The Lady of Shalott
A Blessing and a Curse: The Poetics of Privacy in Tennyson's "The Lady of Shalott" Author(s): Joseph Chadwick Reviewed work(s): Source: Victorian Poetry, Vol. 24, No. 1 (Spring, 1986), pp. 13-30 Published by: West Virginia University Press Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/40002181 . Accessed: 22/01/2012 02:08
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A
Blessing
Poetics
and
a
Curse:
The in
of
Privacy
Tennyson's 'The of Shalott" Lady
JOSEPH CHADWICK
IN HIS FAMOUS REVIEW of Poems, Chiefly Lyrical (1830), Arthur Henry Hallam claims that Tennyson "belongs decidedly to the class we have . . . described as Poets of Sensation,"1 he places his friend squarelywithin certain main currents of English Romantic aesthetics. Opposing Tennyson's work to Wordsworth'sdiscursive, "reflective" poetry, he argues that Tennyson's poetics are patterned on the examples of the most perfect previous "Poets of Sensation": Shelley and Keats. And he fleshes out his argument by defining the poet of sensation's characteristic notions of beauty, imagination, and audience. Such a poet's "predominant motive," he writes, is not "the pleasure [one] has in knowing a thing to be true," but rather "the desire of beauty" (pp. 184-185, 184). Discussing Shelley and Keats, he describes the kind of imagination needed to sustain the predominance of that desire, claiming that
Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at . http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.
West Virginia University Press is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Victorian Poetry.
http://www.jstor.org
A
Blessing
Poetics
and
a
Curse:
The in
of
Privacy
Tennyson's 'The of Shalott" Lady
JOSEPH CHADWICK
IN HIS FAMOUS REVIEW of Poems, Chiefly Lyrical (1830), Arthur Henry Hallam claims that Tennyson "belongs decidedly to the class we have . . . described as Poets of Sensation,"1 he places his friend squarelywithin certain main currents of English Romantic aesthetics. Opposing Tennyson's work to Wordsworth'sdiscursive, "reflective" poetry, he argues that Tennyson's poetics are patterned on the examples of the most perfect previous "Poets of Sensation": Shelley and Keats. And he fleshes out his argument by defining the poet of sensation's characteristic notions of beauty, imagination, and audience. Such a poet's "predominant motive," he writes, is not "the pleasure [one] has in knowing a thing to be true," but rather "the desire of beauty" (pp. 184-185, 184). Discussing Shelley and Keats, he describes the kind of imagination needed to sustain the predominance of that desire, claiming that