Exercise 1

• Right from the fourth line, the reader can understand that Ulysses is the speaking voice but what he is telling is addressed to an unknown audience. Despite that, going close to the end, Ulysses seems addressing to his friends with an invitation:”Come my friends”.

• He is in Ithaca.

• Ulysses’s age is not specified but from the text the reader can understand that he is a mature character. An additional hint is suggested by the fact that Telemachus is old enough to reign the island of Ithaca. 

• He is setting out on leaving for new adventures in order to discover new places and learn new things.

Exercise 2 

His past life --> Ulysses is satisfied about his past experiences and desires to discover new places around the world.  Expressions like I cannot rest from travel, I will drink life to the lees, and verbs like enjoyed, roaming, honoured, move express Ulysses' s willpower and his thirst for knowledge.

View of present and future --> The contraposition between living in Ithaca and travelling around the world comes to surface. The contrast is conveyed through the use of the adjectives dull and sinking. Dull makes somebody think about something boring while sinking reminds of something vivacious that is looking for new opportunities.

Attitude to Telemachus --> According to Ulysses, Telemachus is a smart person. The expression I leave the sceptre and the isle makes the reader understand that Ulysses trusts his son. Moreover, with the expressions to make mild, soft degrees you can understand that Telemachus is a patient person.

Address to his mariners --> When Ulysses addressed  his friends, once again, comes to the light his desire to travel. To convey his will there are several verbs that remind of dynamics and movements: strove, seek, push off, to sail, find.

Exercise 3a

In the present poem, Tennyson portrayed Ulysses like an adventurous man that does not want to stop but he desires to live new experiences and discover new places. He recently went back from a long trip but he does not want to stay in Ithaca with his family because there people are boring: they only hoard, sleep and feed. Differently from his father Ulysses, Telemachus is prudent and a static figure. He is destined to reign on Ithaca island and not to travel around the world like his father. For this reason, Ulysses can be taken to be symbolic of the thirst of knowledge, willpower, spirit of adventure. Besides, the reader must remember that the figure of Ulysses is not new in literature.. Tennyson recalled a passage of the Divine Comedy where Dante had already narrated about Ulysses but from a different point of view. While Tennyson exalts Ulysses’s adventurous spirit, Dante condemns him because he preferred travelling rather than staying with his family.

Exercise 3b

In my opinion, the poet sides with Ulysses because his point of view is privileged. It seems as if Tennyson supports Ulysses’s desire to move farway to look for new experiences. 

Exercise 4

Since the poem was composed when Tennyson was still suffering for the death of his dearest friend Arthur Hallam, it certainly reflects a sense of loss. Indeed Tennyson had declared Ulysses was written soon after Arthur Hallam’s death and gave my feeling about the need of going forward, and braving the struggle of life perhaps more simply than anything in In Memoriam. Therefore Hallam’s loss is considered by Tennyson as a new opportunity to look at life.

Exercise 5 

The dramatic monologue is organized into blank verses, in particular it is written in unrhymed iambic pentameter. Interesting to note is that it is the same meter John Milton exploits in his Paraday Lost that like in Tennyson’s Ulysses narrates about a hero.