British poetry and literary traditions

¶ … narrative technique in poetry of the nineteenth century is to discuss the various meanings and symbols written in the words of that era. Victorian poetry, including Romantic poetry, included an eclectic mix. The authors of these kinds of poetry loved to experiment and broadened not only the range of English poetry, but also subject-matter, and method, to an unmatched extent. The writers of this era paid attention to narrative because that is how they felt the words would be expressed best. Their focus was that on description, feeling, and persistent thought. Foremost poets like Arnold, Browning, Tennyson, and Keats demonstrated consistent techniques that became synonymous with Victorian and Romantic poetry.

"To Marguerite: Continued" a poem by Matthew Arnold, was first published in 1852. It was intended as a sequel to "Isolation: To Marguerite." And was a part of the title, "To Marguerite, in Returning a Volume of the Letters of Ortis." When examining the poem, the first stanza delivers a metaphor consisting of comparison of humans to islands. These islands, encompassed by the world and life around them, is also surrounded by the sea. The most famous of his lines in the poem: "we mortal millions live alone" can be interpreted as commentary on the lives of people of the Victorian era. People although together, were a world apart, drifting into their own thoughts, feelings, and secrets thus setting the tone for the poem.

His feelings, the speaker of the poem, are for someone, a romantic connection, that he feels is impossible. The poem remarks on life, as incontrollable, dark, and most of all, disconnected, isolative. Using science to explain the once united and connected land mass on earth to the now fragmented nature of the modern world, one can see the hopelessness of this narrative. There is no resolve, no journey to connection, it is simply a capture of the feelings within the poem, of sadness, madness, and confusion.

Although there is some desire for hope: "Oh might our marges meet again!" (), there still lie unresolved despair as the connections the speaker seeks cannot and will not come. And the water, the "estranging sea" is what divides them, the water, the feelings, they are what keep land masses from becoming united into one. The sea is the framing device and the island an example of word play. Although Marguerite was never mentioned, it could be seen as a deleted affair as the romantic desire is there, but not directly expressed.

Browning's "Porphyria's Lover" possesses natural language. However unlike Browning's other, later poems, it lacks the dialectical markers or colloquialisms Browning is more known for. Additionally the pattern of the verses are a rhyming ABABB even though the rhythm of the poem copycats natural speech. The irregularity and power of the pattern proposes insanity hidden within the speaker's coherent self-presentation.

In terms of narrative, it uses a scene typically from Romantic poetry. A storm outdoors, the speaker, warm and comfortable in the cottage. The image of simplicity and comfort mixed with the image of a rosy-cheeked girl who longs for interaction takes away the beauty of the Romantic poetry and moves it into the modern with her "shoulder bare" and defiance of the woman to the family to be with the speaker. Sex out of wedlock, taboo in Victorian society, was hardly seen in poems of the time.

Moreover, the sexual nature of the woman was made to feel natural in the poem. It was okay for her to behave in such a manner. The actions so adequately described, there was a lot of sensory detail. The pattern seemingly natural, made the poem into a dramatic monologue. The author used in medias res to remove the reader from the beginning of the story, and plunges straight into the action. The girl lies dead before the speaker starts. His speech acts as a stream of consciousness that tries to freeze an instant much like her death was the speaker's attempt at stopping time.

"The Sleeping Beauty" by Lord Alfred Tennyson uses several narrative techniques. The first of which can be seen in the second line of the first stanza. "She lying on her couch alone" (). The phrase uses incorrect English to change the tone of the poem. Although the poem does not try to establish a rhyming pattern in the BC in the first stanza with "grown" and "form," the two words sound well together as though they rhyme. The pattern however is ABABCDCD with BC sounding like they should rhyme. All the "slumberous light" uses personification to describe light.

Many of the lines within the first stanza are filled with imagery of this woman: "A braid of pearl" and "rounded curl." She is so beautiful and magnificent that even the smallest things she does are explained or described on a grand scale. She is the epitome of beauty and wears the finest of bracelets. Her hair, so well formed in words: "Her full black ringlets" are an indicator of something the writer wants to evoke, perhaps the darkness of her state and the health of the girl. Long, thick hair especially during Victorian times was admired.

Furthermore people who delve into the scene like Tennyson does do this to achieve immersion into a moment. The woman is sleeping, she caught between to realms. In these two realms her undeniable grace and beauty are pictured in lines of a poem that rhyme and at the same time confuse. Such grandeur in these lines evoke a sense of forever and instant.

"Ode to a Grecian Urn" by John Keats, the last poem discussed, is one of the most popular poems of its era. It is rich with imagery and symbolism. The first of which is the urn. The urn is the main focus of the poem. The descriptions of the urn vary as the poem progresses. The start of the poem has the urn appearing virginal as well as married. The speaker dislikes its decoration but compliments its shape. Towards the end it is viewed as a sage that imparts wisdom. This then becomes ekphrasis.

The other symbols that are of particular interest are the plants and trees as the descriptions within the verses are inundated with weeds, branches, flowers, and trees, making it a pastoral poem and also removing the beauty of the urn as its true beauty lies within its simplicity. Going into more specifics, line 16 provides some insight into the logic of the speaker as trees cannot indeed be bare for the trees are forever the same on the urn. Lines 21-22 also uses personification as the tree branches, or "boughs," are made to be "happy," never saying goodbye, to the spring. Line 43 has the speaker use one last time image of "forest branches and the trodden weed," to evoke suffocation instead of inspiration that the images first drew.