Welcome back to The Daily Poem, a podcast from Goldberry Studios. I'm Sean Johnson, and today is Monday, July 22nd, 2004. And we are kicking off a four-parter because there is a poem that I've wanted to feature on The Daily Poem for some time now, but it's just too long for a single episode to bear.

And that poem is The Lady of Shalot by Alfred Lord Tennyson,

the great 19th century English poet.

And it tells the story of Elaine of Astelot,

a figure from Arthurian myth, who is imprisoned in a tower

and bound by a terrible curse. Then she sees from afar and falls in love with Sir Lancelot

and tragedy ensues. Though there are certainly some folks out there who are able to contort

themselves and read her end as somehow triumphant and empowering, I'll leave that final

verdict up to the listener. Tenison was generally enamored with Arthurian myth and the culmination of that interest

for him was the cycle of Arthurian poems, the idols of the king. And he was not alone in this

fascination with Arthurian myth.

It was sweeping British artists of the period.

While Tennyson was living and writing,

the painterly school, known as the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood,

was also falling deeply in love with Arthurian scenes, themes, and figures.

In fact, I first came to a knowledge of this poem alongside a viewing of John William Waterhouse's

painting The Lady of Chalot.

He produced in 1888.

There are many famous and recognizable paintings of this figure,

the Lady Elaine, the Lady of Chalot.

But for my money, Waterhouse is perhaps the most famous and most recognizable.

And I remember being deeply gripped by both. The image and the poem itself and this unutterable sorrow and the pain of this tragic story, but can really grip any young man who has even a kernel of romantic thinking within them.

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