Alfred Lord Tennyson's Life and Impact

I sometimes hold it half a sin to put in words the grief I feel. For words, like nature, half reveal and half conceal the soul within. But for the unquiet heart and brain, a use in measured language lies. The sad, mechanic exercise like dull narcotics numbing pain. In words, like weeds, I'll wrap me o'er, Like coarsest clothes against the cold. But that large grief which these enfold Is given in outline, and no more. Alfred Lord Tennyson, one of England's greatest poets, died on October the 6th, 1892. His statue stands today in the grounds of Lincoln Cathedral, a proud memorial to a famous son of Lincolnshire. Some 20 miles east of Lincoln, nestled in the gentle splendour of the Lincolnshire wolds, is the tiny hamlet of Summersby. There, in the rectory, on August 6th 1809, Alfred Tennyson was born. He was the third surviving child of George Clayton Tennyson, rector of the parish of Summersby with Bag Enderby, and Elizabeth Fitch, daughter of a former rector of Louth. The Tennysons had eleven children, and somehow managed to find room for them, and as many as ten servants, in the limited space available in the rectory. Alfred shared a small attic room with his elder brothers Frederick and Charles, his favourite. In a variety of ways, the rector and his wife provided a stimulating environment for their children. Alfred's warm and affectionate mother would often read poems and stories to them, and the rector, a brilliant scholar and himself an amateur poet, had a well-stocked library where Alfred read many of the books which were so important in the development of his poetry. But the major influence on Alfred, which formed the basis for his greatest work, lay outside the rectory. As a young boy, he spent many happy hours playing with his brothers and sisters in the countryside around Summersby. It was during this period of his life that he began to develop the sensitive awareness of man's relationship with his natural surroundings, which so characterized his poetry. A favourite spot was nearby Holywell Wood, which offered the children endless opportunities for fun and games all year round. The village school was here, and also the brook, which Alfred immortalised many years later. I come from haunts of coot and herr, and I make a sudden sally, and sparkle out among the fern to bicker down a valley. I chatter over stony ways in little sharps and trebles. I bubble into eddying bays, I babble on the pebbles. I slip, I slide, I gloom, I glance among my skimming swallows. I make the netted sunbeam dance against my sandy shallows. I chatter, chatter as I flow to join the brimming river. For men may come and men may go, but I go on forever. As the young Alfred played with his brothers and sisters, he was absorbing the wonders of the natural world, and even then, subconsciously storing away the myriad images which were to emerge in so much of his work. The king and queen did eat their off, the noblemen beside, and what they did not eat that day, the queen next morning fried. But the harmony and fulfilment which young Alfred found in his natural surroundings and the happiness he derived from them was in sharp contrast to the deep despair and unhappiness which clouded his life at home. His father suffered from epilepsy and was prone to long bouts of dark depression and violent, sometimes drunken rages. He was something of a tyrant and his wife and family lived much of their lives in dread of him. A deeply unhappy and bitter man, he was rector of the parish not through a sense of vocation, but as a result of events that had taken place within his family many years before. George Tennyson, the poet's grandfather, was a solicitor in Market Raisin, a few miles from Lincoln. An overbearing and ill-tempered man, by the time he was thirty, he had acquired a sizable fortune through shrewd purchases of land all over North Lincolnshire. As his wealth grew, it became his ambition to make the Tennysons one of the great families in the land. His eldest son, George Clayton Tennyson, Alfred's father, was, perhaps inevitably, a disappointment. He was physically awkward and disobedient. Not only that, but at an early age, George showed signs of his epilepsy, and this, more than anything, persuaded his father to break with tradition and pass on the bulk of his inheritance to his younger son, Charles. At the village of Tealby, not far from Market Raisin, George owned some 2,000 acres. Here seemed to be the perfect site to establish the family seat. The existing estate house was a modest thatched cottage, but over the years it was transformed into a huge residence with the grand title of Bayon's Manor. After George Tennyson died, Alfred's uncle Charles took on the title of Danecourt Tennyson and continued adding to the house, which was, in truth, a sad parody of an English ancestral home, and now it lies, perhaps appropriately, in ruins. Meanwhile, the disinherited George was conveniently pushed into a clerical life. He would always