1 AF / January 2012
The Romantic Age
1785-1839
Snow Storm: Hannibal and his army crossing the Alps, JMW Turner (1812)
Contents
Robert Burns: A Red, Red Rose .............................................................................................. 2
William Blake: The Lamb ........................................................................................................ 3
William Blake: The Tyger ....................................................................................................... 4
William Blake: London ............................................................................................................ 5
William Wordsworth: Composed Upon Westminster Bridge, September 3, 1802 .................. 6
Tina Dickow: Copenhagen ....................................................................................................... 7
Samuel Taylor Coleridge: The Rime of the Ancient Mariner (excerpt) .................................. 8
Iron Maiden: Rime of the Ancient Mariner ........................................................................... 10
Lord Byron: She Walks In Beauty ......................................................................................... 13
Jane Austen: Emma (excerpt) ................................................................................................ 14
Mary Shelley: Frankenstein (excerpt) .................................................................................... 15
Walter Scott: Ivanhoe (excerpt) ............................................................................................. 17
2 AF / January 2012
Robert Burns: A Red, Red Rose
O my luve's like a red, red rose,
That's newly sprung in June;
O my luve's like a melodie
That's sweetly play'd in tune.
As fair art thou1, my bonnie lass
2,
So deep in luve am I;
And I will love thee3 still, my dear,
Till a' the seas gang4 dry.
Till a' the seas gang dry, my dear,
And the rocks melt wi' the sun:
I will luve thee still, my Dear,
While the sands o'life shall run.
And fare thee weel5, my only Luve!
And fare thee weel, a while!
And I will come again, my Luve,
Tho' it were ten thousand mile!
(1796)
1 thou = you 2 bonnie lass = pretty girl 3 thee = you 4 gang = go 5 fare thee weel = goodbye
3 AF / January 2012
William Blake: The Lamb
Little Lamb, who made thee?
Dost thou know who made thee?
Gave thee life, and bid thee feed6
By the stream and o'er the mead7;
Gave thee clothing of delight,
Softest clothing, woolly, bright;
Gave thee such a tender voice,
Making all the vales8 rejoice?
Little Lamb, who made thee?
Dost thou know who made thee?
Little Lamb, I'll tell thee,
Little Lamb, I'll tell thee:
He is called by thy9 name,
For he calls himself a Lamb.
He is meek10
, and he is mild;
He became a little child.
I a child, and thou a lamb.
We are called by his name.
Little Lamb, God bless thee!
Little Lamb, God bless thee!
(1789)
6 bid thee feed = told you to eat 7 mead = field 8 vales = valleys 9 thy = your 10 meek = gentle
4 AF / January 2012
William Blake: The Tyger
Tyger
11! Tyger! burning bright
In the forests of the night,
What immortal hand or eye
Could frame12
thy fearful symmetry13
?
In what distant deeps or skies
Burnt the fire of thine14
eyes?
On what wings dare he aspire15
?
What the hand dare sieze the fire?
And what shoulder, & what art.
Could twist the sinews16
of thy heart?
And when thy heart began to beat,
What dread17
hand? & what dread feet?
What the hammer? what the chain?
In what furnace was thy brain?
What the anvil18
? what dread grasp
Dare its deadly terrors clasp?
When the stars threw down their spears,
And watered heaven with their tears,
Did he smile his work to see?
Did he who made the Lamb make thee?
Tyger! Tyger! burning bright
In the forests of the night,
What immortal hand or eye
Dare frame thy fearful symmetry?
(1794)
11 tyger = tiger 12 frame = make 13 symmetry = shape 14 thine = your 15 aspire = fly high 16 sinews = muscles 17 dread = frightening 18 anvil = heavy iron block on which metal is shaped with a hammer
5 AF / January 2012
William Blake: London
I wander thro'
19 each charter'd
20 street,
Near where the charter'd Thames does flow,
And mark21
in every face I meet
Marks of weakness22
, marks of woe23
.
In every cry of every Man,
In every Infant's cry of fear,
In every voice, in every ban24
,
The mind-forg'd25
manacles26
I hear.
How the Chimney-sweeper's cry
Every black'ning Church appalls27
;
And the hapless28
Soldier's sigh
Runs in blood down Palace walls.
But most thro' midnight streets I hear
How the youthful Harlot's29
curse
Blasts30
the new born Infant's tear31
,
And blights32
with plagues the Marriage hearse33
.
