Learning Paths » 5A Interacting
1) Read the poem through and say:
- who is speaking and to whom
- how old he is
- where he is
- what he is setting out on
The speaking voice in Ulysses by Tennyson is the one of an old Ulysses who speaks to himself as no one is listening to him. Ulysses is in Ithaca.
2) Now read the text again, this time paying attention to the developement of the argument.
Summarize what Ulysses says and feels following the guidelines on the left. For each point consider also Tennyson's vocabulary indicating which words and phrases, in particular, reveal in the hero's traites and attitudes. The first point has been written for you.
lacks
Life on Ithaca (lines 2-5) | It is uncivilised and... Negative adjectives such as idol, aged convey Ulysses's total dissatisfaction with life on Ithaca |
His past life (lines 6-19) | I become a name..I am a part of all that I have met... Ulysses remembers his life and regrets to have gave up that previous life. |
View of present and future (19-32) | Yet all experience is an arch wherethro'...beyond the utmost bound of human thought...he used words like gleams fades, to rust, breathe, eternal silence against gray spirit... Ulysses is old but he wants to continue to know the world, like a sinking star. |
Attitude to Telemacus (33-44) | This is my son, mine own Telemacus...when I am gone. He works his work, I mine. Ulysses uses word like prudence, soft degrees, good to underline the Telemacus maturity to reign but he also underlines the different behaviour that have his son towords his job and his ability to ability to submit to people's traditions. |
Address to his mariners (45-70) | He talks to his mariners with whom he has made so many journeys. They were ready to sail even if they had to pain. toil'd, wrought, thought with me, free hearts, free foreheads, old, my friends, heroic hearts |
3a) How is Ulysses portrayed in the poem?
To answer the question, consider:
- His present situation
- The contrast with Telemacus
- What he can be taken to be symbolic of
- Whether he differs from the picture we usually associate with the hero of the Odyssey
Ulysses is portrayed like an old man that doesn't want to surrender to his life, his age, his job. He wants left Ithaca because he is not like his son Telemachus. As a matter of fact Telemachus is "centred in the sphere of common duties". Ulysses is a metaphor of a way of consider life( Ulysses is a "sinking star" who wants to step over to human end)
3b) What is the poet's attitude to Ulysses and Telemacus? With whom does it side?
I think that the poet sides with Ulysses, as a matter of fact he says that "most blameless is he"(referring to Telemachus). Ulysses' s son is like a king of the Victorian Age.
4) The poem was composed when Tennyson was still suffering for the death of his dearest friend, A. Hallam, in 1883. Does the poem reflect a sense of loss?
Yes it does. As a matter of fact Ulysses have the incapacity to adapt himself to the Ithaca's life and so he feels as if he has no house.
5) As you will have realised the hero's feelings are communicated through a careful choice of words.
What observations can you make about the meter and the music of the poem and the relationship with its meaning?
In this poem we find blank verse: iambic pentameters without rime. The speaking voice uses unadorned and forceful language, that expresses Ulysses' conflicting moods as he searches for continuity between his past and future.