Tuesday, 22 - January - 2020
Alfred Tennyson & Robert Browsing
Hello Reader...
Today I shared one new blog with you. This blog about best to Poet Alfred Tennyson and Robert Browsing. Both are the best Poet in his time period. This blog task given by our Professor Vaidehi Hariyani Mam. Her style of study is diffrent but I like that very much. Click here for her Blog link of Wordsworth and Coleridge comparison. And also I will also share my blog link in this blog which is the same as mam on Wordsworth and Coleridge which I will also share last in this blog.
Alfred Tennyson
Alfred Tennyson was born August 6, 1809, in Lincolnshire, England, to George and Elizabeth Tennyson. The family was very large; eleven children reached maturity. Alfred's father was not wealthy, as his grandfather had made his younger son Charles his heir, leaving George to enter the ministry. Tennyson often worried about money throughout his life. Several of Tennyson's family members also struggled with alcoholism and mental illness, including his father, who grew violent and paranoid from excessive drinking in the 1820s.
At this time Tennyson composed the strange and mesmerizing "Timbuctoo," which attracted the notice of other young intellectuals. Tennyson was invited to join the Apostles Club in 1829, which included Arthur Henry Hallam, James Spedding, Edward Lushington, and Richard Monckton Milnes. These men would be his friends his entire life (except for Hallam, who died young). Hallam and Tennyson were particularly close, and the former became engaged to Tennyson's sister Emily after he met her on a visit to Somersby.
In 1830 Tennyson published Poems, Chiefly Lyrical. The volume included poems such as "Mariana," "The Kraken," and "Ode to Memory." "Mariana" is one of Tennyson's most beguiling and justly famous works. Reviews of this volume were generally favorable. In 1832 Tennyson published Poems, which included "The Lady of Shalott," "The Lotos-Eaters," "The Palace of Art," and "Oenone." Unfortunately, the reviews were brutal and damning, and Tennyson, sensitive to criticism, was crushed.
Hallam's death in 1833 at the age of 22 was another profoundly devastating blow to Tennyson. This death, his sister's despair over her fiancé's death, the terrible reviews, his father's death, his poverty and isolation in the country where he resided, and his own fears about mental illness and addiction pushed him into depression. He said of this period, "I suffered what seemed to me to shatter all my life so that I desired to die rather than to live." Many of Tennyson's most famous works of poetry were influenced by his immense grief even though they were not uniformly pessimistic. These included "Ulysses," "Tithonus" and, of course, the monumental In Memoriam A.H.H..
Tennyson became engaged to a young woman, Emily Sellwood, but fears about his financial situation and his possible mental problems led him to break off the engagement in 1840. During this time he was rather itinerant, moving about a great deal, and some of those closest to him thought his poetic genius had evaporated. In 1842, however, he published Poems, which contained some work from 1830 and 1832 that had been revised as well as new work; these two volumes provided the basis for his excellent reputation and secured his fame.
A government pension in 1845 alleviated some of his financial distress, and he married Emily in 1850. In 1847 he published "The Princess: A Medley," and in 1850 he finally published In Memoriam anonymously. Subsequent editions of that poem brought Tennyson a great deal of fame and money. The death of Wordsworth in 1850 seemed to designate Tennyson as his poetic successor, and indeed, in 1850 he was made Poet Laureate of the United Kingdom. Alfred's and Emily's first son, Hallam, was born in 1852, and a year later they established a home in Farringford, the Isle of Wight. A second son, Lionel, was born in 1854. "Maud, and Other Poems" was published in 1855, The Idylls of the King was published in 1859, and Tennyson published various other poems throughout the next decade.
Tennyson was admired by Prince Albert and Queen Victoria. The Queen described her first impression after meeting him: "very peculiar looking, tall, dark, with a fine head, long black flowing hair & a beard, — oddly dressed, but there is no affectation about him." Tennyson accepted an offer of barony in 1883 and took his seat in the House of Lords in March 1884. He also was awarded honorary degrees from Oxford and Edinburgh, and he made friends with other luminaries such as Charles Dickens, William Gladstone, and Robert Browning.
Lord Tennyson was frequently ill throughout the 1880s. He suffered immensely once again when his son Lionel died at age 32 in 1886. On October 6, 1892, Tennyson died. He is buried at Westminster Abbey.