remain bitter about what had happened, and at odds with his father and brother, the Tealby Tennisons. All this was to have a profound effect on Alfred. A constant fear of the mental illness and epilepsy which haunted the Tennysons, the so-called Tennyson Black Blood, clouded much of the first half of his life. And he inherited his father's bitterness towards the Tilby Tennysons. He hated his grandfather and uncle. He later gave vent to these feelings in Loxley Hall, as the poet stands by his grandfather's tomb. Gone, the tyrant of my youth, and mute below the chancel stones. All his virtues, I forgive them, black on white above his bones. In 1816 Alfred started at the Grammar School in Schoolhouse Lane, Louth. While he was there he stayed with his grandmother in a cottage in Westgate Place, which has changed little since Tennyson's day. All that remains of the original school, however, is a stone figure of its founder, Edward VI. Alfred was a pupil for four years and was, by all accounts, extremely unhappy. He was bullied by older boys and treated harshly by the masters, the tone being set by the tyrannical rule of the headmaster, Mr Waite. Tennyson learnt very little there, and in visits to Louth in later years, he would even avoid walking in that part of the town. By 1824, there were 23 people living in the rectory, including 10 servants. Alfred spent many hours looking after his brothers and sisters, telling them stories drawn from his fertile imagination. And he was gradually developing his poetry, encouraged by his mother and his elder brother Charles in particular. But his father's condition was exacerbated by the cramped conditions at home. As he flew into his regular rages, the children would scatter. It was not unusual for them to be seen roaming the lanes in the middle of the night. The villagers must have understood, for they would often invite the Tennyson children into their homes. It was here that Alfred acquired the intimate knowledge of Lincolnshire culture, which came out in his remarkable dialect poetry. Another great influence on Alfred's life was the sea, and all his life he lived by or near it. His first experience of it was at Mablethorpe on the Lincolnshire coast, where his father rented a house and the family would spend many of their summer holidays. As a young boy, Alfred loved to go there. It was yet another setting in which to indulge his creative imaginings, as he later revealed in a short poem entitled Mablethorpe. Here often, when a child I lay reclined, I took delight in this locality. Here stood the infant Ilion of the mind, and here the Grecian ships did seem to be. And here again I come, and only find the drain-cut levels of the marshy lee, grey sandbank. and pale sunsets, dreary wind, dim shores, dense rains, and heavy clouded sea. And it was to Mablethorpe that Alfred and his brother Charles came in 1827 on the day that Jacksons of Louth published Poems of Two Brothers. Apparently they came simply to shout in their excitement to the sea. But their elation must have been tempered by the situation at the rectory, for their father was getting worse. He had begun to physically threaten his family. He prevented the children from going to school, he refused to pay bills, and he had fits in church. People were afraid of him. There was even talk of having him committed to an asylum. Finally, he agreed to go to France for treatment, and in that same year, 1827, Alfred was able to escape from the torments of home when he entered Cambridge University. Alfred moved into lodgings at 57 Trumpington Street with his brothers Charles and Frederick. The shy and awkward young man who arrived at the Blue Boar Inn initially found Cambridge overwhelming. However, his brothers helped to ease him into university life and he soon began to enjoy it. In fact, it was a welcome relief after the misery and anguish of his home life. All three brothers soon established a reputation for their poetry, but it was Alfred who really shone. In 1829 he entered and won the Chancellor's Gold Medal Poetry Competition. In the course of working on this he met Arthur Hallam, with whom he was to share the deepest friendship of his life. They were drawn together by their mutual love of poetry, but Arthur was rather an unlikely friend for Alfred, coming as he did from a wealthy background. Over the next four years, the two men became extremely close in what was for Alfred arguably the most emotionally intense period of his life. Years later, he described Hallam as being as near perfection as a mortal man can be. When Alfred went home to Summersby in the summer of 1829, he carried with him a romantic appearance and a promising reputation as a poet. He was therefore much in demand at society balls and soirees, and seemed to revel in the attention. In fact, given his lifelong tendency towards melancholy, the next four years were probably among the happiest and most carefree of his life, partly because the atmosphere at the rectory was lightened by the long