Curse And The Lady Of Shalot example essay topic

Find a painting or read a poem? What do you see? What do you think? Have you just glanced at the piece and not given it a second thought? Accepting it for face value? Or perhaps you have you re-read it thinking about the hidden meanings in between the versus or brushstrokes?

As a critic, William Pater feels that the job of the critic is to "distinguish and analyze". The critic should look at a piece analyzing it from his personal perspective. If you simply looked at the piece and accepted it for what it was you would be much like the critic Henry Arnold. Arnold believed that "the whole life of intelligence; practice is everything, a free play of the mind is nothing". He felt that the main job of a critic was to simply see an object as it was.

The Lady of Shallot can be interpreted in many different ways or simply as the poet, Alfred Lord Tennyson wrote it. The Lady of Shallot tells of a woman that is cursed due to her beauty in order to protect Sir Lancelot from falling in love with her and allowing her to destroy the kingdom. Shallot is the name of the island where she is hidden. Here she is surrounded by: "Four gray walls, and four gray towers, Overlook a space of flowers, And the silent isle embowers The Lady of Shalot". (Lines 15-18) The walls and towers signifying the strength of men over women during the times.

The men kept their distance away from women however were often "overlooking" them. The "space of flowers" represents the femininity of the cursed woman. The silence of the island is the silence in her heart. Her only task is to weave in order to avoid the curse. The mirror that she uses to see the outside world is inspiration for her weaving, however she feels very little. There is a power struggle that exists in the poem between men, the curse and the Lady of Shalot.

In the begging it is the men that have control over the woman. The Lady of Shalot is hidden away from the men and is overlooked by the men. Second, it is the curse that controls the woman. She knows not what the curse is, yet lives her life with the only task of weaving. Lastly, is the power that the woman has over Camelot. It is her beauty that they fear and it is the curse that prevents her from looking down over Camelot.

Her beauty is her power and it is what Camelot fears. The cursed woman is not the first to be hidden away from Camelot. "Only reapers, reaping early In among the bearded barley, Hear a song that echoes cheerily... ". (Lines 28-30) The reapers are the ones that can hear her song because they to are conflicted with a secluded life. Their task is to reap the wheat to make bread, as the cursed woman's job is to weave and make her life.

Both jobs, reaping of the wheat to make the bread, and weaving signify again an emphasis of women in the poem and their position in society, and lend to the idea that the reapers are also female. The poem continues to show how the Lady of Shalot begins to have emotion and begins to feel. Her heart begins to speak, the island is no longer as silent as it was. The Lady begins to feel loneliness.

"And sometimes through the mirror blue The knights come riding two and two: She hath no loyal knight and true, The Lady of Shallot". (Line 60-63) Here in the poem, the mirror switches from being inspiration for her work to what she wants in life. It is here, where what she sees sparks emotions in her heart. The mirror reflects all that she sees, feels and wants for herself. "I am half sick of shadows, said The Lady of Shallot". (Line 71) When Sir Lancelot enters the poem, he enters in the way that men where portrayed at the time much like the woman entered the poem.

He his painted as being strong, masculine, atop a strong horse. "His broad clear brow in sunlight glowed; On burnished hooves his war horse rode; From underneath his helmet flowed His coal-black curls as on he rode, As he rode down to Camelot; From the bank and from the river He flashed into the crystal mirror, "Terra Lira", down by the river Sang Sir Lancelot. (Line 100-108) Like the Lady of Shalot and her mirror, Sir Lancelot has his shield "A red-cross knight forever kneeled To a lady in his shield". (Line 78-79) He sees his ideal woman in his shield. Although he does not see her on his ride, he has made his presence known in the mirror and she has seen him. "She left the web, she left the loom, She made three paces through the room, She saw the water lily bloom, She saw the helmet and the plume, She looked down to Camelot.

Out flew the web and floated wide; The mirror cracked from side to side; "The curse is come upon me", cried The Lady of Shallot". (Line 109-117) Here is where the curse befalls the Lady of Shalot, she escapes her four walls and towers and begins to go toward Camelot in a found boat. The boat is open and allows for movement which symbolizes her freedom. Rain begins to fall over Camelot as if they foresee her arrival to Camelot.

"Heavily the low sky raining Over towered Camelot; Down she came and found a boat Beneath a willow left afloat, And round about the prow she wrote The Lady of Shalot". (Line 121-126) For her sail to Camelot she is clothed in white. It signifies her purity, virginity, innocence and also represents her want to marry Sir Lancelot. As she sails, her dress sways from left to right, signifying the choices that she has made. Left signifying the negative aspects of the decision which include the curse that has been bestowed upon her. The right sway of her dress signifies the positive aspects of her decision which include her following her heart.

The song which she sings down the river is the song of her freedom. How she came to live her life as she had wanted, to break out of the shackles of society. It is this song, however that kills her. She dies "under tower and balcony, by garden wall and gallery". (Line 154) She dies under the symbols that confined her in the first place. She sails into Camelot yet again silent.

Her song has stopped; her heart is yet again silent. As she sailed into Camelot, and as the people saw her, they feared her and prayed for their safety. The only one that did not fear her was Sir Lancelot. "And they crossed themselves for fear, All the knights at Camelot: But Lancelot mused a little space; He said, "She has a lovely face: God in his mercy lend her grace, The Lady of Shalot". (Line 166-171) Pater states that "we hardly have time to make theories about the things that we see and touch". Analyze, fall into it, relate to it, and let it cross the boundary deep into your personality.

It is the job of the piece, "For art comes to you proposing frankly to give nothing but the highest quality to your moments as they pass and simply for those moments sake". (pg 1644) Do not let life simply pass you by without any thought or letting any impressions be made. Arnold searched to break through the boundaries of language and to simply see the piece as it really is. Language that was transparent was the best language for Arnold. This thought allows "for an order of ideas, which by comparison will be displaced and only the best ideas will prevail". These would be the ideas that see the work as it is with no analyzing or looking deeper into the work.

The ideas would not include what the author is about, or writes about simply what the poem is about. In the Lady of Shalot the main point is that the woman was placed in the tower to be kept from Camelot. Her beauty would captivate Sir Lancelot as is shown at the end of the poem and this would be detrimental to Camelot. Arnold felt that creativity needs elements such as ideas that are current to the times. The author must know the times and know them as they really are. It is known that women in society at the time were kept to feminine tasks such as weaving and to marry.

They did not hold the position of men and therefore they lived in a male dominated society. "Sometimes a troop of damsels glad, An abbot on an ambling pad... ". (Lines 55-56) "Came two young lovers lately wed... ". (Lines 70) According to Arnold this was how Alfred Lord Tennyson saw society and how women fit into society as compared to men.

Tennyson, like Goethe, Wordsworth and Byron, "they had their source in a great movement of feeling, not in a great movement of the mind". (pg 1518) The poem shows change when the Lady of Shallot sees her "loyal knight" and the curse is bestowed upon her. At this point she decides to flee her confines. This change, in the Arnold ean sense, is not imagined or premeditated. When we are in need of change we will change according to how we see the situation and how it plays out. We cannot want to be something and through actions become it. In conclusion, Pater asks the reader and critic to not waste time, to see in between the lines of poetry.

"The whole scope of observations is dwarfed into the narrow chamber of the individual mind". Arnold argues that to "the whole life of intelligence, practice is everything, a free play of the mind is nothing". (pg. 1518).