On Thursday we'll be discussing Elizabeth Barrett Browning and in particular two major genres of poems she wrote: ballads and political poetry. We've already seen an example of her political works in "Runaway Slave at Pilgrim's Point," a poem that revises the dramatic monologue to allow an oppressed figure to tell her own story. Just as "Runaway" directly attacks slavery in America, "The Cry of the Children" vehemently opposes child labor, a topic of significant debate in the early- to mid-Victorian period, before legislation was drafted to at least reduce working hours for the young. Here Barrett Browning uses a more traditional poetic structure to make her claim rather than establishing one of the children as her primary speaker. "Crowned and Wedded," while not a protest poem, also addresses a contemporary event in British politics and its ramifications.
In addition to poetry that addressed specific political issues of her period, Barrett Browning also wrote a large number of ballads or romances, narrative poems originating in oral, folk traditions. These might seem to be unrelated to her other works. They make no direct assertions about contemporary political issues; in fact, their settings are often historically and/or culturally distant from Victorian Britain. You might consider, however, the formal or thematic concerns that these two types of poems share.
In addition to the illustration of "Romaunt of the Page" I sent with the readings, have a look at the illustrated opening of this Parliamentary report on child labor in mines. More information and images at the British Library: http://www.bl.uk/romantics-and-victorians/articles/child-labour
Happy reading,
Prof. M.
“A Romance of the Ganges” has a distinctly fairy-tale like quality about it, and only its tragic ending keeps it from fully resembling a lullaby. The even rhythm lulls the reader into a sense of calm, as does the imagery of a river by moonlight with stars and little lights flowing across it…it’s all very sweet and soothing (until things go drastically wrong). The third to last line in each paragraph also has a rhyme within the line itself: “The wave-voice seems the voice of dreams,” or “Oh, calm in G-d! thy calm is broad.” This inter-line rhyme is not readily apparent on first reading, but it adds to the sense of steady rhythm, almost like a rocking cradle. The tremendous amount of alliteration also adds to this effect. In paragraphs V and VI especially, the “s” and “sh” sounds are repeated over and over again: “stars…symbolize the soul…the soul by instinct sad…symbols…small…six…seven…” producing a sort of “shhh” sound – the sound of soothing. And the refrain of “the river floweth on” creates a sense of calm both in its imagery and its repetition. Given the story depicted in the poem, however, this sense of calm becomes almost creepy, lending an enchanted quality to an otherwise horrifying tale. Hence, the fairy-tale like feel of the piece overall.
ReplyDeleteThere are two breaks in the steady flow of the poem, however, at which points the stanzas become longer, the rhyme scheme changes accordingly. And the changes aren’t consistent – first it changes one way for two stanzas, and then it changes a different way for the next. Once it changes when Luti is making Nuleeni vow, and then again when Nuleeni answers back. The first change, in stanza XVIII and XIX, gives Luti’s words a sort of curse-like quality in its addition of an extra line. In most fairy-tales, the curse put on the princess by the evil witch is rhymed, or intoned. In a poem, that would not be not enough to distinguish it, so this change in rhyme scheme creates that effect. The second change in rhyme scheme and meter gives Nuleeni a distinct voice – she talks differently than either the poem or Luti.
All of these poems concern minority groups--yay! Although it seems to be expected of a female poet to be the speaker for those without a mouthpiece, she doesn’t go about it in an overly contrived way; rather, common threads run through each poem, which I believe to sum up her attitude toward society’s approach to these people.
ReplyDeleteAll of the poems concern innocence. The crowning of the queen juxtaposed with her marriage asks the celebrants to pretend that Victoria is a regular English peasant so that she can have innocence and joy in her marriage without the crushing weight of queenship. The children who turn the wheels in the factories and mines have a complete loss of innocence, which the narrator pleads to have returned to them. When it comes to “Romance of the Ganges,” the innocence comes across in the background action of the poem--the releasing of the love-lanterns onto the water--and the lullaby-like quality of the poem itself; Luti, however, is far from innocent, and she dashes the innocent dreams of Nuleeni and all of the other girls by the time the poem ends.
The last poem, however, seems to decry innocence. The knight goes on and on about his wife and says that she should never leave her proverbial tower because “unwomaned if she be.” The page, who [spoiler alert] is actually his wife in disguise, takes offence to this (for obvious reasons) and says that womanhood is not defined by her prettiness or the clothing and jewelry she wears, rather “by truth, or by despair.” In her case, truth and despair are one, because her husband’s attitude toward her and her secret sacrifice sends her over the edge and leads to her more permanent, deadly sacrifice.
The words ring true for all of these poems, though: characters who are generally thought to be idyllic and innocent and sweet are very, very… not. It’s intended to be unsettling that they are not as “pure” as their station or initial poetic/genre-ic structures “demand.” The only exception seems to this seems to be Victoria, who is not expected to be innocent, but EBB pleads her case along with everyone else’s; just because it has become socially accepted for her to be regal at all times and above regular human states and emotions does not mean that she is or should be lacking in the opportunity to be human and happy. And just as it seems acceptable for her to be treated as above love, so too it has been accepted that women must be pure and glad, and that all children must be happy while simultaneously being literally worked to death. The innocence is expected, yet also consciously forcibly removed by the populace. I view these poems as a collective cry against that phenomenon.
