View Hannah Alley's profileCritical Anthology: To what extent does Tennyson represent females in his poems as isolated, trapped and dependent on males? (Written in 2013)
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To what extent does Tennyson
represent females in his poems as isolated, trapped and dependent on males?
Written in 2013 by Hannah Alley
I believe that
Tennyson represents females in his poems as isolated, trapped and dependent on
males, through his particular poems: Mariana
and The Lady of Shallot. However, his
poem Godiva contrasts with his other
works and offers a female character who does not conform to my assessment .
Mariana presents the protagonist’s feelings of distance and
disconnection with society as she wallows in her depressive desperation for her
lover to return. Mariana is isolated and lonely throughout the poem. Tennyson
particularly uses syntax and repetition to highlight these ideas: “The day is
dreary”, “I am aweary, I am aweary”. This constant repetitive refrain represents
Mariana’s struggles with daily life and her insecurity while living alone. There
is a lack of independence within her character, as though females need a strong
male to give them balance in their lives. Furthermore, the rhyming of “aweary”
and “dreary” create a tired tone, and the refrain is repeated with only slight
variation, emphasising the duration of Mariana’s isolation; thus the reader is confronted
by a sense of isolation and severe depression.
“Upon the middle
of the night” and “she seem’d to walk forlorn” are particular time references, suggesting
that Mariana actually loses sleep due to the absence of her lover. The use of
third person pronouns creates distance between the reader and the the
protagonist, despite evoking sympathy for her. Finallu, “the slow
clock-ticking” suggests that the protagonist is trapped in unending wait for
her lover. She relies utterly on her lover, the male in her life, and the
passage of time does nothing to lessen her misery; without him, Mariana appears
unable to even leave the range.
Tennyson utilises environment to
further portray Mariana as trapped, isolated and dependant on males through
firstly using “upon the lonely moated grange” on the 9th line down.
This immediately creates a lonely atmosphere and her isolation is almost
suffocating, both for herself and the reader. He mentions the “moated grange”,
a physical representation of Mariana’s mental solitude. Tennyson uses a
symbolic metaphor for Mariana’s sexual desire for Angelo: “the shadow of the
poplar tree fell/upon her bed”. Sexual desire was not openly expressed in the
1800s, so this line demands the reader’s attention and displays the severity of
Mariana’s longing. Shadows possess connotations of death and darkness, things
that dominate her thinking while Angelo is away from her. Tennyson regularly
references the time of day in Mariana’s room: “waking she heard the night fowl
crow”, “’til cold winds wake the gray-eyed morn”. Time progresses yet Mariana is
unchanging, inactive and lonely, trapped in her room. Without a male to
encourage her into action, Mariana accomplishes very little during the time the
poem relates.
Tennyson shifting tone exemplifies
these ideas, such as the eerie tone presented in stanza 6: “the doors upon
their hinges creak’d/behind the mouldering wainscot shriek’d”. At this stage,
Mariana is more vulnerable than ever, so much so that the reader pities her as
much as they might empathise with her situation. Mariana is presented as weak, in
need of a domineering male to protect and drive her; women need men. In the, men would work while women stayed at home and
Tennyson’s Mariana is in keeping with this convention The tone at the end of
the poem is a noticeable shift: “he will not come”. Mariana has finally come to
the realisation that her lover will not return and Tennyson suggests that Mariana
is considering suicide. She displays extreme dependence and attachment for her
lover, to the point that she seems unable to go on living without him. Without
Angelo, Mariana simply cannot be happy and has no future, as conveyed by Barry,
P: “the focus of interest on the heroine’s choice of marriage partner, which
will decide her ultimate social position and exclusively determine her
happiness and fulfillment in life, or her lack of these.”
Another
of Tennyson’s poems, The Lady of Shallot,
is in keeping with this presentation of women. The Lady of Shallot represents the main, female, protagonist’s
isolation as an artist, the suppression of her sexuality and her entrapment in
a classical, mythological world. Again, however, her final outburst of freedom
and desperation contrasts with this initial assessment and might portray her as
independent.
Tennyson
again utilises setting, beginning the poem with “by the island in the river”, evoking
an initial depressing and isolated atmosphere through use of pathetic fallacy. Similarly,
“on the side the river life, long fields of bailey and of rye” suggests that
Lady analyses the world outside her castle with some scrutiny “Fields” and
“river” would usually represent freedom and the natural world, but Lady is
trapped on her island both mentally and physically. Ostensibly the poem is very
similar to Mariana, as both
protagonists observe from a window, unable to engage with their respective societies. Theorist Barry, P presented the lack of
proactivity by stating “in the nineteenth-century fiction very few women work
for a living, unless they are driven to it by dire necessity”. The Lady of Shallot was published in
1833, at a time when this was certainly the case. This idea is reinforced
through “four gray walls, four gray tours” apparent metaphors for prison and
entrapment; “grey” connotes dullness, suggesting that Lady leads a boring,
monotonous life. The absence of any other presence in the poem means her
isolation is absolute. The juxtaposition created by the next line: “overlook a
space of flowers” suggests that Lady is missing out on the outside world and,
to some degree, aware of this.
