Tennyson's Ulysses: Contradictions of Victorian Age and the Poet's Inner Dialogue, Appunti di Letteratura Inglese

Scarica Tennyson's Ulysses: Contradictions of Victorian Age and the Poet's Inner Dialogue e più Appunti in PDF di Letteratura Inglese solo su Docsity! Letteratura inglese II, lezione 8 Ulysses Tennyson= for a very long time Tennyson has been considered as the poet of the queen. Most representative poet of the nation. Celebratory poems, that shows the power of England...This is reductive. >Charles Dickens: points out what were the contradictions of Victorian age > Light and darkness: Industrialisation. reform bills: 1832, 1867, 1884 (right to vote, except women); 1833: abolition of slavery. 1875: Trade Union act. 1830: abolition of the Liverpool-Manchester railway. 1851: The great exhibition. Religion was an important theme: Higher criticism of the Bible; George Eliot in 1846 translated D.F Strauss's Das Leben Jesus: humanity of Jesus, Jesus is more human. 9. 1859: Darwin origin of species: gives another story of the origin of humanity. QONSNIASWSNE >Religious doubt. “The dialogue of the mind with itself”: suggest interior dialogue because of this new input that upset the Victorian beliefs. >Religion for Tennyson: despair > doubt-+ hope. Tennyson himself moves from a situation of despair (death) he loses faith in God doubt and then hope (in memorial). Pessimism and Optimism (The two voices), despair and joy. Pro and against progress. Desire of escape from society and even oneself (“The Lotus Eaters and theme of oblivion) 3 Ulysses: desire of escape: he wanted to live a more heroic life. >>Tennyson's own two voices: 1. the “Private” romantic Tennyson=intimate Tennyson; melancholy theme (Tithonus). 2. The public Tennyson: the poet of social responsibility and duty. Celebration of the nation; the woman question of the Victorian period: education open to all women (The lady of Shalott, the princess). >>Ulysses is a specific kind of poem: dramatic monologue, synonym of soliloquy. L Genre by Robert Browning: he failed. A poem in which we have a character on the stage speaking to the public but also, in the poem, there is a narrative voice, a silent interlocutor to whom the character speak; element of irony (example: in one of his dramatic monologue, the poet allows the reader, through some strategies to understand what the duke is saying about his wife is false);No identification between the reader and the character. The distance between the character and the reader, and the character and the author of the poem. No empathy between character and reader. >In Ulysses we don't have the third aspect. He is a character, but he is very close to the poet. The poet makes use of the voice of Ulysses in order to convey what the he feels, ecc.. he feels close to Ulysses.