I was struck by how each poem discussed the plight of women in a new way. “Crowned and Wedded” was a break from the pain of femininity and instead a celebration of one of the happiest moments in a women’s life, marrying the person she loves. The love in the poem transcends all else including duties of a queen and so, “Let none say, God preserve the queen! But rather Bless the bride!” EBB creates an interesting image when she mentions the Dead as being amongst those people celebrating with the queen. It seems as if by both mentioning the queen in the context of a bride and death, there is a sense of equality to the proceedings. Death is the great equalizer, but so is love. Love makes the queen a blushing bride just as it does the commoner.
ReplyDeleteIn “The Romance of the Ganges” there exists a very different kind of relationship. The man in question is only important in the context of his relationships to each of the women (a bit of an interesting shift from the normative ‘women are objects’ narrative). The ballad is an eight line ballad, but each stanza breaks this rule by including the same 9th line “The river floweth on.” Its as if nature itself can’t be confined to petty human ideas, like symbolism or poetic form. Or heartbreak for that matter, because no matter what is happening in the poem, the river still flows, not caring about the lives being ended in its midst. And then in the 19th stanza suddenly EBB breaks the form again (or again again breaking the rules within a poem that already breaks the form) and Luti passionately expounds into 13 lines. It is as if the river finally gave in and could no longer stand by and overflowed. (but then, inexplicably, “the river floweth on”)
"The Cry of the Children" was reminiscent, thematically and tonally, of a cross-section of Blake's "The Chimney Sweeper," "London," and "Holy Thursday." There's the regular rhythmic beat not unlike an easy to memorize child's poem, and an immediately available meaning, but simplicity is entirely deceptive as this poem is neither sweet nor easy. Two lines jumped out at me in particular: "All are turning, all the day, and we with all" and "For God's possible is taught by His world's loving,/And the children doubt of each." The first is emblematic of the heavily leaned on use of repetition in this poem, but with a finesse that stimulates changed meaning with the use of nearly identically words. Having the children subsume themselves into the mechanism and ever-moving "nature" (used loosely) that surrounds them gives "all" a united, powerful sense of despair and fruitlessness, and the all-consuming level of the machine that destroyed and destroys these young lives; the concept of groups - "us" "our" "they" "all" - is visited on repeatedly throughout the poem, and it is just that issue which is so unnervingly problematic: here we have a society, built on vast, massive machines, on the backs of the children. The Group whose main, if not sole, purpose is to protect their children is responsible for the totality of their sadness, struggle, and demise. Little Alice is one girl, the only moment of individuality in this poem, but she, too, is collected by a group. She if, of course, representative of all the children, but even more explicitly, they describe a sort of body-snatch, or desire for one, wherein she could literally be with them again. Or them with her, for, after all, "It is good when...we die before our time" say the children (a line that seems somehow straight out of Blake's creepy angel-child-thing). As for the second line, at first my mind automatically read "God's Gospel" and it took a beat for me to realize my error. How much more depressing is it that the word is "possible"... This asks about God's own strength/God's hand in then world, but, more fundamentally, it questions the existence of any God. This is an intrinsically atheistical comment with which the children are directly, intimately involved in their "doubt" of everything and anything, even that which should (according to some, including this society) be unimpeachably true. Nothing is true any longer, or rather, nothing is guiltless. The issue raised in "God's possible" goes to the core of this poem, and the rallying cry EBB would seem to be hoping to raise: what is possible here, what have we done, and, if it is that we've so abandoned a core responsibility -our kids - and created a deviant society, then what reliance can there be on anything, including God? That was long-winded, but what I'm trying to get at is this: the regularity of the lines-meter, rhyme, word repetition-is mirroring this question of the orderliness of our society, built on orderly machines, that is so fundamentally askew and truly, deeply messed up. A real upper.
ReplyDeleteCrowned and Wedded:
ReplyDeleteI think EBB did a really nice job of personalizing a very public matter. Even though the Queen is accepting on herself a large responsibility, EBB made sure to turn the tables, and make the poem maybe more about joining womanhood and leaving childhood behind, not because of queenly responsibilities, but rather her becoming an adult by marrying. When the poem writes of her "child-smile" in the first paragraph, I think that can be interpreted both ways, as in she is leaving childhood because of her new queenly responsibilities, and because of her responsibilities to a new family, and life. The poem continues with the double meaning "let her vow" which can be viewed as let her vow to become queen, as well as let her vow in marriage, and we see the poet does later interpret the line that way "let her vow to love" but the juxtaposition remains of the wedding/becoming queen. EBB I feel also brings us into the queens mind, in that for once, she wants to be "normal" and "but a wife she to herself may seem". I think its a really beautiful poem to read, in that it surprises you with the message.