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“I am half sick of shadows”: Finding the Metaphor in Tennyson’s “The Lady of Shallot.”
The metaphor of “The Lady of Shalott” is greatly dependent upon the Lady herself; she is
isolated, removed from society, locked away in a grey cheerless stone building, and left to toil at
her loom seeing only what her mirror shows her. This is not unlike the lower-class citizens of
Victorian England. They have been segregated from the rest of society, work in cheerless, and
often dangerous, buildings and work for unreasonable hours. The workers have also been kept at
a level of education low enough that they must be fed ideas and instructions by a task master. All
of these factors form the basis for the point Tennyson makes: If the working class has been
established to fail from the very beginning, they will die striving to achieve what they don’t
have. From the fate of the Lady, Tennyson seems to have a desire to call to the attention of his
readers what their greed and cold desire for luxuries are doing to common folk. Alfred, Lord
Tennyson’s “The Lady of Shalott” is a metaphor that further reveals the condition of working
class citizens in Victorian England.
Tennyson was not the first to elaborate on the atrocities of Victorian society on the
working class. Friedrich Engels records in “The Condition of the Working Class in England in
1844,” a selection from The Great Towns, several observations he made while in major European
cities. One of his most poignant recollection states: “He who visits Manchester simply on
business or for pleasure need never see the slums, mainly because the working-class districts and
the middle-class districts are quite distinct” (1155). This passage may not seem to be too earthshattering. Indeed, modern society shares such distinction as well. All one must do is take a trip
to any major metropolitan area to see the segregation of classes. What makes this passage
particularly powerful is when it’s combined with the following, also from Engels: “Nevertheless,
even the less pretentious shops adequately serve their purpose of hiding from the eyes of the
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wealthy ladies and gentlemen with strong stomachs and weak nerves the misery and squalor
which are part and parcel of their own riches and luxury” (1155). In other words, the shops of the
middle-class serve as a shield and are meant to hide the lesser citizens. Though the Lady isn’t
living in squalor, she is no less put away. The poem makes clear her isolation as it describes her
dwelling. She lives on an island occupying a river in a place with four gray walls, four gray
towers, and little breezes that shiver through the current of the river that constantly passes her by.
The river is also significant in that it flows past her, to the seat of all social pleasures, Camelot.
The Lady is not seen and only rarely heard. She merely lives in the tower and weaves.
Just as the Lady of Shalott is forced to weave every day, the working-class British
citizens were forced into menial tasks. John Fielden in The Curse of the Factory System records:
“Here, then, is the "curse" of our factory-system; as improvements in machinery have gone on,
the "avarice of masters" has prompted many to exact more labour from their hands than they
were fitted by nature to perform.” This statement, specifically about the cotton mills, shows
some of the reaction toward workers’ rights starting to surface. The cotton mills were known to
be terrible working conditions. If one was lucky enough to inhale any of the free-floating cotton
(which would become lodged in the lungs, rot, and cause death), then the worker had to worry
about getting hands or other body parts caught in the machines and ripped off. The cotton was
also highly flammable. The Lady is likewise endangered in her occupation. She’s a weaver. She
works with beautiful threads and weaves the pattern given to her from the mirror. An appeal to
the text reveals that she is at her loom day and night; her whole existence is simply to weave.
And her task is driven by the looming presence of her curse, and a longing to be amongst the
shadowy figures presented by the mirror.
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The duty of the curse and the mirror is to keep the Lady at work and forbid her from
entering into social society, just as the constant working kept the working-class British repressed.
The magic mirror allows the Lady to see the world around her, but in a distorted sort of way. The
figures she sees are described using very few words and unclear, “And moving thro’ a mirror
clear/ That hangs before her all the year/ Shadows of the world appear” (46-8). She sees the
world through a shadowy filter, and is not allowed to participate in it. In Victorian society, the
segregation of the poor from the rich caused a good deal of misconception about what upperclass living was all about. The poor longed to be rich and saw the world from their dreams. Their
own lives were the stark reality and the separation literally removed them from exchanges with
the rich. Joseph Chadwick claims that “The Lady, unlike the “market girls,” the “troop of
damsels glad,” or the “two young lovers lately wed” in her mirror, remains outside the cycles of
economic and sexual exchange: “She hath no loyal knight and true’” (17). The Lady is able to
see the middle and upper classes, yet is destined to remain outside society, locked in her tower,
without someone who has power to champion her cause. She instead, is driven to continue her
work from a horrible curse.