absences of his father. When Alfred returned to Cambridge in October, he and Hallam fell in with a small band of intellectuals who had formed a semi-clandestine group. known as the Apostles. They held meetings at which they delivered papers on serious philosophical subjects. They liked him and pampered him and encouraged his poetry, urging him to write it down instead of merely storing it in his head. Above all, and perhaps most important in the development of his work, they didn't criticize him, for he was painfully sensitive to criticism throughout his life. At the end of the Michaelmas term, Alfred took Arthur Hallam home to Summersby. The rector was in France and Alfred's mother created a warm and friendly atmosphere. Arthur liked the Tennyson's with all their eccentricities. He was particularly drawn to Alfred's sister Emily. Following April, Alfred returned to Lincolnshire with Arthur and began to introduce him to local families, including the Selwoods of Horncastle. Henry Selwood, brother-in-law to Sir John Franklin, the famous Lincolnshire explorer, had three daughters, Anne, Louisa and Emily. Early one morning in the spring of 1830, Arthur Hallam and Emily Selwood were walking in Holywell Wood when they came upon Alfred. It was a seductive combination, the physical beauty of the place and the imposing figure of the young poet. Emily immediately fell in love with Alfred. Meanwhile, Hallam's visits to Summersby that summer were periods of intense pleasure for Alfred and his family. and indeed for hallam himself which elms that counterchange the floor of this flat lawn with dusk and bright and thou with all thy breadth and height of foliage towering sycamore how often hither wandering down my arthur found your shadows fair and shook to all the liberal air that dust and din and steam of tau he brought an eye for all he saw he mixed in all our simple sports They pleased him, fresh from drawling courts and dusty purlieus of the law. Oh, joy to him in this retreat, emantled in ambrosial dark, to drink the cooler air and mark the landscape winking through the heat. Oh, sound to rout the brood of cares, the sweep of scythe in morning dew, the gust that round the garden flew and tumbled half the mellowing pears. Nor less it pleased in livelier moods beyond the bounding hill to stray, and break the live-long summer day with banquet in the distant woods. In July, Alfred left Summersby to avoid meeting his father and went to stay with Arthur. Having met some Spanish exiles, he and Arthur decided to travel to Spain. Their plan was to take money and coded letters for revolutionaries plotting the overthrow of King Ferdinand. In the event, this romantic escapade ended in disappointment. But the journey itself gave Alfred his first sight of the Pyrenees, which inspired him profoundly and provided the landscape against which he would create his classical work. The visit also left its mark in a way which would distinguish him for the rest of his life, for it was during this period that he began to wear his famous Spanish-style cloak and sombrero. Over the years, Tennyson's father had been responding to treatment, but early in 1831 he suffered a relapse. Alfred and Charles were summoned home. Alfred knew there was little chance of his returning to Cambridge. His poetry was improving, but at the expense of his studies. And he also realised that he might soon be dependent on his grandfather. On March 16, 1831, George Clayton Tennyson's unhappy struggle with life came to an end. His wife's hope that he would be reconciled with his family and buried at Tealby was in vain. When instead he was laid to rest in the churchyard at Summersby, not one of the Tealby Tennyson's was there. The bitterness between the Summersby and Tealby Tennyson's was worse than it had ever been, and in a grim echo of his father's fate, there was talk of Alfred being ordained. He was severely depressed and became ill. His overriding... fear was still of mental illness, of having inherited the Tennyson black blood, a fear that was to overshadow him for many years. The Tealby Tennysons represented all that was unjust and iniquitous in Alfred's life, but the shallow and materialistic values which his grandfather and uncle espoused were to be found in many of the people he had met at society gatherings in Lincolnshire, even if he had wanted to. Alfred could never have been accepted by the county set, for he was poor, and this was brought home to him in 1834, when he fell in love with Rosa Baring, who lived at nearby Harrington Hall. She was very pretty, and Alfred must have been fascinated. June on many a flower reposes, many a blossom May discloses. But in autumn unto me blooms a rose, the rose of roses. Rose of roses, bliss of blisses, rosebud lips for honey kisses. East and west and north and south bear not such a rose as this is. Perfect world of winning graces, music made for love's embraces. Many a face I see, but thine sweeter than all human. Roses of roses, bliss of blisses, Were