The Lady of Shalott Symbolism

8/12/2019 The Lady of Shalott Symbolism

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The Lady of Shalott: Symbolism, Imagery & Wordplay

There’s more to a poem than meets the eye. Welcome to the land of symbols, imagery, and wordplay. This

interpretation is from the version fond in most high school te!tboo"s# Lc"y yo#

The $iver

This is the first big image in the poem, and it comes up again and again after the first line. It's almost like the backbone of the poem,

running through it and holding it up. Do you feel how the river sort of pulls the plot along? That's especially true toward the end, as

the Lady begins her final ourney. The movement of the river, its flow and its strength, is so key to this poem that it's not surprisingthat Tennyson leads out with this image.

• Line %: The river is the first image, and so, in a way, everything is put in relation to the river. !amelot is down the river, the

island is in the middle of the river, the fields are on either side of the river. "eginning, middle, and end, we keep coming back

to the river.

• Line %: In the line before this, the speaker has told us about the #wave that runs forever# down the river. $e think this idea

of an endless wave, a current that can't be stopped, is really key. The river is mostly peaceful and pretty, but there's something

almost scary about this eternal wave. %inally, it's going to pull the Lady to her death.

• Line %'(: &s the situation with the Lady gets more serious, the river seems to pick up on her distress. In this line, we are told

that the river is complaining. $hen you give human feelings to a nonhuman thing like a river, that's called personification.

In this case it helps to emphasi(e the Lady's fate, which is apparently so tragic it can even make a river sad.

)amelot

)ust the name of !amelot calls up images of ama(ing castles, kings and knights, and people living in peace and ustice. *ven in the

fantasy world of this poem, it seems far away, untouchable until the very end. $hen we finally do see !amelot, it's a place of oy and beauty, every bit as social and splendid as the island of +halott was lonely and sad.

• Line *: $e won't point out every spot where !amelot comes up, since the word is used as a refrain in the fifth line of almost

every stan(a. $e think that repetition is meant to make !amelot seem more like a far off dream than an actual place. It'salmost like heaven, a place the Lady can dream about but not actually see.

• Line %*+: In this line, the Lady finally gets to !amelot, the place we've heard so much about. It's a place full of happy

people, but for the Lady it's fatal. +he can't enter the world of knights and ladies ecept as a pale and silent corpse in a coffin.

$hen the lady arrives, she brings her sadness with her, and the appearance of her body kills the #royal cheer# of !amelot. It's

a powerful image, almost like two worlds crashing together.

The Island

The island in the river, cut off from the land and the outside world, is a maor symbol of the Lady's isolation and loneliness.

• Line : $hen we first hear about the island, in the middle of all that natural description, it sounds like kind of a nice spot,

surrounded by flowers. It's a little isolated, sure, but maybe that's a good thing - it's peaceful, out of the way, off the beaten path, maybe the kind of place you'd like to have a cabin. It isn't until later that we learn about the sinister curse.

• Line +%: &fter the second stan(a, the speaker actually doesn't use the word #island# again, but here he talks about #remote

+halott.# That's an interesting phrase, and it shows how much our image of +halott has changed. ow it seems lonely, and we

know that, because of how remote the island is, the Lady will be separated from Lancelot as long as she stays there. Theisland has become like a prison, more like &lcatra( than some chilledout little spot in the river.

The Lady of Shalott



/bviously she's the main character and a huge part of this poem, but is the Lady of +halott a maor image? Lancelot is almost buried

in description, but we hear almost nothing about the Lady herself. 0air color, eyes, height? Those things aren't all crucial, but they'd

help us to build a mental picture of our main character. In some ways, it feels like the speaker is trying to hold back an image of theLady, to make her deliberately hard to imagine.

• Line %+: The first time we hear her name is as the closing line of the second stan(a. $e're going to hear the same thing a lot

more before the poem is over. The Lady's name is a refrain that the speaker uses over and over. 0er name almost starts tohypnoti(e us, like a magical spell.

• Line -%: Don't worry, we won't take you through all of the spots where the poem talks about the Lady, but we thought this

one was worth mentioning. This is the place where the Lady admits her frustration with her life, and says she is #half sick of

shadows.# $hile we still don't get an image of her face, we can feel the strength of her personality in this moment, a glimmerof the independence and strong will that is about to blossom.

• Line %*: This is the end of the Lady's transformation, the moment of her death. +he has moved from slavery and

imprisonment to freedom, but it has cost her everything. "efore she sang, now she is 1uiet. +he was warm, now she is fro(en.&ll of these are powerful images of loss and change. *ventually she becomes a sort of statue, a pale shape in a coffinlike

boat.

