Lord Alfred TennysonMajor Works 1

Major Works 

“In Memoriam A.H.H.”

• Written between 1833 and 1850; Published in 1851 

anonymously

• Original title- “The Way of the Soul”

• In memory of A.H. Hallam- an elegy

• Written in Iambic tetrameter- ABBA (In Memorium Stanzas)

• 133 Cantos (including the prologue & the epilogue)

• The poet expresses his anxiety towards change, death and mortality. He expresses his grief over his dearest friend’s death over these past 17 years. The tone of the poem keeps changing 

between personal and universal. 

• The poem ends with a marriage song for his sister Cecilia’s wedding with Edward Lushington. Hence, the poem ends with a reaffirmation of Christian faith.

• T.S. Eliot called it “most unapproachable of all his poems”. 

• Famous quotes-

 “Tis better to have loved and lost than never to have 

loved at all”

 “nature, red in tooth and claw”

“The Lotos Eaters”

 Published in his collection Poems (1833)

 Story is inspired from Homer’s Odyssey.

 Written as a dramatic monologue.

 Inspired from his trip to Spain with Arthur Hallam.

 “mild eyed melancholy” is used for Lotos-eaters who are put 

into a state of trance and isolation from the world. 

 Odysseus is the speaker who is motivating his Mariners that 

they shall soon touch their native shore. 

 The Mariners also decide to live their lives relaxing like the 

Lotos-eaters because “slumber is more sweet than toil”.

 The narrative is divided into 2 parts- 1

st part is descriptive in nature and is composed in Spenserian stanza form; the 2nd part is a song of 8 stanzas of varying length. 

 There’s also a short story called “The Lotus Eater” by W. Sommerset Maugham written in 1945, based on the life of 

John Ellingham Brooks. It was published in a collection called “The Mixture as Before”. 

 Important quotes-

 “And deep-asleep he seem’d, yet all awake,

And music in his ears his beating heart did make.”

 “All things have rest: why should we toil alone”

 “'There is no joy but calm!"—

Why should we only toil, the roof and crown of things?”

 “Let us alone. What pleasure can we haveTo war with evil? Is there any peace

In ever climbing up the climbing wave?”

“The Lady of Shallot”

• A Lyrical ballad published in 1833 (20 stanzas) and 1842 (9 

stanzas).

• She lives in Camelot- Myth of Elaine Astolat as recounted in a 13th-century Italian novellina titled Donna di Scalotta.

• Written in 19 stanzas divided in 4 parts- There are four stanzas in Parts I and II, five stanzas in Part III, and six in Part 

IV. 

• The stanzas all contain the same basic structure: there are nine lines, with a rhyme scheme of aaaabcccb.

• She weaves images and looks through the mirror at the village below- a curse.

• She is enchanted by Sir Lancelot- an Arthurian knight.

• She dies in a boat before reaching his palace.

• Theme- the danger of isolation for an artist; the danger of art as something that is away put from the reality; female virtue as a subject of Victorian imagination. 

• Famous lines-

 “I am half-sick of shadows”

 “She knows not what the curse may be,

And so she weaveth steadily”

 “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.”

 “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. “Mariana”

 Published in 1830 in Poems, Chiefly Lyrical.

 A lyrical narrative poem.

 The rhyme scheme of the poem- ABAB CDDC EFEF. 

 Inspired from Mariana in Measure for Measure by Shakespeare.

 About a woman who wishes her death because of unrequited love (Angelo)- theme of isolation and its danger.

 The woman who continuously laments her lack of connection with society. The isolation defines her existence, and her longing for a connection leaves her 

wishing for death at the end of every stanza.

 Tennyson offers an insight into both Mariana’s physical life in her secluded grange and her psychological inner 

life. Additionally, the poem is replete with auditory imagery, which ironically highlights the isolation of Mariana. 

“Enoch Arden”

 Published in Enoch Garden and Other Poems (1864).

 A narrative poem- story given by Thomas Woolner.

 Fisherman turned merchant sailor (due to financial problems) Enoch Arden, leaves his wife Annie and three children to go to sea with his old captain, only to be stranded there for over 11 years. 