(1794)
19 thro’ = through 20 charter’d = privileged; the ruling classes hold a charter, a privilege. The use of the word 'Chartered' is ambiguous. It may express the political and economic control that Blake considered London to be enduring at the time of his writing. Blake's friend Thomas Paine had criticised the granting of Royal Charters to control trade as a form of class oppression. However, 'chartered' could also mean 'freighted', and may refer to the busy or overburdened streets and river, or to the licenced trade carried on within them. 21 mark = note 22 weakness = humility 23 woe = grief 24 ban = prohibition 25 mind-forged = created by man’s reason, not rooted in nature 26 manacles = chains tying hands together 27 appall = horrify 28 hapless = unfortunate 29 harlot = whore 30 blast = destroy 31 tear = eye 32 blight = destroy 33 hearse = vehicle for carrying a coffin
6 AF / January 2012
William Wordsworth: Composed Upon Westminster Bridge,
September 3, 1802
Earth has not anything to show more fair34
:
Dull35
would he be of soul who could pass by
A sight so touching in its majesty:
This City now doth, like a garment36
, wear
The beauty of the morning; silent, bare37
,
Ships, towers, domes38
, theatres, and temples lie
Open unto the fields, and to the sky;
All bright and glittering in the smokeless air.
Never did sun more beautifully steep39
In his first splendour, valley, rock, or hill;
Ne'er saw I, never felt, a calm so deep!
The river glideth at his own sweet will:
Dear God! the very houses seem asleep;
And all that mighty heart is lying still!
(1802)
Claude Monet: Thames Below Westminster, c. 1871.
34 fair = beautiful 35 dull = boring 36 garment = clothes 37 bare = naked 38 dome = round, circular roof 39 steep = bathe
7 AF / January 2012
Tina Dickow: Copenhagen
Copenhagen
I’ve never seen you look this bright
Just awaken
From the beauty snooze you took last night
Oh, this tingling feeling
To be the blood inside your veins
I’ve been leaving believing
I could find a better place
And all this time…
You were right here
Copenhagen
I’ve never felt your grip so tight
Care is taken
You’ll catch me if I slip, I’ll be alright
Oh, this wonderous feeling
To be walking your empty streets
I’ve been leaving believing
I’d find better streets than these
But all this time…
You were right here
Outside my window
At my feet
In my heart
In the air I breathe
Copenhagen
(2010)
8 AF / January 2012
Samuel Taylor Coleridge: The Rime of the Ancient Mariner
(excerpt)
Three young men are walking together to a wedding, when one of them
is detained by a grizzled old sailor and can do nothing but sit on a
stone and listen to his strange tale. The Mariner says that he
sailed on a ship, and he recalls that the voyage quickly darkened,
as a giant storm rose up in the sea and chased the ship southward
where the ship was stuck inside a maze of ice. But then the sailors
encountered an Albatross, a great sea bird. As it flew around the
ship, the ice cracked and split, and a wind from the south propelled
the ship out of the frigid regions, into a foggy stretch of water.
The Albatross followed behind it, a symbol of good luck to the
sailors, but the old sailor confesses that he shot and killed the
Albatross with his crossbow.
Alone, alone, all, all alone,
Alone on a wide wide sea!
And never a saint took pity on
My soul in agony.
The many men, so beautiful!
And they all dead did lie:
And a thousand thousand slimy things
Lived on; and so did I.
I looked upon the rotting sea,
And drew my eyes away;
I looked upon the rotting deck,
And there the dead men lay.
I looked to Heaven, and tried to pray:
But or ever a prayer had gusht,
A wicked whisper came, and made
my heart as dry as dust.
I closed my lids, and kept them close,
And the balls like pulses beat;
For the sky and the sea, and the sea and the sky
Lay like a load on my weary eye,
And the dead were at my feet.
The cold sweat melted from their limbs,
Nor rot nor reek did they:
The look with which they looked on me
Had never passed away.
An orphan's curse would drag to Hell
A spirit from on high;
But oh! more horrible than that
Is a curse in a dead man's eye!
Seven days, seven nights, I saw that curse,
And yet I could not die.
9 AF / January 2012
The moving Moon went up the sky,
And no where did abide:
Softly she was going up,
And a star or two beside.
Her beams bemocked the sultry main,
Like April hoar-frost spread;
But where the ship's huge shadow lay,
The charmed water burnt alway
A still and awful red.
Beyond the shadow of the ship,
I watched the water-snakes:
They moved in tracks of shining white,
And when they reared, the elfish light
Fell off in hoary flakes.
