The Lady Of Shalott

Fiction | Poem | Adult | Published in 1842

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Summary

Background

Poem Analysis

Themes

Symbols & Motifs

Literary Devices

Background

Cultural Context

Tennyson was perhaps one of the most prominent Victorian poets, and “The Lady of Shalott,” especially the revised 1842 version, reflects the Victorian preoccupation with feminine innocence and sexual suppression. In the Victorian era, men and women were culturally and physically divided in public and private spaces, and this division drives the central themes and imagery of the poem. Tennyson’s revised version includes an ending that replaces her suicide note with a simple acknowledgement from Lancelot, since suicide was particularly taboo at the height of the Victorian era. Victorian trends are also reflected in the poem’s subject matter and source material. Victorians admired chivalry and praised the concepts of chastity and virtue, and were therefore particularly interested in Arthurian legend, which saw a large resurgence during the mid-nineteenth century.

Arthurian legends, and particularly Tennyson’s early poetry, were major inspirations for the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, a group of English painters and artists founded in 1848. Brotherhood members William Holman Hunt and John William Waterhouse both famously painted the Lady of Shalott as she appears in different moments in Tennyson’s narrative.

Literary Context

The woman named “The Lady of Shalott” by Tennyson is based on Elaine of Astolat, a character in the legend of King Arthur. Arthurian legends refer to a disparate body of medieval histories based on Welsh and English folklore that, while popular, are largely agreed to be fictional. Tennyson’s story is specifically based on La Donna di Scalotta, a 13th-century Italian romance in which the Lady of Shalott dies of lovesickness after being rejected by Lancelot and floats to Camelot on a small boat. Tennyson’s subject matter is clearly derived from these stories and steeped in the tradition of Arthurian legend, but his focus on the Lady of Shalott’s isolation and her decision to break her curse and join the everyday world are his own additions, and are not found in the source text. This subject was not a departure for Tennyson; he worked with Arthurian material in other early poems, including “Sir Launcelot and Queen Guinevere” and “Sir Galahad.”

While Tennyson worked mainly in the aftermath of British Romanticism, his early work is deeply indebted to the Romantic tradition and the work of poets like William Wordsworth, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Percy Shelley, and Lord Byron. “The Lady of Shalott” is lyrical and emotional, but it does not exhibit the fervor and boundless imagination associated with the Romantics. It contains elements of Romanticism in its pastoralism and profuse imagery but differs in its purpose and themes. The woman named “The Lady of Shalott” by Tennyson is based on Elaine of Astolat, a character in the legend of King Arthur. Arthurian legends refer to a disparate body of medieval histories based on Welsh and English folklore that, while popular, are largely agreed to be fictional. Tennyson’s story is specifically based on La Donna di Scalotta, a 13th-century Italian romance in which the Lady of Shalott dies of lovesickness after being rejected by Lancelot and floats to Camelot on a small boat. Tennyson’s subject matter is clearly derived from these stories and steeped in the tradition of Arthurian legend, but his focus on the Lady of Shalott’s isolation and her decision to break her curse and join the everyday world are his own additions, and are not found in the source text. This subject was not a departure for Tennyson; he worked with Arthurian material in other early poems, including “Sir Launcelot and Queen Guinevere” and “Sir Galahad.”