Robert Browning
Robert Browning was a celebrated English poet of the Victorian era. Born on May 7, 1812, in Camberwell, South London, in England, Browning was the only son of affluent parents Robert Browning Sr. and Sarah Anna Wiedeman. His father was a clerk at the Bank of England and earned a handsome salary. His paternal grandfather was a rich slave owner in Saint Kitts in the West Indies, where Browning Sr. also went to work. Browning’s father returned to England, though, after being revolted by slavery and becoming an abolitionist. Browning’s maternal grandfather was a German ship-owner, whose family settled in Dundee, Scotland.
Browning’s father had a collection of approximately 6,000 books, and Browning developed a keen interest in reading and writing. Raised in such a literary household, Browning gained creativity from his family, and started writing poetry at the young age of 12. His sister, Sarianna, who was also gifted with artistic talents and a musical mind, worked with her brother on many creative projects. Meanwhile Browning’s father further encouraged his literary pursuits.
Given Browning’s literary upbringing, it was natural for him not to feel satisfied by the private schools where he was sent to study. Discontented, Browning left school and set about getting education at home through a private tutor. By the age of fourteen, he had became fluent in Greek, French, Latin, and Italian from reading books from the library his father set up at home. Romantic poets like Shelley and Lord Byron inspired him the most during these years. In order to further his knowledge, Browning attended the University College London to study Greek, but left after a year. His parents’ evangelical faith prevented him from studying at Oxford or Cambridge University.
In 1845, he met a poetess, Elizabeth Barrett, and they developed a romantic relationship, which led to their marriage. The couple took a trip to Italy in hopes of improving Elizabeth’s health. They kept their wedding a secret due to fear of Elizabeth’s father, who did not approve of marriage for any of his children. Elizabeth’s father disowned her when he learned of the marriage, and the Brownings stayed in Italy until Elizabeth’s death. It was during this time that Browning became highly creative and productive in his writings. Unfortunately, his wife passed away in 1861, leaving behind a son.
Browning returned to England with his son, and became an important part of literary circles there. After five years of hard work in England, he published his popular poetry book “The Ring and the Book” in 1868. Following this, Browning started publishing frequently and, in 1870, he released his series of long poems “Red Cotton Night-Cap Country” and “Balaustion’s Adventure.” Browning died in Venice at the residence of his son on December 12, 1889.
Robert Browning’s Works
Browning worked very hard on his poems during his initial years, and finally produced “Men and Women,” which won him wide recognition in 1855. He completed his most ambitious and perhaps the greatest work “The Ring and the Book” in 1869. It received much recognition in the literary circles of England in 1881, when the Browning Society was established. After winning wide popularity, Browning produced his major work “Parleyings with Certain People of Importance in Their Day” in 1887. It was a unique piece of work in that it even baffled the Victorian audience. Browning wrote profusely, and his most popular plays include “Pippa Passes,” “Strafford,” “King Victor and King Charles,” “A Blot in the Scutcheon,” “The Return of the Druses,” and “Colombe’s Birthday,” while his popular dramatic monologues are “Rabbi Ben Ezra,” “Fifine at the Fair,” and “My Last Duchess.”
Robert Browning’s Style and Popular Poems
Browning’s style of writing mainly relies on dramatic monologues, in which the actions, settings, and characters are revealed through their own words. However, this revelation is not done deliberately but inadvertently as the speaker reveals himself and his past actions through images and symbols. His most popular poems include “A Wall,” “A Tale,” “A Pretty Woman,” “My Last Duchess,” “Soliloquy of the Spanish Cloister,” “The Last Ride Together,” “The Last Leader,” and “The Laboratory and Meeting at Night.”
More about His Life
Robert Browning won several awards, including an honorary doctorate fromEdinburgh. He got offers of being Lord Rectorship of Glasgow and Life Governor of London University, but he turned down several other offers. His last collection of poems, “Asolando,” which employed concise lyric, was published in 1889 on the day of his death.
Works :
Henry van Dyke
Robert W. Service
William Butler Yeats
Lord Byron
Langston Hughes
Eugene Field
Claude McKay
Dorothy Parker
Alicia Elsbeth Stallings
Amber Flora Thomas
Robert Burns
Diffrence between Both Poet.