not thine the kiss of kisses? Ah, for such a kiss as that! Ah, for such a rose as this is! Although Alfred realized that Rosa did not love him, still more painful was the realization that even if she had, he was not by any means an eligible suitor. This last disappointment added to the growing alienation he felt towards the county of his birth. Many years later, when he was wealthy and successful, he wrote the hugely popular poem Maud, drawing on his experiences with Rosa. But tomorrow, if we live, our ponderous squire will give a grand political dinner to half the squirelings near. And Maud will wear her jewels, and the bird of prey will hover, and the titmouse hope to win her with his chirrup at her ear. A grand political dinner to the men of many acres, a gathering of the Tory. A dinner and then a dance for the maids and marriage makers. And every eye but mine will glance at Maud in all her glory. For I am not invited. But with all the Sultan's pardon I am as well delighted, for I know her own rose garden, and mean to linger in it till the dancing will be over, and then, oh then, come out to me for a minute. But for a minute come out to your own true lover, that your true lover may see your glory also, and render all homage to his own darling, Queen Maud, in all her splendour. Come into the garden, Maud, for the black bat night has flown. Come into the garden, Maud. I am here at the gate, alone. and the woodbine spices are wafted abroad and the musk of the rose is blown in 1836 alfred's brother charles married louisa selwood whose sister emily had been waiting patiently in the background ever since the meeting with Tennyson in Holywell Wood. Emily and Rosa were very different. Rosa was attractive and coquettish, while Emily was deeply religious and rather plain. Soon after Charles and Louisa's wedding, Alfred and Emily became engaged. It was to be a very long engagement, for it coincided with an extremely unsettled period for Alfred. The pity is that he did not realise sooner the part that Emily could play in bringing much-needed stability into his life. It was Arthur Hallam who helped Alfred through the difficult years after his father's death. Their friendship and his own poetry gave meaning and purpose to Alfred's life. In 1831, Hallam became his manager. The welcoming atmosphere at Summersby Rectory induced him to stay for ever longer periods. His relationship with Emily Tennyson became still more intense, and by December 1832 they were engaged. He and Alfred shared a deep and warm friendship. If anyone could bully Alfred into producing poetry, it was Arthur Hallam. This was not an easy task, and Arthur would often become irritated with Alfred's laziness. By the early 1830s, however, Alfred had begun to realise there was a possibility of earning a living through his poetry, and in December of 1832, The Lady of Shalott, one of his most successful poems, was published. Alfred's friendship with Arthur Hallam was troubled by the fact that Arthur had been suffering for some time from severe headaches. Following a visit to Summersby in April, he once again became very ill. At the end of July, he went to Europe with his father. The night before he left, Alfred rushed to London to see him. It was the last time they met. Hallam wrote letters to Summersby all through the summer. In September, his condition deteriorated and he died. The Tennyson's were devastated, but for Alfred the loss was particularly hard to bear. I suffered what seemed to me to shatter all my life, so that I desired to die rather than to live. For solace he turned to his poetry, and began to work on what was to become one of his greatest poems. He didn't go to Hallam's funeral, the experience would have been too painful. By the late 1830s, Alfred was anxious to leave Lincolnshire. He was frustrated by the narrow-minded snobbery he had experienced, as well as the general lack of intellectual stimulation. He later reflected... Its dullness came not from lack of dissipation, but from the provincial stuffiness and unintellectual interests of the harmless, stout, fox-hunting Lincolnshire squires. Despite all this, he left Lincolnshire with very mixed feelings, for Somersby was full of special memories. His childhood, the death of his father, Hallam's visits. He had lived in Lincolnshire for 28 years, and the thought of life going on there without him was painful. Unwatched, the garden bough shall sway, the tender blossom flutter down, unloved. That beech will gather brown, this maple burn itself away. Unloved, the sunflower shining fair, Ray round with flames her disk of seed, And many a rose carnation feed with summer spice the humming air. Unloved by many a sandy bar, the brook shall babble down the plain, At noon or when the lesser wane is twisting round the polar star, Till from the garden and the wild a fresh association blow, And year by year the landscape grow familiar to the stranger's child. As year by year the labourer tills his wanted glebe or lops the glades, and year