lyrical poetry - OUDL Home

LYRICALPOETRY"Now is done thy long day's work," the wonderfulflow and the chiming rhymes of the Lady of Shalott,to say nothing of its dramatic poignancy:All in the blue unclouded weatherThick-jewell'd shone the saddle-leather,The helmet and the helmet featherBurn'd like one burning flame together,As he rode down to Camelot,As often through the purple night,Below the starry clusters bright,Some bearded meteor trailing light,Moves over still Shalott.Add to these The Lotos-Eaters with its closing chorus,and the varying rhythms of The Vision of Sin. Onemay prefer to these rich and manifold cadences songwhich, like that of Burns or Blake or Shelley, flowsmore directly and simply from the heart of a passion,for Tennyson does not quite sing, even so much asBrowning can; or one may be in quest of a "message"and complain with Carlyle of Tennyson's lollipops—yet lollipops are a relief to the strain and tedium ofsermons—but no candid critic, possessing ear andimagination, can overlook the amazing extension ofthe sensuous range of English lyrical poetry whichTennyson had achieved by 1842. Only Coleridge, ifhe had realised the promise of 1798, could, one thinks,have gone further. The question remains, did he inhis later work not alone add some fresh prosodic andstylistic achievements to those already attained, butdid his poetry catch the tone passionate and thoughtfulof the greatest lyrical poetry from Sappho to Burnsand Shelley? To some extent he did, if never supremely.No song in the 1842 volume has the plangentquality of "Tears, idle tears" from The Princess , for68