…Four grey walls, and four grey towers, Overlook a space of flowers, And the silent isle imbowers The Lady of Shalott…
…There she weaves by night and day A magic web with colours gay. She has heard a whisper say, A curse is on her if she stay To look down to Camelot. She knows not what the curse may be, And so she weaveth steadily, And little other care hath she, The Lady of Shalott.
And moving through a mirror clear That hangs before her all the year, Shadows of the world appear. There she sees the highway near Winding down to Camelot;…
…And sometimes through the mirror blue The knights come riding two and two. She hath no loyal Knight and true, The Lady of Shalott…
…"I am half sick of shadows," said The Lady of Shalott…
…She left the web, she left the loom, She made three paces through the room, She saw the water-lily bloom, She saw the helmet and the plume, She look'd down to Camelot. Out flew the web and floated wide; The mirror crack'd from side to side; "The curse is come upon me," cried The Lady of Shalott…
…Down she came and found a boat Beneath a willow left afloat, And around about the prow she wrote The Lady of Shalott…
…And at the closing of the day She loosed the chain, and down she lay; The broad stream bore her far away, The Lady of Shalott…
Excerpts taken From Lord Alfred Tennyson's "The Lady of Shalott".
The Lady of Shalott was locked in a tower. She was cursed in that she could never look directly out the window. Everything she saw happening outside was through a reflection in the mirror, which she in turn weaved into her web. One day, however, she noticed Sir Lancelott and the sight of him caused her to leave her weaving and look out the window. Immediately the curse befell her. She knew it, and left the tower, floating down the river in a boat as she slowly died.
3 comments:
How sad. Cursed to not really live but only exist in shadow, then on her one attempt at real life, she dies. Sad.
I recognized the quotes from Anne of Avonlea as well. Though I would not have know that it was that one, and not Anne of Green Gables, since that is what I know her as, no matter what book.
It sounds like a rather sad story, and yet too familiar perhaps?
i haven't watched it in a long time although we own it. i saw the poster of The Lady of Shalott like the one i posted for sale recently and it made me think of it. for some reason this painting is absolutely riveting to me. i think i identify with this poem in more ways than one.
an interesting note about Anne and her recitations of TLofS: in the poem it talks about seeing life through the reflection of a mirror, and similarly Anne had her window friend Katie (and Katie's world), whom she saw in her reflection and wished to be a part of.
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