The mood and concerns of the Victorian age are revived here through the poetry of Tennyson, Arnold and Browning. The editor's perspective introduction probes the psychological alienation and isolation of the Victorian poets, explores the influences the Romantics had upon their poetry, and demonstrates how the Victorians moved the poetic tradition toward the twentieth century. Included are biographical sketches of each poet, bibliographical notes and critical annotations.
This is a reproduction of a book published before 1923. This book may have occasional imperfections such as missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. that were either part of the original artifact, or were introduced by the scanning process. We believe this work is culturally important, and despite the imperfections, have elected to bring it back into print as part of our continuing commitment to the preservation of printed works worldwide. We appreciate your understanding of the imperfections in the preservation process, and hope you enjoy this valuable book.
As a consequence of rapid scientific and industrial progress or the theories of Evolution and Communism, Victorian people and of course the literary writers are consigned to reach the acme of religious confusion or spiritual loss or conflict between faith and doubt. It is an admitted fact that the Victorian people and writers are divided into two idealistic worlds. So if one group goes in the favor of faith or religion, the other is of course in the favor of doubt. So conflict in ideologies is a must.
As much ink is spilled overwriting or enough debate is tabled regarding this very issue, the topic conflict between faith and doubt or science and religious places in the different sorts of Victorian literary devices especially in the Victorian poetry as “Poetry is the criticism of life.”6 This is because, Hugh Walker comments; ‘it is curious that in the year 1850 both Tennyson and Browning produced poems in which the religious element is more prominent than it is in anything they had previously written.” 7 Needless to say hundreds of books like ”History of the Conflict between Religion and Science” (1875), Origin of Species (1859) and” The Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom (1876) by John Draper, Andrew Whites, and Charles Darwin respectively are written on this conflict. This is why, being the children of the time, Matthew Arnold, Robert Browning, Alfred Tennyson and Cristina Rosette’s poetry started concerning with this very conflict and of course it becomes the mirror on which Victorian faith and doubt are clearly reflected. To lament on the loss of faith, Matthew Arnold “who chastises and instructs the reader on contemporary social issues,”8 says in his poem :
“The Sea of Faith
Was once, too, at the full, and round earth’s shore
Lay like the folds of a bright girdle furled.
But now I only hear
Its melancholy, long, withdrawing roar,
Retreating, to the breath
Of the night-wind, down the vast edges drear
And naked shingles of the world”.
(Dover Beach, Line: 21- 28 )
In these quoted lines, making an explicit comparison between Victorian religious faith and sea, Arnold, in truth, laments over the transition from the age of faith into the age of skepticism, uncertainty or turbulence. The sea of faith, to Arnold, was full in past. It had flown with great energy and left it vigorous waves on the seashore. But now the poet hears the melancholic sounds of withdrawing waves. More clearly, religious faith of the Victorian people is replaced by agnostic, atheistic or skeptic thoughts.
Alfred Lord Tennyson is considered to be one of the most well-liked British poets during more of Queen Victorian period 9 questions faith in God, in nature and even in scientific without any hesitancy in his poetry. In the truest sense of the term, we observe that Tennyson possesses mixed feeling about scientific progress. This is why, Tennyson acknowledged evolution as progress and concerned about this conflict with the Christian scripture theory of creation like most of the Victorian people whose faith is being tempted by Charles Darwin’s theory of Natural Selection.
In this connection, Tennyson sometimes goes in the favors of religion and same times is in the favor of doubt or religion. He is, actually, in between. This is because, Tennyson exposes his sufferings from the conflict of faith and doubt in his poetry. In the poems ‘The Lotos-Eaters’ “and ‘Locksley Hall’ the speakers are wild to abandon modern society and return to a savage lifestyle in the jungle. In the poem, ‘In Memoriam’ the Victorian poet concerns with this idea saying
“We have but faith we cannot know….
