Explore the ways the poems in this anthology reflect the Victorians' fascination with the Middle Ages

Tennyson creates a mythic world in which faith existed in attempt to inspire faith in the present. He Sir Bedivere to “take Excalibur and fling him far into the middle mere, watch what thou seest, and lightly bring me word” to him, the Excalibur not only represents power, but embodies a way of life. When he takes the sword to the water’s edge the first time, he cannot let himself to throw it in, as it is so beautiful. Tennyson describes the Excalibur as “brightening”, “sparkled”, “twinkled with diamonds sparks, myriads of topaz-lights”. The second time, Bedivere determines that if he throws the Excalibur into the water, “a precious thing, one worthy of note should thus be lost for ever from the earth, what good follow this, if this were done?” he wants to keep the sword so that he can have the material proof of all that has taken place under Arthur’s reign. Bedivere’s inability to let go of the Excalibur indicates his lack of faith in Arthur. He will not take the leap of faith and trust that Arthur and the roundtable were more than just a fantasy. Later in the poem Bedivere cries out, “Ah my lord Arthur, whither shall I go? For now I see the true old times are dead, when every morning brought a noble chance, and every chance brought a noble knight. But now the whole round table is dissolved which was an image of the mighty world.” The world that Bedivere knows is falling apart. Bedivere does not know how to believe in a world without Arthur, for Arthur has been his faith. For people in Victorian times, King Arthur was a symbol, of Christ and Christianity, of human beings and humanity. “The Morte’d Arthur” isn’t just about celebration of Arthurian times, but also linking to the sense that the goodness, beauty, faith is perishing from Tennyson’s world too. Yet there is the idea that change is not necessarily bad. Change can be something that is healthy and life affirming.

In the lady of shallot, the way Camelot is portrayed as a busy, thriving place. Everyone goes to Camelot in different stage of life. For example those details about “churchman” go there, “lovers to and fro Camelot”, “funeral processions”, it’s an active, busy thriving place. It contrasts to that fairy, dream like world of “Lady of shalott” that world where life is such lack of colour everything is grey and white, and everything is mysterious and lacking in any kind of substance. There are two contrasts, the fairy land of shalott which is devoid from reality, devoid from any real feeling which is a place that confines four grey walls where things are beautiful and graceful but confined to the world of fairy tale, it’s the world of dream and imagination. The way Tennyson draws contrast between the Arthurian shadowy nature and every detail about Sir Lancelott is so solid and masculine, almost overpoweringly bright. The world of Camelot in “lady of shalott” is much more like the real world; it’s a world that’s based around senses and actual experience and where life goes on. The prize that the lady of shalott pays is that when she leaves her dream world, when she seeks for real life that longing will destroy her. But that world of Camelot that seems so much part of the real world which is so confident and secure in “Lady of shalott” is threatened when the boat with lady of shalott floated to Camelot. People looked at her with fear, except sir lancelott. We see knightly shivery from him as this is reflected from his response to lady of shalott. The image on his shield shows a Red Cross knight kneeling to a lady; the shield was the demonstration that he is both a Christian knight and also a knight that extends courtesy and grace to ladies. Stanza III focuses on one particular knight who captures the Lady's attention: Sir Lancelot. This dazzling knight is the hero of the King Arthur stories, famous for his illicit affair with the beautiful Queen Guinevere. He is described in an array of colours: he is a “red-cross knight”; his shield “sparkled on the yellow field”; he wears a “silver bugle”; he passes through “blue unclouded weather” and the “purple night,” and he has “coal-black curls.” The moment the Lady sets herself aside to look upon Lancelot, she is seized with death.

Tennyson was very fascinated with the Medieval world as both his poems  “Morte’d Arthur” and “The Lady of Shallot” portray the medieval period as a gallant, spiritual and dream like place. “Morte’d Arthur” emphasises more on the religion, and “The Lady of Shallot” stresses on the contrast between the fairy tale world of Shallot and the busy thriving world of Camelot.