by year our memory fades from all the circle of the hills. The whole family left Lincolnshire and rented a house in London. Alfred soon became acquainted with some of the luminaries of the literary circle, including Thackeray and Thomas Carlyle. Alfred got on well with Carlyle, who said of him, One of the finest looking men in the world. A great shock of rough, dusty dark hair, bright laughing hazel eyes, massive aquiline face, most massive yet most delicate, of sallow brown complexion, almost Indian looking. His voice is musical. Metallic, fit for loud laughter and piercing wail and all that may be between. Speech and speculation free and plenteous. I do not meet in the late decades such good company over a pipe. In 1842 a collection of Tennyson's work was published and called simply Poems. It was this work which established him for the first time as a serious poet. There drew he forth the brand Excalibur, and o'er him, drawing it, the winter moon, brightening the skirts of a long cloud, ran forth and sparkled keen with frost against the hilt, for all the half twinkled with diamond sparks, myriads of topaz lights and jacinth work of subtlest jewel. Meanwhile, Alfred's obsession with his physical and mental state continued. Two of his brothers were by now in mental asylums, and Alfred himself, over the next five years, took prolonged periods of treatment for his physical and mental condition. His close friends did their best to understand his behaviour, but at times they despaired of him. Edward Fitzgerald, who gave him financial as well as moral support, said, This really great man thinks more about his bowels and nerves than about the laureate's wreath he was born to inherit. I believe the trumpet can wake Tennyson no longer to do great deeds. In 1848, a Dr. Gurley convinced Alfred that his illness was not inherited epilepsy, but gout, and ordered him to drastically curtail his drinking. A great cloud was lifted from him. Marriage was now conceivable and, it seems, desirable. For once, in the depth of depression, he had told Aubrey de Vere that he could no longer bear to be knocked about by the world and that he must marry and find peace and love or die. The only remaining obstacle to marriage was money. By the end of 1848, copies of The Princess were selling well, but his publisher, Edward Moxon, wanted something new. Alfred was rather dismissive about a manuscript he had been working on. It was a very private piece of writing and would probably be of no interest to the public. What Moxon read delighted him, and he wrote Alfred a cheque for £300 on the spot, promising him a regular income for exclusive publishing rights on future work. The manuscript contained In Memoriam, which was published in 1850 and regarded by many as his finest work, dedicated to the memory of Arthur Hallam, the poet of the year. The poem reveals the depth of Alfred's grief over the death of his friend. I passed beside the reverend walls in which of old I wore the gown. I roved at random through the town and saw the tumult of the halls and caught once more the distant shout, the measured pulse of racing oars among the willows. Paced the shores of many a bridge and all about the same grey flats again. and felt the same but not the same. And last, up that long walk of limes I passed to see the rooms in which he dwelt. Despite his changing circumstances, Alfred was still unsettled and lonely. In November 1849, he returned to Lincolnshire and rekindled his relationship with Emily Selwood. Although Alfred was now resolved to marry her, part of him still feared the loss of his freedom. It was his brother Charles who finally helped to bring them together. He knew Alfred well and wished to make sure that, as he put it, no more morbid thoughts, shilly-shallying and such-like nonsense should cause any last-minute changes of mind. So, Charles it was. who finally grabbed an unusually well-scrubbed Alfred by a surprisingly clean and pressed collar and led him to the altar of a church in Ship Lake in Berkshire on June 13, 1850, for his marriage to Emily. Alfred was 41, his bride 37. After the wedding, he said, The peace of God came into my life before the altar when I wedded her. And so a new order came into his life. His bills were paid, his clothes were clean, his letters were answered, his meals were on time. His marriage clearly saved him from total dissipation and possibly an early death. Emily was a devoted wife who did everything she could to provide Alfred with an environment in which he could work and be content. When Alfred and Emily returned to London in October, after their honeymoon, they found that Alfred's reputation as a poet had changed dramatically. The reviews of In Memoriam were very good, and amongst those who were impressed by it was Prince Albert. In November, Alfred was invited to become poet laureate. The following February, he went to the palace to receive the laureateship from Queen Victoria. At about the same time, the Tennysons moved into a house in