For knowledge,…”
( In Memoriam: Line: 21-22)
But in every poem, Tennyson seems to arrive at the conclusion that we should have faith in scientific progression and of course in our religion.He is, in fact, reluctant to reject belief and to accept knowledge as the path of solution for the Victorian crisis of faith. In truth, he is keen to reconcile Victorian belief with knowledge. So it can be noted that Tennyson wants to solve the problem originated from the Victorian conflicts of faith and doubt reconciling his faith with knowledge. In a similar manner, the Victorian crisis of faith and doubt has clearly appeared in the poetry of Elizabeth Barret Browning, one of the most prominent of the Victorian poets. Her very poem ‘The Cry of the Children’ speaks about the suffering and faithlessness of the Victorian people through child labor. Even though Matthew Arnold’s poem ‘Dover Beach’ discusses the Victorian crisis of faith from the spiritual point of view. Elizabeth Barret Browning’s poem ‘The Cry of the Children’ concerns with this very issue from the practical point of view. Children ask help to God but he doesn’t pay need to them.
“Is it likely God, with any around Him,
Hears our weeping anymore”
( Line: 227-228 )
But this scene is somewhat different for the dead girl. She looks happier because she is now out the industrially developed Victorian society. And she has not been compelled to do a lot of work in mills and factories around fourteen to fifteen hours with little wages. In truth, the children symbolize the working class people, the worst sufferers of the Victorian society. This industrial unscrupulous society is established through the blood and sweat of the working classes people. Truly, the children are innocent but they are forced to go against the God. As the poem states:
“How long,” they say, “how long, O cruel nation,
Will you stand, to move the world, on a child’s heart, —
(‘The Cry of the Children’: Stanza: xiii, Line: 33-34)
This is because, the faith of Victorian children declines. Again the poet says:
“But, no !” say the children, weeping faster,
” He is speechless as a stone;…..
Do not mock us; grief has made us unbelieving —
We look up for God, but tears have made us blind.”
Do ye hear the children weeping and disproving,”
(‘The Cry of the Children’: Stanza: xi, Line: 125-126 &131-133)
Here, we are not considering all Victorian people to be atheist. Because loss of faith doesn’t mean atheism. It, to us, means the Victorian conflict between faith and doubt. Because scientific discoveries, industrialization, and the theory of evolution and communism make the people skeptic regarding religion and even in science.
Reference
1. https://www.slideshare.net/mobile/JyotibaGohil/comparison-between-robert-browning-and-alfred-tennyson
2. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Browning
3. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alfred,_Lord_Tennyson
Alfred Tennyson & Robert Browsing
Hello Reader...
Alfred Tennyson
Alfred Tennyson was born August 6, 1809, in Lincolnshire, England, to George and Elizabeth Tennyson. The family was very large; eleven children reached maturity. Alfred's father was not wealthy, as his grandfather had made his younger son Charles his heir, leaving George to enter the ministry. Tennyson often worried about money throughout his life. Several of Tennyson's family members also struggled with alcoholism and mental illness, including his father, who grew violent and paranoid from excessive drinking in the 1820s.
At this time Tennyson composed the strange and mesmerizing "Timbuctoo," which attracted the notice of other young intellectuals. Tennyson was invited to join the Apostles Club in 1829, which included Arthur Henry Hallam, James Spedding, Edward Lushington, and Richard Monckton Milnes. These men would be his friends his entire life (except for Hallam, who died young). Hallam and Tennyson were particularly close, and the former became engaged to Tennyson's sister Emily after he met her on a visit to Somersby.
In 1830 Tennyson published Poems, Chiefly Lyrical. The volume included poems such as "Mariana," "The Kraken," and "Ode to Memory." "Mariana" is one of Tennyson's most beguiling and justly famous works. Reviews of this volume were generally favorable. In 1832 Tennyson published Poems, which included "The Lady of Shalott," "The Lotos-Eaters," "The Palace of Art," and "Oenone." Unfortunately, the reviews were brutal and damning, and Tennyson, sensitive to criticism, was crushed.
Hallam's death in 1833 at the age of 22 was another profoundly devastating blow to Tennyson. This death, his sister's despair over her fiancé's death, the terrible reviews, his father's death, his poverty and isolation in the country where he resided, and his own fears about mental illness and addiction pushed him into depression. He said of this period, "I suffered what seemed to me to shatter all my life so that I desired to die rather than to live." Many of Tennyson's most famous works of poetry were influenced by his immense grief even though they were not uniformly pessimistic. These included "Ulysses," "Tithonus" and, of course, the monumental In Memoriam A.H.H..
