Alfred Lord Tennyson is one of the most well known writers of

the Victorian period. Critics of Tennyson's works have

ascertained that everything he has written has a basis of several

characteristics. These characteristics being: a recurrent motif

of individual isolation and the use of voyage or odyssey,

dramatic monologue, an effort of equilibrium between the public

and private obligations of the poet, experimen-

tation with form, the resolution of a war between the ancients

and moderns through the use of fables, and a dedication to the

principle that sound is the main vehicle of the senses.

Tennyson's poem "The Lady of Shallot" shows prime examples

of each of these characteristics.

Tennyson's Lady shows us the full characterization of

being imprisoned. She is imprisoned on her isle, "Four grey

walls, and four grey towers, Overlook a space of flowers, And

the silent isle embowers The Lady of Shallot."(Anderson, Ln.

15-17).

The key behind the Ladies imprisonment lies in the fact

that she will be cursed if she looks down on Camelot and tries to

take part in real life. "She has heard a whisper say, A curse is on

her if she stay, To look down to Camelot" (Anderson, ln. 40-42).

In Elizabeth Lee's essay, she states that "She (the Lady of Shallot)

is cursed under the pain of death never to participate in the

actual lives she sees" (Lee, 1).

The only way that the lady of Shallot can take part in real

life is by watching things transpire below her through a magic

mirror that she uses to weave. "And moving through a mirror

clear, That hangs before her all the year, Shadows of the world

appear" (Anderson, ln. 46-48).

The lady of Shallot is growing tired of being alone and only

viewing shadows of the world. She can sit at her loom and

watch all the world pass by her, but can never take part in what

she sees.

"But in her web she still delights,

To weave the mirror's magic sights,

For often through the silent nights

A funeral with plumes and lights

and music, went to Camelot;

Or when the moon was overhead,

Come two young lovers lately wed;

"I am half sick of shadows," said

The Lady of Shallot."(Anderson, 64-71).

This point is a pivotal part of the story. The lady is growing tired

of her surroundings and her embowerment. It is at this point in

the story that we know that it would take very little for her to risk

the curse and leave the loom.

It is then that the lady sees Lancelot in her mirror, and it is

Lancelot who causes her to leave the loom and bring the curse

upon herself. "She left the web, she left the loom, She made

three paces through the room, She saw the water lily bloom, She

saw the helmet and the plume, She looked down to Camelot"

(Anderson, ln. 108-112).

This is when the use of voyage and odyssey comes into

play. The lady leaves her tower and makes her way down to the

river where she finds a boat. "Down she came and found a boat

Beneath a willow left afloat, And round about the prow she wrote

The Lady of Shallot." (Anderson, ln. 123-125). According to

popular criticism this action is symbolic of an artist leaving their

work to take part in life outside of their creativity.

The lady of Shallot floats in the boat all the way to

Camelot. She knows that she is dying while she travels on the

river. And before she even reaches Camelot she is dead. "For

ere she reached upon the tide The first house by the waterside,

Singing in her song she died, The Lady of Shallot." (Anderson, ln.

150-152). In the viewpoint of one critic, "The Lady of Shallot

illustrates the spirit of the artist, one that distances itself from

humanity and creates images from life's reflections. When the

artist tries to gain acceptance in the public life, she dies and her

work is never seen" (Lee, 1).

The next basic characterization of Tennyson's poetry that

can be found in "The Lady of Shallot" is that of the dramatic

monologue. The first dramatic statement of the poem is made

by the lady herself. She says, "I am half sick of shadows"

(Anderson, ln. 71). This is the beginning of the end for the lady of

Shallot. All it takes at this point is just a little push to convince

her to leave the island. This comes in a song that she hears

Lancelot singing, "Tirra Lirra by the river sang Sir Lancelot"

(Anderson, ln. 108). For the lady, Lancelot equals temptation, a

temptation that she can not conquer.

Perhaps the most important instance of dramatic

monologue comes at the end of the poem. After the lady has left

the loom and died on her voyage to Camelot, Lancelot has a

chance to see her. "But Lancelot mused a little space; He said

"She has a lovely face; God in his mercy lend her grace, The

Lady of Shallot"" (Anderson, ln. 168-170). Lancelot never knows

that she did what she did because of him, but he still feels

compassion for this woman whom he never had a chance to

know.

Then we must face the public and private obligations of the

poet.

The exact meaning of the allegory

in this poem is uncertain, but it is

generally held that the lady is a

poet or artist, the castle an ivory

tower, the tapestry and mirror met-

aphors for the creative imagination.

(Anderson, footnote)

The public obligation of the poet or artist is to maintain the

quality of his/her work and to give to the people what they want

and need. But privately all artists dream of being on the other

side of the pen. It's like being outside of a window and staring in,

only in "The Lady of Shallot" she is trapped within and unable to

get out except through the images she sees in her mirror. When

the artist does attempt to rejoin reality she dies. An artist without

their work is nothing according to the masses. They are no

longer fulfilling their public obligations to the people. According

to one critic:

The tension between Tennyson estab-

lishes between the interior and the

exterior world, between the natural,

material world and the shadow of that

world reflected by the lady's magic

mirror, gives expression to the Vic-

torian preoccupation with the contrast

between the exterior and the interior

worlds. (Nelson, 2)

Another critic also tried to voice what he believed to be

Tennyson's feelings about the public and private obligations of

the poet, what he voiced in "The Lady of Shallot".

In Tennyson the Victorian poet's

sense of a division between the needs

of self and of society appears in his

quest to find a public use, for the kind

of poetry that gave him pleasure and,

second, for intensely personal exper-

iences, including his reactions to the

death of his best friend Hallam.

(Landow, 1)

Also, Tennyson tried to use "The Lady of Shallot" as an ancient

fable by which he could resolve a modern war; the war of the

plight of the artist. "In "The Lady of Shallot" Tennyson makes an

Arthurian figure of his own invention serve as a symbol for the

artist" (Landow, 1). And also, "This mythic poem embodies the

way ordinary human needs destroy the artist" (Landow,1).

And with that we see that Tennyson has managed to

include four of the basic six characteristics that people

associate with his works into "The Lady of Shallot." And by the

breaking down of his work into these smaller sections we can

see the over-all plight of the artist in a society where people feel

their needs should be met even at the expense of the artists.