Locksley Hall by Alfred, Lord Tennyson Summary
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Lord Tennyson
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Notes & Analysis
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Poetry
.Early one
morning, a soldier asks his comrades to leave him at Locksley Hall, an estate
on an eminence near the sea. In his youth, he spent many a night at the hall
gazing out a window at stars, in particular those in the constellation Orion and
in the Pleiadescluster.
During the day, he often wandered the beach while thinking of the promises of
the future.
.......“In the Spring," the knight says, “a young man's fancy turns lightly to thoughts of love" (line 20). And so it was with him when he told his cousin Amy that “all the current of my being sets to thee" (line 24). And she told him, “I have loved thee long" (line 30). They spent many mornings on the moorland listening to the sounds of nature, and they passed many evenings by the sea watching the ships go by.
.......Now she is out of his life, for she was a “Puppet to a father's threat, and servile to a shrewish tongue." She lowered herself and married a man unworthy of her. Consequently, the speaker says, her husband's “nature will have weight to drag thee down" (line 48). He will treat her little better than his dog or his horse. And she will have to be there to humor him in his moods. But “I had loved thee more than ever wife was loved" (line 64) says the speaker.
.......The speaker berates Amy for forsaking him, saying she apparently never truly loved him. And the day will come when her husband will die, but not before she has a child who will become the center of her attention. When her child grows, she will lecture it with a “hoard of maxims" (line 94) telling the child to be chary of her feelings (as Amy's own parents did). Such feelings could be dangerous.
.......“What is that which I should do?" (line 99), the speaker asks.
.......He would have been content to fall in battle to his enemies. Now, it would be wonderful if he could return to his days of youthful excitement, when he felt alive.
.......The soldier ponders for a moment about the world and the future, then hears the bugle call of his men coming for him and says, “I am shamed thro' all my nature to have loved so slight a thing" (line 148). He also says, “Woman is the lesser man, and all thy passions, match'd with mine, / Are as moonlight unto sunlight, and as water unto wine—" (lines 151-152).
.......The soldier dreams of going to a far-off land in the Orient with no traders and no ships with European flags. There, he would wed a savage woman who would bear him “dusky" children (line 168) who could “whistle back the parrot's call, and leap the rainbows of the brooks" (line 171). But he relents and says he does not really prefer a rude and barbarous life.
.......He bids farewell to Locksley Hall, hoping that that a thunderbolt will strike it down.
.
.......“In the Spring," the knight says, “a young man's fancy turns lightly to thoughts of love" (line 20). And so it was with him when he told his cousin Amy that “all the current of my being sets to thee" (line 24). And she told him, “I have loved thee long" (line 30). They spent many mornings on the moorland listening to the sounds of nature, and they passed many evenings by the sea watching the ships go by.
.......Now she is out of his life, for she was a “Puppet to a father's threat, and servile to a shrewish tongue." She lowered herself and married a man unworthy of her. Consequently, the speaker says, her husband's “nature will have weight to drag thee down" (line 48). He will treat her little better than his dog or his horse. And she will have to be there to humor him in his moods. But “I had loved thee more than ever wife was loved" (line 64) says the speaker.
.......The speaker berates Amy for forsaking him, saying she apparently never truly loved him. And the day will come when her husband will die, but not before she has a child who will become the center of her attention. When her child grows, she will lecture it with a “hoard of maxims" (line 94) telling the child to be chary of her feelings (as Amy's own parents did). Such feelings could be dangerous.
.......“What is that which I should do?" (line 99), the speaker asks.
.......He would have been content to fall in battle to his enemies. Now, it would be wonderful if he could return to his days of youthful excitement, when he felt alive.
.......The soldier ponders for a moment about the world and the future, then hears the bugle call of his men coming for him and says, “I am shamed thro' all my nature to have loved so slight a thing" (line 148). He also says, “Woman is the lesser man, and all thy passions, match'd with mine, / Are as moonlight unto sunlight, and as water unto wine—" (lines 151-152).
.......The soldier dreams of going to a far-off land in the Orient with no traders and no ships with European flags. There, he would wed a savage woman who would bear him “dusky" children (line 168) who could “whistle back the parrot's call, and leap the rainbows of the brooks" (line 171). But he relents and says he does not really prefer a rude and barbarous life.
.......He bids farewell to Locksley Hall, hoping that that a thunderbolt will strike it down.
.
