Notes of the 18^th of April 2012

Ulysses is a dramatic monologue written by Lord Alfred Tennyson in 1883. The dramatic monologue is a form of poetry which developed in the Victorian Age. Its features are:

-        it’s written in the first person

-        it’s the voice of a character different from the poet

Romantic poets declares their needs using the first person narrator, from their point of view.

Dramatic monologue is innovative in the way Mr. Eliot defined innovation, that is the innovation supposes the knowledge of the tradition.

the dramatic monologue  allows: 

-        the reader to make a personal idea that depends on the writer linguistic choice. 

-        to understand the personality (and the pathologies) of the character who’s speaking (from the outer surface is possible to perceive some psychological aspects, not easily perceived from the inner)   

-        the possibility to express an idea less filtered by the poet.

The Victorian age leads to the ‘900, and the poetry of the period offered:

-        lyric poetry: characterized by intimism, private aspects

-        linguistic structure that allows the reader to understand the meaning

The society is characterized by a sense of inconvenience that leads the scholars to deep questions. The poets have to express the new conflict that is growing between people in the society. Great Britain has an avant-garde position as to the other nations, thanks to the first Industrial Revolution.  

Language used in the dramatic monologue is very similar to the spoken language: it foreruns the stream of consciousness. Indeed the poet uses:

-        deictics (“here”, “there”….)

-        an hypothetical listener

-        fillers (“well”, “by the way”….)

The listener is the audience of the dramatic monologue (the presence of one silent listener is implicit in the theater). It provides to the reader a larger distance from the poet’s ideas. The speaking voice wanders about what has happened to itself.

The Ulysses of Tennyson is not the Ulysses we’re expecting. Indeed he’s not happy to be at home again, he feels nostalgia not for his life in Itaca but for his travels. The reader understands he wants to leave his home.

Another newness about this Ulysses is his age: he’s old, tired, suffering, incapable to communicate with his subjects.