 At the 10th year, Philip Ray proposes to Annie but she keeps on postponing the engagement. Every night she goes to bed reading Bible and praying for Enoch to return. 

 With no sign of him, Annie marries Philip and has a child with him (one child with Enoch is dead) only to be found later by Enoch. He never really tells them of his return and dies with a broken heart. 

“Tears, Idle Tears”

 A lyric poem

 Appeared in 1847 as a shorter lyric attached with the longer poem The Princess: A Medley.

 Written in irregular Blank verse- 4 stanzas of 5 lines each

with no specific rhyme scheme 

 Also inspired by the beauty of Tintern Abbey.

 Tennyson’s speaker is able to depict the sorrow of mourning and the devastation of lost youth. He brings attention to what it means to age and become aware of 

the darker side of life.

 He also feels sorrow for those who have lived and died before his time. By the time a reader gets to the end of the poem, it will be clear that the speaker is narrating the piece from beyond the grave. In conclusion, Tears, Idle Tears brings attention to feelings intimately associated with aging, such as regret, reminiscence, and despair.

 Each stanza ends with “the days that are no more”.

 The past is expressed as “sad”, “Strange”, “dear, deep and 

wild”.

“Idylls of the King”

 A series of 12 connected narrative poems.

 Written in blank verse.

 Influenced by Malory’s Morte d’Arthur. 

 The whole work recounts Arthur's attempt and failure to lift up mankind and create a perfect kingdom, from his coming to power to his death at the hands of the traitor Mordred. Individual poems detail the deeds of various knights, including Lancelot, Geraint, Galahad, 

and Balin and Balan, and also Merlin and the Lady of the Lake. 

 The poems were dedicated to the late Albert, Prince Consort. 

 The poem can be read as an allegory of the societal conflicts in Britain during the mid-Victorian era. 

 The first set of Idylls, "Enid", "Vivien", "Elaine", and "Guinevere", was published in 1859."Enid" was later divided into "The Marriage of Geraint" and "Geraint and 

Enid", and "Guinevere" was expanded.

 The Holy Grail and Other Poems appeared in 1869.

 "The Last Tournament" was published in Contemporary Review in 1871. 

 "Gareth and Lynette" was published in 1872.

 The final idyll, "Balin and Balan", was published in Tiresias 

and Other Poems in 1885. 

 The Dedication was published in 1862, a year after the Prince Consort had died; the epilogue, "To the Queen," was published in 1873 “Ulysses”

 Written in 1833; Published in 1842 in Poems (Second Volumme).

 A dramatic monologue- In Blank verse 

 Old Odysseus expresses his desire to explore againDespite

his reunion with his wife Penelope and his son Telemachus, Ulysses longs for further experience and knowledge.

 As the poem begins, Ulysses has returned to his kingdom, Ithaca, after the long journey post the Trojan War. Confronted again by domestic life, Ulysses expresses his lack of contentment, including his indifference toward the "savage race" whom he governs. 

 Ulysses contrasts his present mundane life with his heroic past, and contemplates his old age and eventual death—"Life piled on life / Were all too little, and of one to me / Little remains".

 While Ulysses thinks that his son Telemachus will be a good king, he seems to have lost any connection to his son and the conventional methods of governing ("He works his work, I mine", "by slow prudence" and "through soft degrees").

 In the final section, Ulysses turns to his fellow mariners and calls on them to join him on another quest, making no guarantees as to their fate but attempting to conjure their heroic past: “Come, my friends,/ 'Tis not too late to seek a newer world.”

 “To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.” “Tithonus”

 Published in 1860 in Cornhill Magazine, though written in 1833. 

 A dramatic monologue spoken by Tithonus and addressed to Eos, begging for death. 

 Based on Greek myth of Tithonos who is in love with Aurora, goddess of dawn.

 In the poem, Tithonus asks Eos for the gift of immortality, which she readily grants him, but forgets to ask for eternal youth along with it. As time wears on, age catches up with him. Wasted and withered, Tithonus is reduced to a mere shadow of himself. But since he is immortal, he cannot die and is destined to live forever, growing older and older with each passing day.

 She asked gods to make him immortal but forgot to ask for eternal youth.