Montpelier Row, Twickenham. It was near to London, and in that respect suited them well, since Alfred now enjoyed a much busier, and indeed a much grander, social life. However, In many ways it was not to their liking. Twickenham was suburban and there was nowhere for Alfred to indulge in his favourite pastime of walking. Worse still, the house itself was damp and not at all suitable for Emily's frail constitution. Their first child was stillborn and she almost died. On August 11th, 1852, their first son, Hallam, was born. That same year, they decided that they must leave Twickenham, for now Alfred's health was also deteriorating. In 1846, he had visited the Isle of Wight, where he had walked the South Downs. Clearly it was a place in which he felt he could settle down. In 1853, he heard that Farringford House in the freshwater area of the island was available, and at once took Emily to see it. In spite, or perhaps because of its remoteness, Emily fell in love with it straight away. She recorded that first visit in her journal. Looking from the drawing room window, I thought, I must have that view, and I said so to him when alone. On November the 11th, 1853, they took out a three-year lease on Farringford. Three years later, they bought it. Life at Farringford soon settled down to a routine which revolved around Alfred and his work. Emily was single-minded in her devotion to him, and despite her poor health, kept a tight rein on the domestic staff so that things ran smoothly. Alfred usually took a long walk before breakfast, which he ate alone. Much of the rest of the day he would spend working in his study. Emily was conscious of the fact that Alfred missed London, and so she made sure that a constant stream of guests came to the house. One of his friends, Edward Fitzgerald, who visited him once and never came back, thought that perhaps Alfred was becoming a little too grand. If Tennyson did not live on a somewhat large scale with perpetual visitors, I might go once more to see him. Tennyson was, of course, becoming a great celebrity, and more and more people began to search him out. Small crowds would gather by the gates at Farringford, hoping to catch a glimpse of the poet laureate. Alfred referred to them collectively as the Cockneys. This adulation made him increasingly worried about the invasion of his privacy. On March 16, 1854, their second son, Lionel, was born. The two brothers were to emerge with markedly different personalities. Hallam was the conventional and obedient son, devoted to his parents. Lionel was much more of a rebel and a source of concern. Both of them, however, were brought up in a rarefied atmosphere, dressed in fine clothes with their hair unusually long for the period. They had no friends of their own age, and so were taught games by their father. The experience of their early years did little to prepare them for the world outside. Indeed, when Alfred's friends suggested that they ought to go away to school, he rejected the idea on the grounds that the boys would have to have their hair cut. In 1854, the war in the Crimea was very much in the news. When Alfred read the account in the Times of the charge of the light brigade at Balaclava, he was moved to write a poem to commemorate the bravery of the men. The poem was an instant success, and a thousand copies were sent out to the troops, along with a letter from Tennyson. Thirty-six years later, Thomas Edison was to record Tennyson reading some of his poems. One of those poems was The Charge of the Light Brigade. Happily, that recording, though deteriorated and barely audible, is still in existence. Was there a man dismayed? Not though the soldier knew someone had blundered. There's not to make reply, there's not to reason why, there's but to do and die. Into the valley of death rode the six hundred. Cannon to right of them, cannon to left of them, cannon in front of them, volleyed and thundered. Storm back with shot and shell, boldly they rode and well. Into the jaws of death, into the mouth of hell, rode the six hundred. Flashed all their sabres bare, flashed as they turned in air, sabring the gunners there, charging an army while all the world wondered. Plunged in the battery smoke, right through the line they broke. Cossack and Russian reeled from the sabre stroke, shattered and thundered. Then they rode back, but not, not the 600. Cannon to right of them, cannon to left of them, cannon behind them, volleyed and thundered, stormed at with shot and shell, while horse and hero fell, they that had fought so well, came through the jaws of death, back from the mouth of hell, all that was left of them, left of six hundred. When can their glory fade? Oh, the wild charge they made. All the world wondered. Honor the charge they made. Honor the light brigade. Noble 600. Tennyson was by now a figure of national importance, and as such was quite used to being in distinguished company. However, he was not quite prepared for a particular unexpected visitor to Farringford