Page 235 - DENG405_BRITISH_POETRY

British Poetry

Notes her virtue than suffer damage to her looks. Pope thus demonstrates the misplaced significance and
value that society places on external appearances.

24.1.5 The Rape of the Lock: Canto V

Summary

Despite Belinda’s tears and Thalestris’ reproaches, the Baron remains unmoved, refusing to relinquish
the curl. Clarissa then waves her fan to gather the attention of those present. She asks the assembled
group why society places so much value on beauty when it is not tempered by good sense. She notes
that men often call women angels and worship them as such without assessing their moral character.
She observes that beauty is ephemeral: “Curled or uncurled, since locks will turn to gray; / Since
Painted, or not painted all shall fade” (26-7). Because “frail beauty must decay,” women must have
other qualities, good sense in particular, to guide them after beauty fades (25). Consequently Clarissa
tries to convince Belinda that when tantrums (“airs, and flights, and screams, and scolding”) fail to
restore her looks, it is “good humor” that will win the day (32, 31). Clarissa’s moralizing fails to
comfort Belinda, and Thalestris calls her a prude.
Not pacified by Clarissa’s speech, Belinda and Thalestris prepare the other women to launch an
attack on the men to regain the curl. Umbriel sits perched on a sconce, presiding over the epic
struggle with mischievous glee. The humans fight “like Gods nor dread a mortal wound” (44). The
women quickly overpower many of the men: “A beau and witling perished in the throng, / One
died in metaphor, and one in song” (59-60). Dapperwit falls in a faint, and Sir Fopling prays for
mercy before falling as well. Sir Plume nearly overcomes Clarissa, but Chloe saves her, killing Sir
Plume “with a frown” (68). When she smiles to see him fall, he quickly revives.
Belinda flies at the Baron, and the two lock in combat. She gains the upper hand, throwing snuff at
his nose which causes his eyes to tear. She draws a “deadly bodkin” (here, an ornamental hairpin)
and holds it at the Baron’s throat (88). (This is not, however, just any hairpin but rather has a mystical
history. It was once three seal rings that Belinda’s great-great-grandfather wore, which were melted
down after his death to make a belt buckle for his widow. The buckle was transformed into a whistle
for her grandmother before it was melted into a hairpin for her mother, a hairpin which she, in turn,
inherited.) Having defeated the Baron, Belinda again demands the return of her hair, her roar shaking
the “vaulted roofs” (104). The lock, however, has been lost in the scuffle and cannot be found.
Though the humans cannot find Belinda’s lock, the Muse saw it rise towards the sky, for “none but
quick, poetic eyes” could see it (124). The curl becomes “a sudden star / And drew behind a radiant
trail of hair” (127-8). The poem finally addresses Belinda, urging her not to “mourn thy ravished
hair” (141). As a star, her ringlet adds “new glory to the shining sphere,” and stargazers for years to
come can admire it (142). Long after Belinda herself dies and “all those tresses shall be laid in dust,”
the star will remain a testament to her beauty (148).

Analysis

Some critics have interpreted Clarissa’s moralizing as the voice of Pope, articulating the poem’s moral,
but this is a gross misreading of the poem. Though Clarissa’s speech would certainly serve Pope’s
basic purpose of reconciling the families of Arabella Fermor and Lord Petre, Pope’s satire achieves a
broader and more complex social critique, ranging from the idleness of the upper classes to the sexual
double-standard for women. Clarissa’s warnings about the ephemeral nature of beauty are valid but
provide an interpretive problem. Although she assumes the voice of moral superiority at this point in
the poem, it was she who provided the weapon that severed Belinda’s hair. She has therefore
undermined Belinda’s honor and is largely responsible for the present quarrel. Thus Clarissa cannot
claim moral authority as she attempts to do in this speech.

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