In our previous chapter, we discussed 19th century norms and values as they applied to Victorian womanhood. Alfred Lord Tennyson’s ‘Lady of Shalott’, one of his much-loved (and much-debated) poems, raises many of the questions surrounding the woman’s place in a patriarchal society, and, in this sense, Tennyson was the quintessential ‘Victorian writer’ because of ‘his ready acceptance of the mores of his day, his willingness to conform to popular taste (Victorianweb.org). Tennyson borrowing the subject for his poem from the Arthurian legend “Elaine of Astolat”. The story first appeared in a French version the Lady of Escalot in Mort Artu and in the Italian novella La Donna di Scalotta, both in the 13th century. Tennyson’s poem is based on the Italian version., but Tennyson focused on the Lady’s “isolation in the tower and her decision to participate in the living world, two subjects not even mentioned in the Donna di Scalotta. in which the lady dies of unrequited love for Lancelot as she drifts down a river to Camelot in a boat, Tennyson focuses, rather. on the lady’s isolation, caused by a ‘curse’ preventing her from truly experiencing the world, save through reflections from a mirror. It also, importantly, focuses on the consequences of her decision to leave her tower.
This poem, in turn, inspired many of the Pre-Raphaelite painters, whose works equally explored modern social problems; however, although these painters generally agreed on subject matter, the manner in which they represented cultural/social questions was quite different, as we will see in the next part of this chapter.
We turn first of all to the source itself! The Lady of Shalott is a lyrical ballad, a type of writing initiated by Wordsworth and Coleridge and defined in Preface to the Lyrical Ballads’ as “the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings”” It was also a poetry that should reject the past poetry of mannerism and, instead, be written in “the language really used by men.”(Again, we will see that this is precisely the artistic principles we find in Pre-Raphaelite art).
Note: I have printed the poem here in full, adding comments after each verse that is relevant to our later discussion of the paintings inspired by this poem.
THE LADY OF SHALOTT (1842)
Part I
On either side the river lie
Long fields of barley and of rye,
That clothe the wold and meet the sky;
And thro’ the field the road runs by
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.
Willows whiten, aspens quiver,
Little breezes dusk and shiver
Thro’ the wave that runs for ever
By the island in the river
Flowing down to Camelot.
Four gray walls, and four gray towers,
Overlook a space of flowers,
And the silent isle imbowers
The Lady of Shalott.
[In the first two stanzas, Tennyson sets the stage for the opposition that he creates throughout the poem: the abundance of life outside the walls of the castle and the isolation of the lady: the field of barley, the busy roads and rivers flowing to the magical place of Camelot, opposed to her ‘four bare walls, and four bare towers’, and the silence of her island. In contrast to the expansiveness of the outside the outside world, the lady’s world is ‘imbouwered’; time outside the walls goes on ‘forever’ while the castle is surrounded by slow dull time of silence.]
By the margin, willow veil’d,
Slide the heavy barges trail’d
By slow horses; and unhail’d
The shallop flitteth silken-sail’d
Skimming down to Camelot:
But who hath seen her wave her hand?
Or at the casement seen her stand?
Or is she known in all the land,
The Lady of Shalott?
The first 5 lines stress again the abundant life outside the castle walls, while the lady is unseen, unnoticed.
Only reapers, reaping early
In among the bearded barley,
Hear a song that echoes cheerly
From the river winding clearly,
Down to tower’d Camelot:
And by the moon the reaper weary,
Piling sheaves in uplands airy,
Listening, whispers ” ‘Tis the fairy
Lady of Shalott.”
[The final lines of Part I introduce the myths and mystery surrounding the lady, as well as her Invisibility, her marginalization, her erasure. This notion of ‘marginalization’ has played a large role in feminist criticism, especially of 19th century womanhood, as was explained in the previous chapter, and is visible in the works of some of the Pre-Raphaelites paintings, as we shall see.]
Part II
There she weaves by night and day
A magic web with colours gay.
She has heard a whisper say,
A curse is on her if she stay
To look down to Camelot.
She knows not what the curse may be,
And so she weaveth steadily,
And little other care hath she,
The Lady of Shalott.
[The mystery and myth of the lady in her tower is carried through in the first two lines, with the introduction of her ‘magic web’ and in the next four lines that introduce (though do not further explain) the whispered curse and the denial of Camelot, indeed, the outside world.]
And moving thro’ a mirror clear
That hangs before her all the year,
Shadows of the world appear.
There she sees the highway near
Winding down to Camelot:
There the river eddy whirls,
And there the surly village-churls,
And the red cloaks of market girls,
Pass onward from Shalott.
[The first three lines introduce the mirror, which mediates the real world for her, reflecting only ‘shadows’ of life outside the walls.]
Sometimes a troop of damsels glad,
An abbot on an ambling pad,
Sometimes a curly shepherd-lad,
Or long-hair’d page in crimson clad,
Goes by to tower’d Camelot;
And sometimes thro’ the mirror blue
The knights come riding two and two:
She hath no loyal knight and true,
The Lady of Shalott.