one day in May 1855. It had been decided to buy the house when the lease finished. Boxes containing the Tennyson's effects and those of their landlord were scattered all over the house. Into the midst of this scene of total confusion walked Prince Albert. He and the Queen were at Osborne House, their summer retreat on the Isle of Wight, and he had decided to call in on the poet laureate unannounced. In the event, the visit was informal and friendly. A visit from Queen Victoria was proposed, though in fact she never came to Farringford. The Tennysons visited Osborne several times, and Alfred became quite close to the Queen over the years. In fact... Shortly after Albert's death, she sent for Alfred. In his poetry, she had seen his own poignant expressions of grief and must have thought of him as someone with whom she could share her own. Alfred's closest friend at this time was Sir John Simeon, who lived not far away at Swainstone Hall. They spent a lot of time together, and Swainstone became almost a second home for Alfred. In the spring of 54, the poem Maud was taking shape in Alfred's mind, and it was Sir John who encouraged him to get on with it. The cedar tree mentioned in the poem was in the garden at Swainston, and Alfred often sat beneath it to work. Maud was published in July 1855 to huge critical acclaim. The public apparently thought well of it too, for 8,000 copies were sold in the first two months. Tennyson denied that it was autobiographical, but much of the material clearly referred to some of the more traumatic experiences in his life. Not all the critics were kind, however, and one rather caustically remarked that there was one too many vowels in the title of the poem, and it mattered not which one was removed. Tennyson's epic work on the Arthurian legends, The Idols of the King, took up a major part of his life. As he travelled throughout Europe, his natural sensitivity to the atmosphere and feel of certain locations provided him with sources of inspiration for his work on the idols. The first four idols were published in 1859, and 10,000 copies were sold in the first week. Gladstone apparently carried a copy around in his pocket, and the Duke of Argyll warned Alfred that he might be responsible for a spoilt budget. In 1860, Julia Margaret Cameron, an early pioneer in the field of photography, came to live at Freshwater. She was not unlike Alfred, intelligent and unaware of being a little odd, and they soon became good friends. She bought two cottages in freshwater and turned them into one house called Dimbola Lodge. Here she established a literary and artistic salon, hosting social events for Tennyson and his guests, and transporting many of the London literati to this remote village. Distinguished visitors such as Darwin, Thackeray, Lewis Carroll and Edward Lear came for long summer holidays. But Alfred held a special place in her life and exchanges between Farringford and Dimbolla were frequent, often unannounced and sometimes at unseemly hours. Julia even had a special gate built, now called Tennyson's Gate, which he could approach across the fields and so avoid being spotted on the road. Her first passion, however, was photography. In her constant quest for interesting subjects, she would sometimes drag passers-by in from the street if they suited the profile she wished to portray. Even Alfred was cajoled into posing for one of her better-known portraits of the Dirty Monk. And it was her inspired genius for creating extraordinarily sensitive and evocative photographic images that she brought into the romantic world of the Arthurian legends. One of her last projects was to illustrate the idylls. One cold April afternoon in 1864, the great Italian revolutionary Gary Baldy arrived at Farringford. He had apparently decided that he would like to meet the poet laureate, and so a short meeting took place. Before he left, he was asked to plant a wellingtonia tree. Unfortunately, the young tree fell prey to souvenir hunters who stripped off many of its branches. To this day, its bizarre form is a striking reminder of Garibaldi's visit. The regime at Farringford masterminded by Emily seemed to work, certainly if it were to be measured in the volume of Alfred's creative output. The sanctity of his study and his working hours was rigidly enforced, even to the extent of Alfred having a private staircase by which he could avoid certain visitors. Emily would alert him to the pending arrival of unwanted guests, and he would make his escape. Alfred's output was matched by the sales of his work. which often far exceeded even his own predictions. In the summer of 64, Enoch Arden was published, from which he anticipated an income of £2,000. In the event, 40,000 copies were sold, earning him the staggering sum for those days of £8,000. But there were those who felt that the years following his marriage signalled a decline in his poetic powers, a capitulation to vulgar tastes. His good friend Fitzgerald in particular was saddened by this. He