Time
and ordering explore these ideas more; “and by the moon the reaper weary” draws
attention to the evening setting. This makes a sympathetic figure of Lady, alone
as she is in a dark, isolated place. Her loneliness, in particular, is
something that could be solved by a male companion, with her longing referenced
in “came two young lovers lately wed”, which emphasises both her isolation and
the idea that she perhaps misses company and longs for a male partner.
The
rhetorical question “But who hath seen her wave her hand?” demands that the
reader wonder what brought Lady to such a state of loneliness. Tennyson suggests
that nobody notices Lady, in “who hath seen her” and that she is, perhaps, irrelevant,
withdrawn and alienated from the realities of everyday life. The poem implies that
once a woman leaves behind her ordinary life with a male companion, she has
little to live for. This is conventional of the Victorian age, when females
were widely perceived as housewives incapable of much more than their assigned
lots in life, dependant on their working male partners. Feminist critic Bertens,
H stated “since no-one in their right mind will want to give serious power to a
person who must be timid, dependant, irrational, and self-pitying because she
is a woman.” This relates to The Lady of
Shallot because as soon as Lady is able to escape the castle, she is killed
by a spell cast on her as punishment. Women, it seems, “should not take action
because they will fail”.
In
contrast to Mariana, The Lady of Shallot ends with the
protagonist eventually taking action, mirrored in Tennyson’s description of the
environment. “The river eddy whirls” evokes a suddenly proactive mood, surprising
to the reader after so much after so much inaction. Despite the lack of action
throughout suggesting that Lady relies on another person releasing her from her
entrapment inside her castle, she displays genuine independence and determination
when she exits it of her own volition: “she left the web, she left the loom”. Perhaps
Tennyson does not truly represent females as dependent on males and incapable
without them, simply that it demands a greater effort than many are willing to
expend. He does not specifically suggest that Lady was reliant on a male break
free – she merely failed to do so until the very end. This does imply that,
perhaps, females aren’t represented as entirely dependent on males in
Tennyson’s poems.
In
contrast to the previous two poems mentioned, Tennyson’s Godiva portrays females as independent and neither trapped nor isolated.
In Godiva, the poet conveys themes such
as nobility and virtue through a female protagonist, Godiva, who is brave,
passionate and heroic. These qualities are conveyed by language, voice and
poetic structure.
Tennyson
chooses lexis that was already archaic during the Victorian period such as
“bade” and “ay, ay, ay”, affording the poem a sense of antiquity and allowing
the reader to see Godiva as a legendary figure. Here, women are portrayed as
strong and capable of great deeds by their own volition, independent of outside
influence. While Godiva undresses, Tennyson builds anticipation with the verb
“unclasp’d”. She remains “half clip’d in cloud” as though there is still some
kind of magic covering her, as though as pure and innocent, in contrast to her
portrayal later in the poem. She is willing to sacrifice her own femininity and
innocence for other people, and this selflessness makes her a legendary figure,
one who is independent and strong. Tennyson utilises pathetic fallacy when Godiva
streaks through the town, “the low wind hardly breathed for fear”, giving the
impression that even the natural world is in a state of nervous shock at such a
display. Godiva’s exposure represents freedom – something that neither Mariana
nor Lady can possess. Dynamic movement is a constant throughout Godiva, as the protagonist is in
perpetual motion. Where Mariana was static, Godiva takes inspiring actions for
the good of other people. In the Victorian age, women were not usually
permitted to make decisions for the men or have any sort of control and Godiva’s
actions would likely have been in opposition to the values held by the majority
of Tennyson’s readers.
On
the other hand, the iambic pentameter means variations in stress are used for
emphasis, for example using “did” in line 10, displaying that Godiva did
actually do something in the poem, rather than remaining static and trapped in
time. There is a chronological form to present an ordered structure and a
story, suggesting that Godiva’s legend is an important one. The use of direct
speech is something hardly used in Mariana
or The Lady of Shallot, and allows
the reader to see a female character asserting herself to others.
In conclusion, I initially believed that
Tennyson’s two poems Mariana and The Lady of Shallot represent females as
dependent on males, trapped and isolated in many different ways, but my
thoughts have evolved since. Tennyson's women do try to break free of their
situation, but actually fall short of what they want to accomplish. However, it
could be argued that they are portrayed in quite the opposite manner in some
aspects - Godiva, on the other hand, portrays
females as independent, strong, proactive and free. However as the majority of
Tennyson’s poems illustrate females in such a static, depressed,
non-independent manner, I would argue that he definitely represents females in
this way.
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