Chapter 6 Romantic Verse Narrative The Romantic poets

Chapter 6 Romantic Verse Narrative • The Romantic poets produced all sorts of established poetic forms: • Narrative • Epic • Ballad • Ode • Sonnet

• Romantic poetry is associated with Lyrical poems. • In a lyrical poem, we have a speaker and a person spoken to, the “I” and the “you” • Not all Romantic poems are lyrical • Chapter 6 deals with another form of poetry: The Romantic Verse Narrative eg: La Belle Dame Sans Merci and The Eve of St Agnes by Keats. • Romantic poetry stems from Medieval and Renaissance forms. • The modern confusion is due to the involvement of amorous encounters in the stories of knights and their fabulous adventures.

• Features of Romantic writing: • Idealized love and idealized figures (give examples) • Medieval and exotic settings (examples) • Quest for the ideal through adventures, dangers and risks underwent during the journeys. • Implausible and fabulous events followed by a resolution of problems (denouement)

La Belle Dame Sans Merci by Keats

• La Belle Dame Sans Merci (p: 157 -8) • Keats is influenced by Spencer’s “The Fairie Queene” • It is connected to his future fiancée (Fanny Brawne) • It expresses the destructiveness of love (influence of traditional ballads) • It has an imitation of medieval romance (spot the elements from the language used) • It is nearer to Gothic approach of Romance • It is a narrative in which the narrator meets a knight who tells his story with the lady who bewitched him. • It is set within dreams and visions (fanciful element)

• The poem ends with a sense of alienation and despair rather than a union between idealized lovers. • The ironic approach of Keats: • The protagonist is not a knight at arms, but rather a victim male figure who was bewitched by the dangerous enchantress • The quest for ideal is not represented through the love relationship only, but also through human history. • The knight’s quest for ideal love ends up with an antagonizing image of pale knights and princes who fall prey to illusions of idealism (link with French Revolution’s ideals)

La Belle Dame sans Merci John Keats (1795 -1821) 'O WHAT can ail thee, knight-at-arms, Alone and palely loitering? The sedge is wither'd from the lake, And no birds sing. 'O what can ail thee, knight-at-arms, So haggard and so woe-begone? The squirrel's granary is full, And the harvest 's done.

La Belle Dame sans Merci John Keats (1795 -1821) Stanzas I-II In the first two lines of stanzas I and II, the anonymous speaker asks a question. The first line of both questions is identical ("O, what can ail thee, knight-at-arms"). The second lines differ somewhat; in stanza I, the question focuses on his physical condition ("Alone and palely loitering"); in stanza II, the question describes both the knight's physical state and his emotional state ("Haggard and woebegone"). This repetition with slight variation is called incremental repetition and is a characteristic of the folk ballad.

La Belle Dame sans Merci John Keats (1795 -1821) This speaker sees no reason for the knight's presence ("loitering") in such a barren spot (the grass is "wither'd" and no birds sing). Even in this spot, not all life is wasteland, however; the squirrel's winter storage is full, and the harvest has been completed. In other words, there is an alternative or fulfilling life which the knight could choose. Thus lines 3 and 4 of stanzas I and II present contrasting views of life

'I see a lily on thy brow With anguish moist and fever dew; And on thy cheeks a fading rose Fast withereth too. ‘ 'I met a lady in the meads, Full beautiful—a faery's child, Her hair was long, her foot was light, And her eyes were wild.

Stanza III This stanza elaborates on the knight's physical appearance and mental state, which are associated with dying and with nature. In the previous stanzas, the descriptions of nature are factual; here, nature is used metaphorically. His pallor is compared first to the whiteness of a lily, then to a rose; the rose is "fading" and quickly "withereth. " The lily, of course, is a traditional symbol of death; the rose, a symbol of beauty. The knight's misery is suggested by the "dew" or perspiration on his forehead.

'I made a garland for head, And bracelets too, and fragrant zone; (=belt) She look'd at me as she did love, And made sweet moan. 'I set her on my pacing steed And nothing else saw all day long, For sideways would she lean, and sing A faery's song.

“ 'I made a garland for head, And bracelets too, and fragrant zone; (=belt) She look'd at me as she did love, And made sweet moan. ” Arthur Hughes (British, 1832 -1915) Pre. Raphaelite Painter.

“'I set her on my pacing steed And nothing else saw all day long, For sideways would she lean, and sing A faery's song. ” Sir Frank Dicksee (British, 1853 -1928)

'She found me roots of relish sweet, And honey wild and manna dew, And sure in language strange she said, "I love thee true!" 'She took me to her elfin grot, And there she wept and sigh'd fill sore; And there I shut her wild, wild eyes With kisses four.