Within the shadow of the ship
I watched their rich attire:
Blue, glossy green, and velvet black,
They coiled and swam; and every track
Was a flash of golden fire.
O happy living things! no tongue
Their beauty might declare:
A spring of love gushed from my heart,
And I blessed them unaware:
Sure my kind saint took pity on me,
And I blessed them unaware.
The self same moment I could pray;
And from my neck so free
The Albatross fell off, and sank
Like lead into the sea.
(1798)
10 AF / January 2012
Iron Maiden: Rime of the Ancient Mariner
Hear the rime of the ancient mariner
See his eye as he stops one of three
Mesmerises one of the wedding guests
Stay here and listen to the nightmares of the sea.
And the music plays on, as the bride passes by
Caught by his spell and the mariner tells his tale.
Driven south to the land of the snow and ice
To a place where nobody's been
Through the snow fog flies on the albatross
Hailed in God's name, hoping good luck it brings.
And the ship sails on, back to the North
Through the fog and ice and the albatross follows on.
The mariner kills the bird of good omen
His shipmates cry against what he's done
But when the fog clears, they justify him
And make themselves a part of the crime.
Sailing on and on and north across the sea
Sailing on and on and north 'til all is calm.
The albatross begins with its vengeance
A terrible curse a thirst has begun
His shipmates blame bad luck on the mariner
About his neck, the dead bird is hung.
And the curse goes on and on and on at sea
And the thirst goes on and on for them and me.
"Day after day, day after day,
we stuck nor breath nor motion
as idle as a painted ship upon a painted ocean
Water, water everywhere and
all the boards did shrink
Water, water everywhere nor any drop to drink."
There calls the mariner
There comes a ship over the line
But how can she sail with no wind in her sails and no tide.
See...onward she comes
Onward she nears out of the sun
See, she has no crew
She has no life, wait but there's two.
Death and she Life in Death,
They throw their dice for the crew
She wins the mariner and he belongs to her now.
Then...crew one by one
11 AF / January 2012
they drop down dead, two hundred men
She...she, Life in Death.
She lets him live, her chosen one.
"One after one by the star dogged moon,
too quick for groan or sigh
each turned his face with a ghastly pang
and cursed me with his eye
four times fifty living men
(and I heard nor sigh nor groan)
with heavy thump, a lifeless lump,
they dropped down one by one."
The curse it lives on in their eyes
The mariner he wished he'd die
Along with the sea creatures
But they lived on, so did he.
And by the light of the moon
He prays for their beauty not doom
With heart he blesses them
God's creatures all of them too.
Then the spell starts to break
The albatross falls from his neck
Sinks down like lead into the sea
Then down in falls comes the rain.
Hear the groans of the long dead seamen
See them stir and they start to rise
Bodies lifted by good spirits
None of them speak and they're lifeless in their eyes
And revenge is still sought, penance starts again
Cast into a trance and the nightmare carries on.
Now the curse is finally lifted
And the mariner sights his home
spirits go from the long dead bodies
Form their own light and the mariner's left alone.
And then a boat came sailing towards him
It was a joy he could not believe
The pilot's boat, his son and the hermit,
Penance of life will fall onto him.
And the ship it sinks like lead into the sea
And the hermit shrieves the mariner of his sins.
The mariner's bound to tell of his story
To tell this tale wherever he goes
To teach God's word by his own example
That we must love all things that God made.
12 AF / January 2012
And the wedding guest's a sad and wiser man
And the tale goes on and on and on.
(1984)
13 AF / January 2012
Lord Byron: She Walks In Beauty
She walks in beauty, like the night
Of cloudless climes40
and starry skies;
And all that 's best of dark and bright
Meet in her aspect41
and her eyes:
Thus mellow'd42
to that tender light
Which heaven to gaudy43
day denies.
One shade the more, one ray the less,
Had half impair'd44
the nameless grace
Which waves in every raven45
tress46
,
Or softly lightens o'er her face;
Where thoughts serenely47
sweet express
How pure, how dear their dwelling-place.
And on that cheek, and o'er that brow,
So soft, so calm, yet eloquent48
,
The smiles that win, the tints that glow,
But tell of days in goodness spent,
A mind at peace with all below,
A heart whose love is innocent!