The Lady is driven by a hard task master, her curse. The curse, which is activated by her
looking upon Camelot, is the driving force in the Lady’s life. She’s constantly taunted by the
visions of things she cannot own or participate in which she sees in the mirror; therefore, she
forces herself to work. It is interesting to note that the most vivid description of any person
happens after the curse is first mentioned in the poem. In line 40 of part 2, the curse is first
spoken of, then the Lady proceeds to be taunted by visions of her desires, and just as she grows
“half sick of shadows,” (71) she sees the most glorious sight yet, Sir Lancelot. Great care is
given to describe Lancelot; she looked long and hard in her mirror at him. He’s covered in
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shining armor, emblazoned with symbols of chivalry and love, and shines with riches and finery.
He is the ultimate example of a Victorian gentleman, and the Lady desires him. His flashy
lifestyle draws her eyes away from the mirror and her labor to look upon that which is
unattainable. As soon as she does so, the web she has been weaving flies from her loom and her
magic mirror cracks, signifying the activation of the curse. “Out flew the web and floated wide/
The mirror cracked from side to side/ “The curse is upon me’” (114-116). The curse is that if the
lady should desire what was greater than her station, she should wither and die. This action
causes the Lady to become truly human however. Edgar F. Shannon Jr. echoes this sentiment as
he says: “All at once she becomes a person instead of an automaton. Self-assertion frees her from
thralldom to the spell and gives her faith in herself as an individual and as a part of mankind”
(216). Her desire shows that she believes she too should be a part of that higher society, and
she’s willing to die for it. Toward the end of the Victorian period, many of the “masters” had to
deal with more and more labor strikes; the people had become more socially aware of the
differences in society and desired what the other owned. It seems, however, that Tennyson
believed these efforts would eventually fail.
The lady knows the curse will kill her, in spite of any effort she makes to stay alive.
Instead of struggling against the futility, she accepts her fate and prepares for her demise. She
boards a boat, dressed in white—the color of purity and righteousness— and lies upon its deck.
As she floats down the river, she sings her last song. The Lady’s desire to be equal with those in
Camelot seems to be supported by Tennyson by the use of white as the Lady’s burial color. In
addition, the singing shows that she won’t die without a last struggle, a last desire to be heard.
This is, however, a tragically futile attempt. As she floats down the river, the curse takes her life
and she arrives at Camelot dead, pale, and above all, silent. This terrible example brings to mind
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the seemingly futile actions of the proletariat masses. No matter how much they struggle against
their bosses, no matter how loud their voice, their actions are utterly pointless. That voice can,
and will, eventually fall silent. Little will come of their actions.
This last thought, of futility, is a tragic end to “The Lady of Shalott.” She spends an
undetermined portion of her life trying to avoid the longing she has for a higher life, yet is unable
to do so. Then, when she takes action, her life and voice are snatched away and make little
impact. When the Lady arrives at Camelot on her pyre in lines156-7, she is met bet the court of
Camelot. Though the court fears her body, the power she possesses as a martyr for progression,
the attention given to the lady is little more than “Who is this? and what is here?” (163). The
court barely gives her any regard, even Lancelot has precious little else to say. “He said, “She
has a lovely face/ God in his mercy lend her grace/ The Lady of Shalott” (169-71). There is
present in Lancelot’s remarks some amount flippancy, almost as if he sees the shame of this
lady’s death and says, “Oh well, tough break.” Tennyson reveals the shameful treatment and
futile plight of the poorer class of Victorian England through the imagery woven around the
Lady, and the apathy at her death. Yet the fear present in the court of Camelot at the lady’s
arrival foreshadows that one day efforts to equalize the classes will one day be successful.
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Works Cited
Chadwick, Joseph. “A Blessing and a Curse: The Poetics of Privacy in Tennyson's "The Lady of
Shalott.’” Victorian Poetry 24.1 (1986): 13-30. JSTOR. Web. 2 Mar. 2011.
Fielden, John, M.P. “A Cotton Manufacturer on Hours of Labor.” The Curse of the Factory
System. London, 1836. The Victorian Web. Web. 2 Mar. 2011.
Engels, Friedrich. “The Condition of the Working Class in England in 1844.” The Longman
Anthology of British Literature. Ed. David Damroch and Kevin J. H. Dettmar. New York:
Pearson, 2006. 1150-8. Print.
Shannon, Edgar F. Jr. “Poetry as Vision: Sight and Insight in “The Lady of Shalott.” Victorian
Poetry 19.3 (1981): 207-233. JSTOR. Web. 2 Mar. 2011.
Tennyson, Alfred. “The Lady of Shalott.” The Longman Anthology of British Literature. Ed.
David Damroch and Kevin J. H. Dettmar. New York: Pearson, 2006. 1235-9. Print.