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Alfred Tennyson resurrected Arthurian
legends from several centuries of literary neglect, and placed the
person of Arthur firmly in the imagination of the Victorians.
It was a vision of history,
 which inspired the present, that could be shared by all. The Arthurian
revival infused a whole generation with inspiration. In this imaginary
world of the past, those living in the present could be transformed by
the glorious ideals of their forefathers.
In their imagination, soldiers
and empire-builders could become knights, women could aspire to be
courtly ladies, and all humanly endeavours could be inspired by the code
of chivalry.
The past, and particularly the medieval, came to stand for
everything that was good about the country and its people. It was an
image of strength, fairness and honour. The greatness of Tennyson was
his ability to create a national hero at the centre of a national epic.
His son, Hallam Tennyson, said his father's literary intention was to
infuse into his works 'a spirit of modern thought and an ethical
significance' for his and future generations.
Tennyson's own Arthurian
legend was set in the past; but it inspired a taste for all things
Arthurian in his contemporaries, and this has not left us today.
For many years, even from his boyhood, reading in the
rectory library at Somersby, Tennyson had brooded on the subject of
Arthur, and upon what he might make from it.
'The vision of an ideal
Arthur as I have drawn him,' he wrote much later, 'had come upon me
when, little more than a boy, I first lighted upon Malory.'
Composed by the poet in the 1830's and 1840's, his great
works began in 1832 with The Lady of Shalott. His other
poems followed in publication.
Sir Lancelot and Queen Guinevere,
his own Morte d'Arthur, and Sir Galahad
first appeared in print in 1842. Finally, his great works ended with
Idylls of the King, which he started in 1855, and published
all four of them in 1859.
In spite of the quality of his verse,
Tennyson's poetry was met with some scepticism. While medieval history
was acceptable, Arthurian romances were not seen as serious literature.
Tennyson realised that these was a problem with the credibility of his
poems' subject matter, and this explains why some of his works are set
as epic stories being told in the contemporary scene of a Victorian
house on Christmas Eve.
But, while many in the literary world questioned
the seriousness of Tennyson subject matter, support was to come from the
highest quarters in the land.
Queen Victoria herself was known to be
enthusiastic. It is often said that Tennyson affectionately based his
own Arthur upon a highly idealised version of Prince Albert, Queen
Victoria's Consort.
In 1847, it was decided that the Queen's Robing Room in
the Place of Westminster would be painted with Arthurian frescos by Dyce.
With royal stamp of approval, Arthur was indeed back. Tennyson remained a hugely popular, if sometimes figure
in the 19th Century, and his literary works upon the legends of king
Arthur have stood the test of time.
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Sir Lancelot and Queen Guinevere
by
Lord Alfred Tennyson
Like souls that balance joy and
pain,
With tears and smiles from heaven again
The maiden Spring upon the plain
Came in a sunlit fall of rain.
In crystal vapor everywhere
Blue isles of heaven laugh'd between,
And far, in forest-deeps unseen,
The topmost elm-tree gather'd green
From draughts of balmy air.
Sometimes the linnet piped his song;
Sometimes the throstle whistled strong;
Sometimes the sparhawk, wheel'd along,
Hush'd all the groves from fear of wrong;
By grassy capes with fuller sound
In curves the yellowing river ran,
And drooping chestnut-buds began
To spread into the perfect fan,
Above the teeming ground.
Then, in the boyhood of the year,
Sir Launcelot and Queen Guinevere
Rode thro' the coverts of the deer,
With blissful treble ringing clear.
She seem'd a part of joyous Spring;
A gown of grass-green silk she wore,
Buckled with golden clasps before;
A light-green tuft of plumes she bore
Closed in a golden ring.
Now on some twisted ivy-net,
Now by some tinkling rivulet,
In mosses mixt with violet
Her cream-white mule his pastern set;
And fleeter now she skimm'd the plains
Than she whose elfin prancer springs
By night to eery warblings,
When all the glimmering moorland rings
With jingling bridle-reins.
As she fled fast thro' sun and shade,
The happy winds upon her play'd,
Blowing the ringlet from the braid.
She look'd so lovely, as she sway'd
The rein with dainty finger-tips,
A man had given all other bliss,
And all his worldly worth for this,
To waste his whole heart in one kiss
Upon her perfect lips. |
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