(1814)
40 climes = climates 41 aspect = appearance 42 mellow’d = softened, ripened 43 gaudy = too bright 44 impair’d = damaged 45 raven = black 46 tress = lock of hair 47 serenely = calmly 48 eloquent = able to impress an audience (veltalende)
14 AF / January 2012
Jane Austen: Emma (excerpt)
"As a friend!"--repeated Mr. Knightley.--"Emma, that I fear is a word--No, I have no
wish--Stay, yes, why should I hesitate?-- I have gone too far already for
concealment.--Emma, I accept your offer-- Extraordinary as it may seem, I accept it,
and refer myself to you as a friend.--Tell me, then, have I no chance of ever
succeeding?"
He stopped in his earnestness to look the question, and the expression of his eyes
overpowered her.
"My dearest Emma," said he, "for dearest you will always be, whatever the event of
this hour's conversation, my dearest, most beloved Emma--tell me at once. Say `No,'
if it is to be said."-- She could really say nothing.--"You are silent," he cried, with
great animation; "absolutely silent! at present I ask no more."
Emma was almost ready to sink under the agitation of this moment. The dread of
being awakened from the happiest dream, was perhaps the most prominent feeling.
"I cannot make speeches, Emma:" he soon resumed; and in a tone of such sincere,
decided, intelligible tenderness as was tolerably convincing.--"If I loved you less, I
might be able to talk about it more. But you know what I am.--You hear nothing but
truth from me. --I have blamed you, and lectured you, and you have borne it as no
other woman in England would have borne it.-- Bear with the truths I would tell you
now, dearest Emma, as well as you have borne with them. The manner, perhaps, may
have as little to recommend them. God knows, I have been a very indifferent lover.--
But you understand me.--Yes, you see, you understand my feelings-- and will return
them if you can. At present, I ask only to hear, once to hear your voice."
While he spoke, Emma's mind was most busy, and, with all the wonderful velocity of
thought, had been able--and yet without losing a word-- to catch and comprehend the
exact truth of the whole; to see that Harriet's hopes had been entirely groundless, a
mistake, a delusion, as complete a delusion as any of her own--that Harriet was
nothing; that she was everything herself.
(1816)
15 AF / January 2012
Mary Shelley: Frankenstein (excerpt)
It was on a dreary night of November that I beheld the accomplishment of my toils.
With an anxiety that almost amounted to agony, I collected the instruments of life
around me, that I might infuse a spark of being into the lifeless thing that lay at my
feet. It was already one in the morning; the rain pattered dismally against the panes,
and my candle was nearly burnt out, when, by the glimmer of the half-extinguished
light, I saw the dull yellow eye of the creature open; it breathed hard, and a
convulsive motion agitated its limbs.
How can I describe my emotions at this catastrophe, or how delineate the wretch
whom with such infinite pains and care I had endeavoured to form? His limbs were
in proportion, and I had selected his features as beautiful. Beautiful!--Great God! His
yellow skin scarcely covered the work of muscles and arteries beneath; his hair was
of a lustrous black, and flowing; his teeth of a pearly whiteness; but these luxuriances
only formed a more horrid contrast with his watery eyes, that seemed almost of the
same colour as the dun white sockets in which they were set, his shrivelled
complexion and straight black lips.
The different accidents of life are not so changeable as the feelings of human nature.
I had worked hard for nearly two years, for the sole purpose of infusing life into an
inanimate body. For this I had deprived myself of rest and health. I had desired it
with an ardour that far exceeded moderation; but now that I had finished, the beauty
of the dream vanished, and breathless horror and disgust filled my heart. Unable to
endure the aspect of the being I had created, I rushed out of the room, and continued
a long time traversing my bedchamber, unable to compose my mind to sleep. At
length lassitude succeeded to the tumult I had before endured; and I threw myself on
the bed in my clothes, endeavouring to seek a few moments of forgetfulness. But it
was in vain: I slept, indeed, but I was disturbed by the wildest dreams. I thought I
saw Elizabeth, in the bloom of health, walking in the streets of Ingolstadt. Delighted
and surprised, I embraced her; but as I imprinted the first kiss on her lips, they
became livid with the hue of death; her features appeared to change, and I thought
that I held the corpse of my dead mother in my arms; a shroud enveloped her form,
and I saw the grave-worms crawling in the folds of the flannel. I started from my
sleep with horror; a cold dew covered my forehead, my teeth chattered, and every
limb became convulsed: when, by the dim and yellow light of the moon, as it forced
its way through the window shutters, I beheld the wretch -- the miserable monster
whom I had created. He held up the curtain of the bed; and his eyes, if eyes they may
be called, were fixed on me. His jaws opened, and he muttered some inarticulate
sounds, while a grin wrinkled his cheeks. He might have spoken, but I did not hear;
one hand was stretched out, seemingly to detain me, but I escaped, and rushed down
stairs. I took refuge in the courtyard belonging to the house which I inhabited; where
I remained during the rest of the night, walking up and down in the greatest agitation,
listening attentively, catching and fearing each sound as if it were to announce the
approach of the demoniacal corpse to which I had so miserably given life.
