Tithonus - By Alfred, Lord Tennyson

Themes - Living, disappointment, religion and failure

Dramatic Monologue

Blank Verse – unrhymed iambic pentameter - five unstressed syllables alternating with five stressed.

The poem is full of questioning and natural imagery

Aurora (goddess of the dawn) loved Tithonus. Aurora gave him immorality but not eternal youth, he grew old and no longer had the power to die. He regrets his decision and wish he hadn't requested this wish, leaving Aurora smothered in guilt as she feels bad that she did this to him. It suggests that no one should deviate from the cycle of life as it was created for a reason - a man is born, works, dies and is then buried underground.

Tithonus - By Alfred, Lord Tennyson

3rd Stanza

1st Stanza

Negative place, where there are many constrictions - Earth

A long time ago

Repetitive, common, cycle, ongoing - trees grow, leaves fall and tree dies by rotting leading it to fall to the ground.

'Mysterious' - looking into the unknown

Colour - light surrounded by dark, red - love, fire and blood.

A soft air fans the cloud apart; there comes

A glimpse of that dark world where I was born.

Once more the old mysterious glimmer steals

From thy pure brows, and from thy shoulders pure,

And bosom beating with a heart renew'd.

Thy cheek begins to redden thro' the gloom,

Thy sweet eyes brighten slowly close to mine,

Ere yet they blind the stars, and the wild team

Which love thee, yearning for thy yoke, arise,

And shake the darkness from their loosen'd manes,

And beat the twilight into flakes of fire.

Natural imagery

Her eyes are so bright and full of beauty that they shock and amaze everyone.

Wickedness

Religious imagery

The woods decay, the woods decay and fall,

The vapours weep their burthen to the ground,

Man comes and tills the field and lies beneath,

And after many a summer dies the swan.

Me only cruel immortality

Consumes: I wither slowly in thine arms,

Here at the quiet limit of the world,

A white-hair'd shadow roaming like a dream

The ever-silent spaces of the East,

Far-folded mists, and gleaming halls of morn.

'chosen' suggests specific, one and only, importance

4th Stanza

2nd Stanza

Physical appearance

It is unknown as to who the narrator is addressing

Centre and core of everything

Old

Regrets his request

Aurora is always getting more beautiful

Old in age compared to a always young beautiful figure

Shadow suggests he is always there following, yet he has become an unwanted figure

God-like

Lo! ever thus thou growest beautiful

In silence, then before thine answer given

Departest, and thy tears are on my cheek.

Star of Venus, but reminded me of the star that guided the shepherds

Alas! for this gray shadow, once a man—

So glorious in his beauty and thy choice,

Who madest him thy chosen, that he seem'd

To his great heart none other than a God!

I ask'd thee, 'Give me immortality.'

Then didst thou grant mine asking with a smile,

Like wealthy men, who care not how they give.

But thy strong Hours indignant work'd their wills,

And beat me down and marr'd and wasted me,

And tho' they could not end me, left me maim'd

To dwell in presence of immortal youth,

Immortal age beside immortal youth,

And all I was, in ashes. Can thy love,

Thy beauty, make amends, tho' even now,

Close over us, the silver star, thy guide,

Shines in those tremulous eyes that fill with tears

To hear me? Let me go: take back thy gift:

Why should a man desire in any way

To vary from the kindly race of men

Or pass beyond the goal of ordinance

Where all should pause, as is most meet for all?

Aurora

Begging her to undo his wish to never die

The Normal human lifespan

She feels so bad for making him immortal and doesn't want to admit that she can't undo his request

His wish to her - Aurora

Questioning

6th Stanza

'Why me!', he repeats this as he is angry and upset, thinking that he never deserved this to happen.

He used to be someone completely different, but this wish has now changed him

7th Stanza

Mystical, magic

Ay me! ay me! with what another heart

In days far-off, and with what other eyes

I used to watch—if I be he that watch'd—

The lucid outline forming round thee; saw

The dim curls kindle into sunny rings;

Changed with thy mystic change, and felt my blood

Glow with the glow that slowly crimson'd all

Thy presence and thy portals, while I lay,

Mouth, forehead, eyelids, growing dewy-warm

With kisses balmier than half-opening buds

Of April, and could hear the lips that kiss'd

Whispering I knew not what of wild and sweet,

Like that strange song I heard Apollo sing,

While Ilion like a mist rose into towers.

List of facial features, showing that it effected everything

5th Stanza

Smothered in death

The God of music, poetry and medicine

Tithonus knows its bad because every time he asks Aurora cries about it, without asking him

The rest of society are lucky because they can die like expected, and he is unhappy because he no longer has this opportunity

Legendary city of Troy

Yet hold me not for ever in thine East:

How can my nature longer mix with thine?

Coldly thy rosy shadows bathe me, cold

Are all thy lights, and cold my wrinkled feet

Upon thy glimmering thresholds, when the steam

Floats up from those dim fields about the homes

Of happy men that have the power to die,

And grassy barrows of the happier dead.

Release me, and restore me to the ground;

Thou seëst all things, thou wilt see my grave:

Thou wilt renew thy beauty morn by morn;

I earth in earth forget these empty courts,

And thee returning on thy silver wheels.

Tithonus is living in regret and waiting to die, wants to be buried

Why wilt thou ever scare me with thy tears,

And make me tremble lest a saying learnt,

In days far-off, on that dark earth, be true?

'The Gods themselves cannot recall their gifts.'

Aurora's beauty is renewed each day, while he just continuously ages. new energy and new life,

Ironic that he wants to die as many fear death

Resurrection

She admits to him that no on can save him and undo the wish he made to never die

Form.... etc

Summary

Thank You for watching :)

By Kirsty Hampton