Tennyson became engaged to a young woman, Emily Sellwood, but fears about his financial situation and his possible mental problems led him to break off the engagement in 1840. During this time he was rather itinerant, moving about a great deal, and some of those closest to him thought his poetic genius had evaporated. In 1842, however, he published Poems, which contained some work from 1830 and 1832 that had been revised as well as new work; these two volumes provided the basis for his excellent reputation and secured his fame.
A government pension in 1845 alleviated some of his financial distress, and he married Emily in 1850. In 1847 he published "The Princess: A Medley," and in 1850 he finally published In Memoriam anonymously. Subsequent editions of that poem brought Tennyson a great deal of fame and money. The death of Wordsworth in 1850 seemed to designate Tennyson as his poetic successor, and indeed, in 1850 he was made Poet Laureate of the United Kingdom. Alfred's and Emily's first son, Hallam, was born in 1852, and a year later they established a home in Farringford, the Isle of Wight. A second son, Lionel, was born in 1854. "Maud, and Other Poems" was published in 1855, The Idylls of the King was published in 1859, and Tennyson published various other poems throughout the next decade.
Tennyson was admired by Prince Albert and Queen Victoria. The Queen described her first impression after meeting him: "very peculiar looking, tall, dark, with a fine head, long black flowing hair & a beard, — oddly dressed, but there is no affectation about him." Tennyson accepted an offer of barony in 1883 and took his seat in the House of Lords in March 1884. He also was awarded honorary degrees from Oxford and Edinburgh, and he made friends with other luminaries such as Charles Dickens, William Gladstone, and Robert Browning.
Lord Tennyson was frequently ill throughout the 1880s. He suffered immensely once again when his son Lionel died at age 32 in 1886. On October 6, 1892, Tennyson died. He is buried at Westminster Abbey.
Robert Browning
Robert Browning was a celebrated English poet of the Victorian era. Born on May 7, 1812, in Camberwell, South London, in England, Browning was the only son of affluent parents Robert Browning Sr. and Sarah Anna Wiedeman. His father was a clerk at the Bank of England and earned a handsome salary. His paternal grandfather was a rich slave owner in Saint Kitts in the West Indies, where Browning Sr. also went to work. Browning’s father returned to England, though, after being revolted by slavery and becoming an abolitionist. Browning’s maternal grandfather was a German ship-owner, whose family settled in Dundee, Scotland.
Browning’s father had a collection of approximately 6,000 books, and Browning developed a keen interest in reading and writing. Raised in such a literary household, Browning gained creativity from his family, and started writing poetry at the young age of 12. His sister, Sarianna, who was also gifted with artistic talents and a musical mind, worked with her brother on many creative projects. Meanwhile Browning’s father further encouraged his literary pursuits.
Given Browning’s literary upbringing, it was natural for him not to feel satisfied by the private schools where he was sent to study. Discontented, Browning left school and set about getting education at home through a private tutor. By the age of fourteen, he had became fluent in Greek, French, Latin, and Italian from reading books from the library his father set up at home. Romantic poets like Shelley and Lord Byron inspired him the most during these years. In order to further his knowledge, Browning attended the University College London to study Greek, but left after a year. His parents’ evangelical faith prevented him from studying at Oxford or Cambridge University.
In 1845, he met a poetess, Elizabeth Barrett, and they developed a romantic relationship, which led to their marriage. The couple took a trip to Italy in hopes of improving Elizabeth’s health. They kept their wedding a secret due to fear of Elizabeth’s father, who did not approve of marriage for any of his children. Elizabeth’s father disowned her when he learned of the marriage, and the Brownings stayed in Italy until Elizabeth’s death. It was during this time that Browning became highly creative and productive in his writings. Unfortunately, his wife passed away in 1861, leaving behind a son.
Browning returned to England with his son, and became an important part of literary circles there. After five years of hard work in England, he published his popular poetry book “The Ring and the Book” in 1868. Following this, Browning started publishing frequently and, in 1870, he released his series of long poems “Red Cotton Night-Cap Country” and “Balaustion’s Adventure.” Browning died in Venice at the residence of his son on December 12, 1889.