The agic Web

$e think this is one of the most memorable and fascinating images in the poem. That's partly because of the use of the word #web.# It

must literally mean something like a tapestry, but when you hear that word, it's hard not to think of the lady as a kind of spider. There's

some irony there though, because, while she seems to be in control, she's obviously caught in someone else's web. +he should be thewebweaving predator, but instead she turns out to be the prey of some unseen, mysterious force.

• Line +: 0ere's where we first hear about the web. This is a powerful image for a few reasons. %irst of all, it's ust a reallycoolsounding idea. $e imagine the web having an enchanted life of its own, like the brooms in #The +orcerer's &pprentice.#

&t the same time, the theme of weaving is an allsion to older stories, in particular the Odyssey. In that famous epic poem,the hero's wife, 2enelope, sits by herself and weaves while she waits for her husband to return.

• Line /0: This line takes a kind of different angle from the other references to the web. It mentions specifically that the Lady

enoys her weaving. Looked at in this way, the web seems more like an epression of her talent and creativity than a terriblecurse. That's the neat thing about weaving in this poem. It could be a symbol of creative freedom and possibility, or a boring

and endless chore, a symbol of slavery and imprisonment.

• Line %(: The first thing the lady does to break away from her prison is to step away from the loom, where she's weaving. It's

ust a few steps, but they have maor conse1uences. The turn away from the web represents her refusal to be a slave, herdecision to pursue love and the outside world, even if it means her death.

• Line %%0: The web and the mirror are the main symbols of the Lady's weird pseudolife on the island. +o when the web flies

apart here, we know that her island life is over and something else is starting. +till, since this is an image of destruction, we

get a little hint of her approaching doom.

The irror

http://www.shmoop.com/odyssey/penelope.html





This is the web's twin, the other half of the Lady's pair of magical props. &lthough the mirror brings the world to the Lady, it's nothing

like the real thing. +he sees images, shadows, a sort of halfworld. It's like someone staying cooped up in her apartment watching T3

for years. +he'd know what was going on outside, but you couldn't really call that living could you? The Lady sees the world but shecan't interact with it. In that way the mirror becomes another symbol of her intense, terrible isolation from the world.

• Line 0/: 0ere's where the speaker introduces the mirror, which he calls a #mirror clear.# Two lines later, he talks about how

the mirror shows the #shadows of the world# 4line 567. This idea of a clear mirror full of shadows is a bit of a parado!. 0owcan something be shadowy and clear at the same time? It seems like the point here is that the mirror 4like the web7 is filled

with bright colors and people of all kinds, but the Lady can tell that it isn't real. It doesn't have the intensity of real life8 it's

ust a shadowy imitation.

•

Line /*: The Lady's talent is that she can turn the sights of the mirror into an image in her web. It's because of this that wemight think of the mirror and web as metaphors for the life of the artist. +he can represent life, but she can't be a part of it.

&rtists, in a sense, are always taking a bird'seye view, reproducing life from a distance. 9ou can see how, if this went too far,

it might make someone feel alienated and lonely and maybe even cursed like the Lady of +halott. :aybe this poem is like a

therapy session for Tennyson to gripe a little about his life.

• Line %(/: The mirror, ironically, shows the Lady the thing that will break its spell over her. $hen Lancelot comes trotting

into the mirror, everything changes for the Lady. *ven a shadow of him in a mirror is enough to let her know she has to

change her life. 0e must have been pretty hot. +eriously, would you risk your life for a reflection?

Sir Lancelot

$e've said it before, but Lancelot is definitely the rockstar of this poem. *ven in the &rthur legends, he has a reputation as anirresistible ladies' man. This poem spends a bunch of time letting us know how good he looks in his armor. /ther than that, he doesn't

have much to do - no dragons to slay or anything like that. &ll he has to do is show up and look good in a mirror, and he totally rocksthe Lady of +halott's world.

• Line --: $hen he first shows up, he's gleaming in the sun, almost like he was on fire. To underline what a big event this is,

Tennyson breaks a rule he keeps everywhere else in the poem. /n this one occasion, instead of making #!amelot# the last

word of the fifth line of the stan(a, he uses #Lancelot# instead. It might not seem like a big deal, but it has a subtle effect, and

it really points out how much the appearance of Lancelot shakes things up. The Lady's life is going to change completely.

• Line +': In trying to capture the full awesomeness of Lancelot and his gear, the speaker uses a bunch of comparisons. In this

case, he uses a simile to compare the horse's bridle, all covered in ewels, to a constellation of shining stars.

• Line %/+: In Lancelot's last cameo appearance, we don't get as strong a visual image of him. +till, this moment lets us see

another side of him, and it's also where he says his only real line. &t this point, instead of being a glittery piece of eyecandy,he seems sensitive and thoughtful. 0e's also gracious and thoughtful toward the dead Lady, showing that he's not ust

handsome but a class act too. 0e is, in the world of the poem, a perfect guy, bold, chivalrous, handsome, and kind.

