ULYSSES

Ulysses was written by Alfred Lord Tennyson in 1842. We are accustomed to an image of Ulysses completely different from that proposed by Tennyson, an image of a strong and vigorous man, who travels to the sea. Now Ulysses is old, but in his heart, in fact, still beats the indomitable spirit that led him to win Troy, to know the cultures of distant peoples, the spirit that drove him to travel aimlessly through the sea.

The nineteenth century faith in science and progress had long cancelled man's fear of going beyond the limits imposed by God ( the Philars of Hercules in Dante's XXVI canto), which had tormented the medieval mind. So Ulysses becomes the expression of the dynamic man Tennyson's times, who believes that he has the right and the duty of exploit all the possibilities of the human intelligence.

Right from the start, Ulysses arrives in Ithaca from his voyage, but he doesn't feel at home, he doesn't like that place. He is an old and tired king who rules over an island inhabited by people who are only concerned with material life. People of Ithaca are described according to their actions, thanks to his voyage understands he doesn't like to be here, he wants to leave again.  The initial contrast between myth and man comes within the first few lines. Ulysses doesn't gracefully acquiesce to the duties of old age as one would expect; he whines like a spoiled child. Nothing suits his taste: his homeland is barren; his wife is too old. He treats his loyal subjects, whom he ought to rule with wisdom gained from so much experience, as a complete subspecies, "a savage race, / That hoard, and sleep, and feed, and know not me" (4-5).

There are two levels of life: level of individual represented by Ulysses' thoughts and level of society represented by the people.

After living his experience Ulysses says "I am became a name", but this phrase is incorrect because he should say "I have became a name", he uses a perception verb. He was hungry in the heart, he wants to experience new travels, he is a very passionate character.

Ulysses also has memories, fame, glory achieved in the past, trusted friends around him. Yet he prefers a life that is inconvenience, danger, uncertainty, perhaps death, but always aware, travel, adventure.

Ulysses declares that it is boring to stay in one place, and that to remain stationary is to rust rather than to shine; to stay in one place is to pretend that all there is to life is the simple act of breathing, whereas he knows that in fact life contains much novelty, and he longs to encounter this. His spirit yearns constantly for new experiences that will broaden his horizons; he wishes “to follow knowledge like a sinking star” and forever grow in wisdom and in learning.

Tennyson introduces Ulysses' son. Although the two figures are both very good, wise, they are two completely different types of life. Telemachus is the good king, wise Ulysses was never able to embody. Ulysses admired his son deeply and know that his kingdom will be left, in the event of a future trip, in good hands. And he emphasizes the difference between the character and his son (he works His work, I mine).

In the last part, perhaps the most significant. Around him we see the image,of his Sailors. Old, gray-haired, bearded, but with the same eye30 years earlier. Brave sailors who have followed their master everywhere, and only true survivors of the legendary expedition narrated by Homer. Ulysses, with only their rhetoricof the great leader, the great leader, encourages them to take another trip with him,probably the last, and promise their exotic places, but above all a chance to feel again the wind blowing through hair, the possibility of being alive.

This poem is written as a dramatic monologue: the entire poem is spoken by a single character, whose identity is revealed by his own words. The lines are in blank verse, or unrhymed iambic pentameter, which serves to impart a fluid and natural quality to Ulysses’s speech. Many of the lines are enjambed, which means that a thought does not end with the line-break; the sentences often end in the middle, rather than the end, of the lines. The use of enjambment is appropriate in a poem about pushing forward “beyond the utmost bound of human thought.” Finally, the poem is divided into four paragraph-like sections, each of which comprises a distinct thematic unit of the poem.