Robert Browning’s Works
Browning worked very hard on his poems during his initial years, and finally produced “Men and Women,” which won him wide recognition in 1855. He completed his most ambitious and perhaps the greatest work “The Ring and the Book” in 1869. It received much recognition in the literary circles of England in 1881, when the Browning Society was established. After winning wide popularity, Browning produced his major work “Parleyings with Certain People of Importance in Their Day” in 1887. It was a unique piece of work in that it even baffled the Victorian audience. Browning wrote profusely, and his most popular plays include “Pippa Passes,” “Strafford,” “King Victor and King Charles,” “A Blot in the Scutcheon,” “The Return of the Druses,” and “Colombe’s Birthday,” while his popular dramatic monologues are “Rabbi Ben Ezra,” “Fifine at the Fair,” and “My Last Duchess.”
Robert Browning’s Style and Popular Poems
Browning’s style of writing mainly relies on dramatic monologues, in which the actions, settings, and characters are revealed through their own words. However, this revelation is not done deliberately but inadvertently as the speaker reveals himself and his past actions through images and symbols. His most popular poems include “A Wall,” “A Tale,” “A Pretty Woman,” “My Last Duchess,” “Soliloquy of the Spanish Cloister,” “The Last Ride Together,” “The Last Leader,” and “The Laboratory and Meeting at Night.”
More about His Life
Robert Browning won several awards, including an honorary doctorate fromEdinburgh. He got offers of being Lord Rectorship of Glasgow and Life Governor of London University, but he turned down several other offers. His last collection of poems, “Asolando,” which employed concise lyric, was published in 1889 on the day of his death.
Works :
Henry van Dyke
Robert W. Service
William Butler Yeats
Lord Byron
Langston Hughes
Eugene Field
Claude McKay
Dorothy Parker
Alicia Elsbeth Stallings
Amber Flora Thomas
Robert Burns
Diffrence between Both Poet.
The mood and concerns of the Victorian age are revived here through the poetry of Tennyson, Arnold and Browning. The editor's perspective introduction probes the psychological alienation and isolation of the Victorian poets, explores the influences the Romantics had upon their poetry, and demonstrates how the Victorians moved the poetic tradition toward the twentieth century. Included are biographical sketches of each poet, bibliographical notes and critical annotations.
This is a reproduction of a book published before 1923. This book may have occasional imperfections such as missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. that were either part of the original artifact, or were introduced by the scanning process. We believe this work is culturally important, and despite the imperfections, have elected to bring it back into print as part of our continuing commitment to the preservation of printed works worldwide. We appreciate your understanding of the imperfections in the preservation process, and hope you enjoy this valuable book.
As a consequence of rapid scientific and industrial progress or the theories of Evolution and Communism, Victorian people and of course the literary writers are consigned to reach the acme of religious confusion or spiritual loss or conflict between faith and doubt. It is an admitted fact that the Victorian people and writers are divided into two idealistic worlds. So if one group goes in the favor of faith or religion, the other is of course in the favor of doubt. So conflict in ideologies is a must.
As much ink is spilled overwriting or enough debate is tabled regarding this very issue, the topic conflict between faith and doubt or science and religious places in the different sorts of Victorian literary devices especially in the Victorian poetry as “Poetry is the criticism of life.”6 This is because, Hugh Walker comments; ‘it is curious that in the year 1850 both Tennyson and Browning produced poems in which the religious element is more prominent than it is in anything they had previously written.” 7 Needless to say hundreds of books like ”History of the Conflict between Religion and Science” (1875), Origin of Species (1859) and” The Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom (1876) by John Draper, Andrew Whites, and Charles Darwin respectively are written on this conflict. This is why, being the children of the time, Matthew Arnold, Robert Browning, Alfred Tennyson and Cristina Rosette’s poetry started concerning with this very conflict and of course it becomes the mirror on which Victorian faith and doubt are clearly reflected. To lament on the loss of faith, Matthew Arnold “who chastises and instructs the reader on contemporary social issues,”8 says in his poem :
“The Sea of Faith
Was once, too, at the full, and round earth’s shore
Lay like the folds of a bright girdle furled.
