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The Representative Poem
Ashley Stringer-Franco
ENG/ 306 Poetry and Society
Catherine Canino
February 4, 2013

The Representative Poem The nineteenth century is known as the Victorian Era and it is famous for its improvement of information, growth of an empire and enlargement of the economy. The era had a vibrant spirit of events. During this era Alfred Lord Tennyson wrote the well-known poem “Ulyssses” and it represented how he felt at the time. This poem reveals the determined spirit of everyone that lived in his culture. In the poem Tennyson says that Ulysses has been fighting and journeying for at least twenty years of his life on Earth. Along the way he has observed and learned a lot of things, but he is still not happy
They tried to bring together science and religion. Tennyson is a great example on a poet who tried to bring together science and religion. In “The Higher Pantheism” he states his approval of the justifiable conclusion of science, but determinedly discards its further conclusion: “God in law, say the wise; O Soul, and let us rejoice,/ For if He thunder by law the thunder is yet his voice/ Law is God, say some; no God at all, say the fool:/ For all we have power to see is a straight staff bent in a pool.” (Cervo, 2005) In “In Memoriam,” he claims that everyone must keep their belief even though the most recent breakthroughs in science: he says, “Strong Son of God, immortal Love/ Whom we, that have not seen they face,/ By faith, and faith alone, embrace/ Believing where we cannot prove.” (O’Gorman, 2004). Tennyson also talked to his Victorian colleagues about matters of vital social and political worry. In the Victorian era women were mediocre when compared to men. This belief of the Victorians in the minor position of women is spoken by Tennyson in “Locksley Hall”: “Weakness to be worth with weakness! woman’s pleasure, woman’s pain-/ Nature made them blinder motions bounded in a shallower brain:/ Woman is the lesser man and all the passions, match’d with mine/ Are as moonlight unto sunlight, and as water unto wine-“ (New York Times, 1857-1922).
In “Locksley Hall” Tennyson ridicules the