“'She found me roots of relish sweet, And honey wild and manna dew, And sure in language strange she said, "I love thee true!" 'She took me to her elfin grot, And there she wept and sigh'd fill sore; And there I shut her wild, wild eyes With kisses four. ” John William Waterhouse

'And there she lulled me asleep, And there I dream'd—Ah! woe betide! The latest dream I ever dream'd On the cold hill's side. 'I saw pale kings and princes too, Pale warriors, death-pale were they all; They cried—"La belle Dame sans Merci Hath thee in thrall!"

“'I saw pale kings and princes too, Pale warriors, death-pale were they all; They cried—"La belle Dame sans Merci Hath thee in thrall!" 'I saw their starved lips in the gloam With horrid warning gaped wide, And I awoke and found me here, On the cold hill's side. ”

John Keats “Eve of St. Agnes”

What is the Eve of St. Agnes? • St. Agnes, the patron saint of virgins, died a martyr in fourth century Rome. She was condemned to be executed after being raped all night in a brothel; however, a miraculous thunderstorm saved her from rape. St. Agnes Day is Jan. 21. • Keats based his poem on the superstition that a girl could see her future husband in a dream if she performed certain rites on the eve of St. Agnes; if she went to bed without looking behind her and lay on her back with her hands under head, he would appear in her dream, kiss her, and feast with her.

Where does the legend originate ? • There is some controversy regarding where Keats procured the “story” or tale of the poem – Boccaccio’s work Filocolo – Scott’s work “The Lay of the Last Minstrel” – Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet – Spenser

Tension in the Poem • • • Youth and Age Love and Hate Sacred and Profane Color (Hot and Cool) Chill and Warmth

Youth and Age • The two pairs of principal characters: Porphyro and Madeline; Beadsman and Angela – Beadsman • “But no--already had his deathbell rung; The joys of all his life were said and sung: ” (Stanza III 23 -24) • “And back returneth, meagre, barefoot, wan, / Along the chapel aisle by slow degrees: ” Stanza II 13 -14)

Youth and Age • Porphyro – Had come young Porphyro, with heart on fire (Stanza IX, 76) – Like puzzled urchin on an aged crone (Stanza XV, 129)

Youth and Age • Angela – “For I am slow and feeble, and scarce dare” (Stanza XX, 176) – “Ah! why wilt thou affright a feeble soul? “A poor, weak, palsy-stricken, churchyard thing, / “Whose passing-bell may ere the midnight toll; / “Whose prayers for thee, each morn and evening, “Were never miss’d. ”— (Stanza XVIII, 154 -157)

Youth and Age • Madeline – When Madeline, St. Agnes’ charmed maid, / Rose, like a mission’d spirit, unaware: (Stanza XXII, 192 -193) – She comes, she comes again, like ring-dove fray’d and fled. (Stanza XXII, 198)

Love and Hate • There is a rivalry between families in the poem. This harkens to Romeo and Juliet – Baron and his kinsmen in the castle • For him, those chambers held barbarian hordes, /Hyena foemen, and hot-blooded lords, / Whose very dogs would execrations howl / Against his lineage: not one breast affords / Him any mercy, in that mansion foul, (Stanza X, 85 -89)

Sacred and the Profane • The intermingling of the spirit and the flesh – Porphyro comes to the castle for earthly pleasures. – Ethereal, flush’d, and like a throbbing star / Seen mid the sapphire heaven’s deep repose; / Into her dream he melted, as the rose / Blendeth its odour with the violet, — Solution sweet: (Stanza XXXVI , 320 -326)

Sacred and the Profane • Madeline is still part of the sacred • And on her silver cross soft amethyst, / And on her hair a glory, like a saint: / She seem’d a splendid angel, newly drest, /Save wings, for heaven: — Porphyro grew faint: / She knelt, so pure a thing, so free from mortal taint (Stanza, XXV, 221 -225)

Color • White or Silver signifying chasteness • Red or Rose signifying passion – There are examples of the juxtaposition of color throughout the poem; however the two intermingle in the following passage

Color and Synthesis • “Full on this casement shone the wintry moon, /And threw warm gules on Madeline’s fair breast, / As down she knelt for heaven’s grace and boon; /Rosebloom fell on her hands, together prest, / And on her silver cross soft amethyst” (Stanza XXV, 220 -225)

Chill and Warmth • The poem opens with a description of the icy cold. – “ ST. AGNES’ Eve—Ah, bitter chill it was! /The owl, for all his feathers, was acold; /The hare limp’d trembling through the frozen grass, /And silent was the flock in woolly fold: ” (Stanza I, 1 -5)

Cold and Warmth • The castle with all its gothic and ethereal spirits is where there is warmth; however, the young lovers can not remain inside their dream. Indeed, after consummating their relationship they must go back into the storm.