Page 357 - DENG405_BRITISH_POETRY

British Poetry

Notes “The Lady of Shallot” tells the story of a woman who lives in a tower in Shallot, which is an island on
a river that runs, along with the road beside it, to Camelot, the setting of the legends about King
Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table. Every day, the woman weaves a tapestry picture of the
landscape that is visible from her window, including Camelot. There is, however, a curse on her; the
woman does not know the cause of the curse, but she knows that she cannot look directly out of the
window, so she views the subjects of her artwork through a mirror that is beside her. The woman is
happy to weave, but is tired of looking at life only as a reflection. One day, Sir Lancelot rides by,
looking bold and handsome in his shining armor, and singing. The woman goes to the window to
look directly out of it, and the moment she does, she knows that the curse is upon her. So she leaves
the tower, finds a boat at the side of the river, writes “The Lady of Shallot” on the side of the boat, and
floats off down the river toward Camelot. As she drifts along, singing and observing all of the sights
that were forbidden to her before, she dies. The boat floats past Camelot, and all of the knights make
the sign of the cross upon seeing a corpse go by, but Lancelot, seeing her for the first time, notes, “She
has a lovely face.”
This poem was first published in 1832, when Tennyson was 23 years old, in a volume called Poems.
Up to that point, Tennyson had received great critical acclaim and had won national awards, but
the critics savagely attacked the 1832 book, mostly because of poems such as “The Lady of Shallot”
that dealt with fantasy situations instead of realistic ones. The next year, 1833, Tennyson’s best
friend died, which affected the poet as greatly as would anything in his life. For a long time, during
a period that later came to be known as “the ten years’ silence,” nothing of Tennyson’s was published.
In 1842, a new volume, also called Poems, was published, to great critical acclaim. The new book
had a slightly revised version of “The Lady of Shallot,” and this version is the one that is studied
today.

Story

The Lady of Shallot is a magical being who lives alone on an island upstream from King Arthur’s
Camelot. Her business is to look at the world outside her castle window in a mirror, and to weave
what she sees into a tapestry. She is forbidden by the magic to look at the outside world directly. The
farmers who live near her island hear her singing and know who she is, but never see her.

Write short note on poem the Lady Shallot.
The Lady sees ordinary people, loving couples and knights in pairs reflected in her mirror. One
day, she sees the reflection of Sir Lancelot riding alone. Although she knows that it is forbidden, she
looks out the window at him. The mirror shatters, the tapestry flies off on the wind, and the Lady
feels the power of her curse.
An autumn storm suddenly arises. The lady leaves her castle, finds a boat, writes her name on it,
gets into the boat, sets it adrift, and sings her death song as she drifts down the river to Camelot.
The locals find the boat and the body, realize who she is, and are saddened. Lancelot prays that God
will have mercy on her soul.
This is one of Tennyson’s most popular poems. The Pre-Raphaelites liked to illustrate it. Waterhouse
made three separate paintings of “The Lady of Shalott”. Agatha Christie wrote a Miss Marple mystery
entitled “The Mirror Crack’d From Side to Side”, which was made into a movie starring Angela
Lansbury. Tirra Lirra by the River, by Australian novelist Jessica Anderson, is the story of a modern
woman’s decision to break out of confinement.

The poem was particularly popular amongst artists of the Pre-Raphaelite
movement, who shared Tennyson’s interest in Arthuriana; several of the
Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood made paintings based on episodes from the poem.

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