Tennyson's Rapture: Transformation in the Victorian Dramatic Monologue PDF
Preview Tennyson's Rapture: Transformation in the Victorian Dramatic Monologue
TENNYSON’S RAPTURE This page intentionally left blank Tennyson’s Rapture TRANSFORMATION IN THE VICTORIAN DRAMATIC MONOLOGUE CORNELIA PEARSALL 3 2008 3 Oxford University Press, Inc., publishes works that further Oxford University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education. Oxford New York Auckland Cape Town Dar es Salaam Hong Kong Karachi Kuala Lumpur Madrid Melbourne Mexico City Nairobi New Delhi Shanghai Taipei Toronto With offices in Argentina Austria Brazil Chile Czech Republic France Greece Guatemala Hungary Italy Japan Poland Portugal Singapore South Korea Switzerland Thailand Turkey Ukraine Vietnam Copyright © 2008 by Oxford University Press, Inc. Published by Oxford University Press, Inc. 198 Madison Avenue, New York, New York 10016 www.oup.com Oxford is a registered trademark of Oxford University Press All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of Oxford University Press. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Pearsall, Cornelia Tennyson’s rapture : transformation in the Victorian dramatic monologue / by Cornelia Pearsall. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-0-19-515054-4 1. Tennyson, Alfred Tennyson, Baron, 1809–1892— Criticism and interpretation. 2. Dramatic monologues— History and criticism. 3. Politics and literature—Great Britain—History—19th century. I. Title. PR5592.D68P43 2007 821’.8—dc22 2007000225 2 4 6 8 9 7 5 3 1 Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper. For John This page intentionally left blank ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Perhaps it is fi tting that a book concerned with transformations has undergone so many of its own. John Hollander has championed this project through many of its stages, informing it with his intellectual vitality and generosity. I fi rst wrote about Victorian poetry with Harold Bloom and next with John Guillory, and though not a word here will be familiar to them, this book owes much to their extraordinary tuition. This project has been enlightened by conversations about poetry or about the Victorian period, sometimes over the course of many years or, indeed, many years ago, with Charles Berger, Leslie Brisman, Robert Caserio, Geoffrey Hartman, Linda K. Hughes, Gerhard Joseph, Linda Peterson, Hilary Schor, Warwick Slinn, Kathryn Bond Stockton, Herbert Tucker, Frank Turner, Elizabeth von Klemperer, Barry Weller, and especially Joseph Bristow and Yopie Prins. With her gift for posing questions that require complex answers, Lauren Berlant asked me about the relation of contemporary beliefs in the rapture to this book; answering her led to the research and writing of the entire second chapter. At Oxford University Press, Elissa Morris was an exceptionally supportive acquiring editor. This book has benefi ted signifi cantly from the rigor and respon- siveness of two anonymous readers. Humanities editor Shannon McLachlan, as- sistant editor Christina Gibson, production editor Linda Donnelly, and copyeditor Judith Hoover have been assiduous in their efforts, and I am thankful to them for their thoughtful work in seeing this project to fruition. I am particularly grateful viii Acknowledgments for the gracious resourcefulness of librarians at Smith College, Yale University, and the Tennyson Research Centre in Lincolnshire. Yale University’s Beinecke Library granted permission to reprint a revised version of my essay “Tennyson and the Rapture of ‘Tithonus,’” pp. 104–21 from Never Again Would Birds’ Song Be the Same: Essays on Early Modern and Modern Po- etry in Honor of John Hollander, ed. Jennifer Lewin (New Haven: Beinecke Library, Yale University, 2002). Several short extracts from my article “The Dramatic Monologue,” pp. 67–88 in The Cambridge Companion to Victorian Poetry, ed. Joseph Bristow (Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press, 2000), are reprinted by permission of Cambridge University Press. At Smith College, friends and colleagues in several departments and pro- grams have supported this work in many ways. Michael Gorra, Betsey Harries, and Marilyn Schuster gave me valuable suggestions at an earlier stage. Justina Gregory read all of the chapters on classical monologues as I wrote them, saving me when she could from error and sustaining me more than she could know at an especially critical period of composition. My student research assistant Molly Hamer was instrumental in helping with several fi nal aspects of the production of this book, in particular the drafting of abstracts for Oxford Scholarship Online. The insightful curiosity of my students has taught me again and again how much there is still to discover in Victorian poetry. This project and much else has been illuminated by the friendship and beauti- ful example of Annie Boutelle, Nancy Mason Bradbury, Rosetta Marantz Cohen, Dana Leibsohn, Karen Traub, and long ago of Wilma Harvey and above all Janet Trubenbach. My mother, Marilyn Meyer Pearsall, a philosophy professor, taught me to think in critical ways, and my father, Robert Brainard Pearsall, an English professor, taught me poetry’s centrality to life; I am still learning their lessons. The inspiration of my brother, Anthony Pearsall, and sister, Sarah Pearsall, scholars themselves, has been unfailing. John Rogers supported this project through each of its many incarnations, always seeing what might be best in it, from its earliest to its fi nal version. This book’s dedication to him is small recompense for his dedica- tion to it. I wrote the majority of Tennyson’s Rapture as my daughter Lily was be- ginning to speak; I have fi nished it as my daughter Adeline is beginning to write. I thank them both for teaching me daily the value and the beauty of every word. CONTENTS Introduction: Rapt Oration 3 PART I THE PERFORMANCE OF THE DRAMATIC MONOLOGUE 15 1 The Poetics and Politics of the Dramatic Monologue 19 2 Victorian Rapture 51 PART II UNREAL CITY: VICTORIANS IN TROY 121 3 Locating Troy 129 4 Ulysses and the Rapture of Troy 164 PART III THE RAPTURE OF THE SONG-BUILT CITY 205 5 Tithonus and the Performance of Masculine Beauty 213 6 Tithonus, Tiresias, and the Political Composition of the Song-built City 272 Conclusion: Tennyson’s Apotheosis 339 Notes 351 Index 385
The list of books you might like