1nsolved ysteries

$e never find out who put that curse on the Lady of +halott. This made us a little bit curious. $hat if it turned out that it was the

speaker of this poem? There are a lot of ways that you could picture the speaker of the poem, and we imagine an old witch telling thisstory, looking down into her crystal ball where she can see the images of the Lady and Lancelot.

$here do we get this? $ell, there's the bird'seyeview thing, right? This speaker sees and knows things no one else could. :ore than

that, though, we think there's something a little cold in the sound of this speaker's voice, ust a hint of pleasure at the way the Ladysuffers, at the irony of her last meeting with Lancelot. 2lus, there's the way the speaker hides the details of the curse, almost like she

was keeping a secret. %inally, isn't this whole poem a little like a magical spell, meant to draw you into this world and hold you there?

The rhythm of the poem, the way we come back again and again to the same refrain - it's almost like we are being hypnoti(ed, put

under a curse ourselves by the sneaky magic of the speaker.

2verything a"es a Sond

This poem is about a lady and a knight, for sure, but isn't it also about a river? *verything we see here - islands and trees and castleand fields - is stretched out along the river. It's like the poem's spine. $e even think this poem sounds like a river. It burbles and swirls



and gushes and roars like a river.

o really, think about it. & river doesn't ust have one sound, it has many, and so does this poem. $e start the poem with a 1uiet, la(y,open sound, like a river running flat and wide; #/n either side the river lie< Long fields of barley and of rye# 4lines =>7. Do you feel

how relaed and calm the river sound is here? o hurry, ust smooth water and soft sounds.

Then in the net stan(a, things start to pick up speed, and so does the sound. ow it's like a river rushing down the rapids; #$illowswhiten, aspens 1uiver,< Little bree(es dusk and shiver# 4lines ===7. !an you hear how those words hurry and dance along the line?

$e're in a different part of the river, and the sound has changed completely.

The poem does this again, and again, speeding up, rushing and crashing, and then slowing down again, at the end of the stan(a, wherethe short little refrain bubbles along; #The Lady of +hallot.# +ee that? )ust like a river, speeding up slowing down, loud, 1uiet, fast,

slow, over and over.

The Setting: Where it All Goes Down…

The setting is like our world, only more so. 0ave you ever looked at something, and then put on a pair of sunglasses and looked again?

9ou know how they can make something like a sunset seems more intense, brighter, more real than real? That's how we see the setting

of this poem. It's not like you don't recogni(e the things you see, it's ust that everything has been soaked in a weird and beautiful kindof magic. Things like trees that might ordinarily ust stand there are suddenly almost alive8 they dance and shiver. The river suddenly

has a voice. It doesn't ust burble along, it complains 4line =>7.

It's not like Tennyson ust threw a few magic props into our world. There's something completely, mysteriously different about it. 9ou

imagine the sun would be brighter, the songs would be sweeter, and the knights would be taller and stronger. That magic mirror has alittle bit of a #throughthelooking glass# feel to it already, and that's what we see everywhere around here; a world like ours, but a

little distorted, richer and deeper and more fascinating.

Literary $eferences

• )amelot; This one you've probably heard of8 it's famous for being the castle where the legendary @ing &rthur and his

@nights of the Aound Table lived. There are lots of legends about &rthur, written in several languages, and they give different

details about !amelot. :aybe the most famous of the books about &rthur and !amelot is Thomas :alory's Le Morte

d'Arthur 4The Death of &rthur7, written in the fifteenth century.

• Lancelot; &nother big player in &rthurian legend. /ne of the most famous of &rthur's knights, he causes a bunch of trouble

by sleeping with Bueen Cuinevere. Like we see in this poem, Lancelot seems to be trouble around the ladies. &gain, he's a

maor character in :alory's Morte d'Arthur . That book tells one version of the story of *laine of &stolat, who falls in love

with Lancelot and then dies when he breaks her heart. If you want more info about &rthurian legend, we've posted some linksin our #"est of the $eb# section.

• $ed3)ross 4night; Aedcross @night is one of the heroes of *dmund +penser's epic poem The Faerie Queene. #The Lady of

+halott# doesn't mention that character directly but it does talk about how Lancelot has a picture of #a redcross knight# onhis shield 4line 67. Tennyson's readers would definitely have gotten the reference to +penser. They would also have known

that a red cross is the symbol of +t. Ceorge, the patron saint of *ngland. +o this 1uick shoutout to the redcross knight does a

lot of work. It connects Lancelot with another great work of literature, but also with the idea of chivalry, bravery, and the

history and glory of *ngland.

• 5Tirra3Lirra5 ; This weird little bit of a song is one of only two lines that Lancelot speaks in the whole poem. It's a

reference to a song from +hakespeare's The Winter's Tale 4&ct 5, +cene E7 where one of the characters sings a song about

#The lark, that tirralirra chants.#

The Lady of Shalott Symbolism

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