But now I only hear
Its melancholy, long, withdrawing roar,
Retreating, to the breath
Of the night-wind, down the vast edges drear
And naked shingles of the world”.
(Dover Beach, Line: 21- 28 )
In these quoted lines, making an explicit comparison between Victorian religious faith and sea, Arnold, in truth, laments over the transition from the age of faith into the age of skepticism, uncertainty or turbulence. The sea of faith, to Arnold, was full in past. It had flown with great energy and left it vigorous waves on the seashore. But now the poet hears the melancholic sounds of withdrawing waves. More clearly, religious faith of the Victorian people is replaced by agnostic, atheistic or skeptic thoughts.
Alfred Lord Tennyson is considered to be one of the most well-liked British poets during more of Queen Victorian period 9 questions faith in God, in nature and even in scientific without any hesitancy in his poetry. In the truest sense of the term, we observe that Tennyson possesses mixed feeling about scientific progress. This is why, Tennyson acknowledged evolution as progress and concerned about this conflict with the Christian scripture theory of creation like most of the Victorian people whose faith is being tempted by Charles Darwin’s theory of Natural Selection.
In this connection, Tennyson sometimes goes in the favors of religion and same times is in the favor of doubt or religion. He is, actually, in between. This is because, Tennyson exposes his sufferings from the conflict of faith and doubt in his poetry. In the poems ‘The Lotos-Eaters’ “and ‘Locksley Hall’ the speakers are wild to abandon modern society and return to a savage lifestyle in the jungle. In the poem, ‘In Memoriam’ the Victorian poet concerns with this idea saying
“We have but faith we cannot know….
For knowledge,…”
( In Memoriam: Line: 21-22)
But in every poem, Tennyson seems to arrive at the conclusion that we should have faith in scientific progression and of course in our religion.He is, in fact, reluctant to reject belief and to accept knowledge as the path of solution for the Victorian crisis of faith. In truth, he is keen to reconcile Victorian belief with knowledge. So it can be noted that Tennyson wants to solve the problem originated from the Victorian conflicts of faith and doubt reconciling his faith with knowledge. In a similar manner, the Victorian crisis of faith and doubt has clearly appeared in the poetry of Elizabeth Barret Browning, one of the most prominent of the Victorian poets. Her very poem ‘The Cry of the Children’ speaks about the suffering and faithlessness of the Victorian people through child labor. Even though Matthew Arnold’s poem ‘Dover Beach’ discusses the Victorian crisis of faith from the spiritual point of view. Elizabeth Barret Browning’s poem ‘The Cry of the Children’ concerns with this very issue from the practical point of view. Children ask help to God but he doesn’t pay need to them.
“Is it likely God, with any around Him,
Hears our weeping anymore”
( Line: 227-228 )
But this scene is somewhat different for the dead girl. She looks happier because she is now out the industrially developed Victorian society. And she has not been compelled to do a lot of work in mills and factories around fourteen to fifteen hours with little wages. In truth, the children symbolize the working class people, the worst sufferers of the Victorian society. This industrial unscrupulous society is established through the blood and sweat of the working classes people. Truly, the children are innocent but they are forced to go against the God. As the poem states:
“How long,” they say, “how long, O cruel nation,
Will you stand, to move the world, on a child’s heart, —
(‘The Cry of the Children’: Stanza: xiii, Line: 33-34)
This is because, the faith of Victorian children declines. Again the poet says:
“But, no !” say the children, weeping faster,
” He is speechless as a stone;…..
Do not mock us; grief has made us unbelieving —
We look up for God, but tears have made us blind.”
Do ye hear the children weeping and disproving,”
(‘The Cry of the Children’: Stanza: xi, Line: 125-126 &131-133)
Here, we are not considering all Victorian people to be atheist. Because loss of faith doesn’t mean atheism. It, to us, means the Victorian conflict between faith and doubt. Because scientific discoveries, industrialization, and the theory of evolution and communism make the people skeptic regarding religion and even in science.
Reference
1. https://www.slideshare.net/mobile/JyotibaGohil/comparison-between-robert-browning-and-alfred-tennyson
2. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Browning
3. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alfred,_Lord_Tennyson