Oh! no mortal could support the horror of that countenance. A mummy again endued
with animation could not be so hideous as that wretch. I had gazed on him while
unfinished; he was ugly then; but when those muscles and joints were rendered
capable of motion, it became a thing such as even Dante could not have conceived.
I passed the night wretchedly. Sometimes my pulse beat so quickly and hardly that I
felt the palpitation of every artery; at others, I nearly sank to the ground through
languor and extreme weakness. Mingled with this horror, I felt the bitterness of
16 AF / January 2012
disappointment; dreams that had been my food and pleasant rest for so long a space
were now become a hell to me; and the change was so rapid, the overthrow so
complete!
Morning, dismal and wet, at length dawned, and discovered to my sleepless and
aching eyes the church of Ingolstadt, its white steeple and clock, which indicated the
sixth hour. The porter opened the gates of the court, which had that night been my
asylum, and I issued into the streets, pacing them with quick steps, as if I sought to
avoid the wretch whom I feared every turning of the street would present to my view.
I did not dare return to the apartment which I inhabited, but felt impelled to hurry on,
although drenched by the rain which poured from a black and comfortless sky.
I continued walking in this manner for some time, endeavouring, by bodily exercise,
to ease the load that weighed upon my mind. I traversed the streets, without any clear
conception of where I was, or what I was doing. My heart palpitated in the sickness
of fear; and I hurried on with irregular steps, not daring to look about me:--
"Like one who, on a lonely road, Doth walk in fear and dread, And, having once
turned round, walks on, And turns no more his head; Because he knows a frightful
fiend Doth close behind him tread."49
(1816)
49 This is a quotation from Coleridge’s ”The Ancient Mariner”
17 AF / January 2012
Walter Scott: Ivanhoe (excerpt)
But Ivanhoe was already at his post, and had closed his visor, and assumed his lance.
Bois-Guilbert did the same; and his esquire remarked, as he clasped his visor, that his
face, which had, notwithstanding the variety of emotions by which he had been
agitated, continued during the whole morning of an ashy paleness, was now become
suddenly very much flushed.
The herald, then, seeing each champion in his place, uplifted his voice, repeating
thrice — “Faites vos devoirs, preux chevaliers!” After the third cry, he withdrew to
one side of the lists, and again proclaimed, that none, on peril of instant death, should
dare, by word, cry, or action, to interfere with or disturb this fair field of combat. The
Grand Master, who held in his hand the gage of battle, Rebecca’s glove, now threw it
into the lists, and pronounced the fatal signal words, “Laissez aller”.
The trumpets sounded, and the knights charged each other in full career. The wearied
horse of Ivanhoe, and its no less exhausted rider, went down, as all had expected,
before the well-aimed lance and vigorous steed of the Templar. This issue of the
combat all had foreseen; but although the spear of Ivanhoe did but, in comparison,
touch the shield of Bois-Guilbert, that champion, to the astonishment of all who
beheld it reeled in his saddle, lost his stirrups, and fell in the lists.
Ivanhoe, extricating himself from his fallen horse, was soon on foot, hastening to
mend his fortune with his sword; but his antagonist arose not. Wilfred, placing his
foot on his breast, and the sword’s point to his throat, commanded him to yield him,
or die on the spot. Bois-Guilbert returned no answer.
“Slay him not, Sir Knight,” cried the
Grand Master, “unshriven and
unabsolved — kill not body and soul!
We allow him vanquished.”
He descended into the lists, and
commanded them to unhelm the
conquered champion. His eyes were
closed — the dark red flush was still
on his brow. As they looked on him
in astonishment, the eyes opened —
but they were fixed and glazed. The
flush passed from his brow, and gave
way to the pallid hue of death.
Unscathed by the lance of his enemy,
he had died a victim to the violence
of his own contending passions.
“This is indeed the judgment of
God,” said the Grand Master, looking
upwards — “Fiat voluntas tua! ”
(1820)