In Mariana the setting is completely different and you get the impression of a ramshackle old house that has gone to ruins because no one has taken care of it.
‘The rusted nails fell from the knots
That held the pear to the garden-wall.
The broken sheds look'd sad and strange:
Unlifted was the clinking latch’
Again using empathy, if I were the lady inside the house I would feel alone and the fact that the house is in ruins would just make me more depressed. I think that the lady has just ignored the house because she is to busy waiting for her lover to come home. You can imagine her sitting there by the window and the seasons are changing and she hasn’t even realised because she is so wrapped up in waiting for her lover. You get an image of her growing old still sat by the same window.
The source of the poem “The Lady of Shalott” is loosely based on an Italian romance, "Donna di Scalotta" (Lady of Scalott). Tennyson says that he substituted "Shalott" for "Scalott" because of the softer sound. Tennyson has put his character under an unknown curse in this piece of poetry making her unable to look down to Camelot. The only way she can see the outside world is through a mirror that is opposite her.
‘She has heard a whisper say
A curse is on her if she stay
To look down to Camelot’
To pass the time she weaves the mirror’s magic sights (line 65).
‘But in her web she still delights
To weave the mirror's magic sights’
She finally looks down to Camelot when she sees Sir Lancelot, but when the mirror cracks she knows that the curse is upon her. It starts raining over ‘tower’d Camelot’ when The Lady of Shalott comes down. She finds a boat and starts floating down the river towards Camelot, but she is dead before she reaches the shore. In the second to last stanza it describes a gleaming shape floating by which I like to think is her ghost finally at Camelot. The people of Camelot gaze in amazement at this woman but Sir Lancelot is moved by her beauty and asks God to grace her.
An overwhelming amount of imagery is used in every stanza,
‘On either side the river lie
Long fields of barley and rye’
‘Four gray walls, and four gray towers,
Overlook a space of flowers
which helps set the scene, and gives immense visual pictures, however people interpret pictures and words in different ways. Tennyson uses archaism in almost every stanza to contribute to the flow of this piece of poetry; however he uses little alliteration and assonance.
I like the fact that you have to think to find the correct meaning behind this poem and the way that the poem can be interpreted in different ways. I enjoyed the rhyming pattern and the way this piece flows.
In this other piece of Tennyson’s work (Marianna) the lady is waiting for her lover who is never going to come. She stays in her secluded home all night and day crying and wishing that she was dead.
‘He cometh not,’ she said
She said, ‘ I am aweary, aweary,
I would that I were dead!’
She has nothing to do to pass time except cry and gripe. She isolates herself and concentrates all her thoughts on her lover. She does nothing to her house so it is going to ruins. I think as time goes on the lady realises that her lover is never going to come and realises that she has wasted her time and life, unfortunately there isn’t a lot she can do about it.
In this piece there is more archaism in each stanza, especially the last 4 lines of each stanza.
‘She only said, 'My life is dreary,
He cometh not,' she said;
She said, 'I am aweary, aweary,
I would that I were dead.’
It is important to know what these archaistic words mean because the last 4 lines of the stanza have the most impact. Again immense amounts of imagery are used to set the scene and create an effect. I personally think that it is describing the changing of the seasons. I like the fact that this poem could have several different interpretations but I don’t like the way that you don’t learn that much about the lady herself.
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By Hayley Wilson