the mermaid’s world. Both women (the first “voice” and the poet’s beloved) are mermaids. They pretended from different ways to persuade the poet (the narrator).The first one is like the mother of the mermaids, the conscience, who is interested in knowing what the poet’s affliction is. She has powers of persuasion but without being pretentious. If she would have been pretentious, she hadn’t talked with the poet because the mermaid’s communication is by indecipherable groans. The second one is the poet’s beloved. He falls in love with her without oral communication; she just emits an attractive noise which captivates the poet. She practises the mermaid’s ritual that consists in showing up and dazzled with her charms to the man and, when he is captivated, she disappears.
Mermaid’s song is well-known for ages. Plays like “The Odyssey” describe mermaid’s charms and their dangers.
What I can say about the structure and the form of the poem is that it is composed by twelve stanzas of four lines each. It has the rhythm of a song. One stylistic device which the poet uses is the repetition. In lines 1 and 5, he repeats the same sentence but there is a difference in stress, on line 5 there is a rhetoric exclamation. Both stanzas finish with “The…” and “And…”. From the beginning to the end the theme of “The Nature” appears and there are some characteristic words of the semantic field like: “lake”, “sedge”, “birds”, “squirrel”, “rose”, etc. It represents the mermaid’s world.
In the third stanza, “I” is referred to the “voice” but, in the following stanzas, “I” is referred to the poet. He inserts the personal pronouns at the beginning of the stanzas “I” (four times) and “She” (two times), after he uses “And” too.
In the three first stanzas, the poet uses the verbs in present because it is an actual situation and from the IV to the XI stanza, he talks in past tense to remember his experiences. In the last stanza, he returned to the present to reply to the “voice”.
There are some words which belong to the ancient English like: “thee” (it means “you”) and “faery”. The poet plays with three people: the “voice” that starts the poem, the poet and his beloved. The main character is “La Belle Dame” but the narrator is the poet.
From my point of view, it is a nice poem. I like its theme, but I think that it is so dramatic. The poet has suffered too much being alone, and I believe that “La Belle Dame” is not real. She is an impossible love.
I’ve liked this poem of John Keats and, in my opinion, it has a deep contents but relatively easy to understand.
BIBLIOGRAPHY:
Index of/fores/poesia ‘John Keats’
Copyright 1995-2004 by Dr. Vicente Forés