But in her web she still delights
To weave the mirror’s magic sights,
For often thro’ the silent nights
A funeral, with plumes and lights
And music, went to Camelot:
Or when the moon was overhead,
Came two young lovers lately wed:
“I am half sick of shadows,” said
The Lady of Shalott.
[Tennyson considered this declaration the poem’s most crucial moment These two lines confirm that shadows are a poor substitute for the vibrancy and possibilities of the real world, and they introduce a key moment in the narrative which leads to its turning point in Part III]
Part III
A bow-shot from her bower-eaves,
He rode between the barley-sheaves,
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,
That sparkled on the yellow field,
Beside remote Shalott.
[These first lines again (as in the first lines in Part I) present vivid images of the world with the arrival of Lancelot: ‘dazzling’ ‘flamed’ sun, and the sparkling brilliance of Lancelot’s shield with its image of an honoured lady on its surface. Indeed, the final line, ‘beside remote Shalott’ further stresses the total isolation of the Lady. In the following two stanzas, this implied comparison and the use of vivid imager, even more starkly contrasts world’s (and Lancelot’s) brilliance with ‘remote Shalott’ and the ‘still Shalott.]
The gemmy bridle glitter’d free,
Like to some branch of stars we see
Hung in the golden Galaxy.
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 armour rung,
Beside remote Shalott.
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,
As he rode down to Camelot.
As often thro’ the purple night,
Below the starry clusters bright,
Some bearded meteor, trailing light,
Moves over still Shalott.
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.
From the bank and from the river
He flash’d into the crystal mirror,
“Tirra lirra,” by the river
Sang Sir Lancelot.
She left the web, she left the loom,
She made three paces thro’ 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;
The mirror crack’d from side to side;
“The curse is come upon me,” cried
The Lady of Shalott.
[These final 9 lines of Part III are the turning point in the narrative, or ‘the ‘pregnant moment’3. The catalyst, of course, is Lancelot’s image in the ‘crystal mirror’ and Lancelot’s song’. I have put these lines in italics to draw attention to their importance, not only to the movement of the poem, but to the impact that these lines have had on the imagination of artists, writer since the poem was written. Here we see the lady’s final defiance. No longer complacent, she frees herself from her loom and strides to the window to look upon the world of Camelot, and brings the curse upon her. It’s easy to understand why the dramatic images of these lines have inspired such a varied response from artists.
The next part, Part IV, constitutes the ‘resolution’ to the pregnant moment: the inevitability of the death of the Lady, her punishment for gazing upon the real world. Tennyson sets the foreboding scene immediately in the first lines:
Part IV
In the stormy east-wind straining,
The pale yellow woods were waning,
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,
And round about the prow she wrote
The Lady of Shalott.
The ‘glittering’ world that the lady viewed through her mirror had become threatening, the approach of a storm, the woods now ‘pale’, and ‘waning’; the banks along the river, where lovers and reapers had walked, are now ‘complaining’, and seem deserted. This sad moment is emphasized by the difference in sound between this first half of the stanza, with its harsh sounds: (‘straining’, complaining’, ‘waning’, ‘raining’), and the sounds of the second half, which are soft, and more gentle (most specifically the use of soft vowels, especially ‘o’.) These soft vowels and consonants are carried through to the next stanza. Try reading these stanzas aloud to understand how these these sounds work to create atmosphere.
And down the river’s dim expanse
Like some bold seër in a trance,
Seeing all his own mischance—
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,
The Lady of Shalott.
This image of the lady lying in her boat has been brilliantly illustrate by William Waterhouse. His painting illustrated not only the drama of the scene, but wonderfully captures the despondent beauty of the dying Lady. (Remember Poe’s words about the most the death of a beautiful lady being the most ‘poetical of subjects’!)
I will not add glosses to the following lines, except to note the indifferent response of Lancelot and the fear of the townspeople. These lines also
Lying, robed in snowy white
That loosely flew to left and right—
The leaves upon her falling light—
Thro’ the noises of the night
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.
Heard a carol, mournful, holy,
Chanted loudly, chanted lowly,
Till her blood was frozen slowly,
And her eyes were darken’d wholly,
Turn’d to tower’d Camelot.
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.
Under tower and balcony,
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,
Knight and burgher, lord and dame,
And round the prow they read her name,
The Lady of Shalott.
Who is this? and what is here?
And in the lighted palace near
Died the sound of royal cheer;
And they cross’d themselves for fear,
All the knights at Camelot:
But Lancelot mused a little space;
He said, “She has a lovely face;
God in his mercy lend her grace,
The Lady of Shalott.”
The images in this ballad are rich in painterly possibilities. You many have conjured some of these yourself, as you read the poem. Imagine what the narrative and its images would offer an artist focussed on history and early literature, as were the Pre-Raphaelites. We will explore some of their works in the next section.