had supported Alfred financially for many years prior to his success. He believed that the adulation he had received in London had been the beginning of the rot, but he also blamed Emily. As far as Fitzgerald was concerned, Alfred should have married in Lincolnshire to a jolly woman who would have laughed and cried without reason why. There were those, however, who disagreed. Edward Lear, A close friend of the Tennyson's, and of Emily in particular, said, I believe no other woman in the world could live with him for a month. Whatever can be said of her, she was clearly a loving and devoted wife. Physically, she was very fragile, and was confined to a couch for long periods. But she had great strength of spirit, and a truly Victorian sense of duty towards her husband. But she was also very much in love with him. And her journal entries tell of how much she missed her Ali when he was away, and how she longed for his return. When she died, four years after Alfred, she said, I have tried to be a good wife. Following a trip to Scotland in 1857, Emily became very ill and never really recovered. Sir John Simeon gave her an invalid chair which was an ideal present because Alfred was able to take her with him on his long walks. His favourite walk started in the lane at the back of the garden and up onto the downs. He had a special bridge built so that Emily could join him. Alfred's success brought with it more assaults on the family's privacy at Farringford. The adulation he received was comparable to that of a 20th century film star. People bowed to him in the streets and companies used his name in advertisements, usually without his permission. His wealth had allowed him to purchase a lot of the land around Farringford, but the idea of another home to which they could escape seemed an increasingly attractive proposition. In June of 1867, Alfred visited Greenhill on the south face of Blackdown, just inside the Sussex border near Hazlemere. It was an ideal site on which to build, the view was wonderful, and it was a very secluded spot. He purchased 36 acres for £1,400, and on April 23rd the following year, the ceremonial laying of the cornerstone of Aldworth took place. Designed by Alfred's friend, the architect James Knowles, it was a very grand building, larger than Farringford, and in the French Gothic style. Ironically, the lavish extravagance of Aldworth was not unlike that of his uncle Charles's house, Bayon's Manor in Lincolnshire, which had once symbolised to Alfred all that he abhorred. Nevertheless, Aldworth provided him with a very comfortable second home, and he spent the rest of his life between there and Farringford. Especially to his liking was the fact that his new house had hot running water. He loved bathing and would sometimes have several baths a day. The seclusion of Oldworth and its magnificent setting gave him both privacy and an abundance of walks. One he particularly liked was a long black down on the southern edge of the ridge. Here he built a summer house from which to enjoy the panoramic view. On a good day it was possible to see the sea. In an effort to maximise his privacy, he would blow a whistle from time to time as he walked. This warned people of his approach and, with luck, warded them off. By 1873, Hallam and Lionel were at Cambridge. Lionel was the more carefree of the two, enjoying music, poetry and the company of women. Yet he was emotionally less stable than Hallam. and it seemed that the Tennyson black blood had resurfaced in him. Or, as Edward Lear remarked, he had the morbid Tennysonian turn. Hallam was much more the devoted and dedicated son, qualities which were soon to be put to good use. In 1874, following a trip to Europe, Emily became very ill and was no longer able to manage the family's affairs. Hallam was summoned from Cambridge to become his father's secretary. Like his mother, he single-mindedly devoted his life to managing his father's affairs, even to the point of neglecting his own marriage. Tennyson evidently appreciated Hallam's devotion to him, for between 1865 and 1874, he refused the offer of a baronetcy three times because he wanted an hereditary peerage for Hallam. In 1883, the Prime Minister, Gladstone, offered Tennyson a peerage. Surprisingly, Alfred wanted the title Baron Tennyson Dane Court, but the College of Arms refused. Finally, Baron Tennyson of Aldworth and Freshwater was accepted, and on March 11, 1884, Tennyson took his seat in the House of Lords. It was ironic that he had now achieved all that his grandfather and uncle had strived for in vain. The bitterness between Summersby and Tealby must have seemed a long way off, though he might well have reflected upon it as he accepted his peerage. He certainly thought a lot about Lincolnshire, and his deep affection for his birthplace is never more evident than in his dialect poetry. Northern Farmer New Style was published 33 years after he left Summersby. In celebrating the rich language of the ordinary Lincolnshire people, the same ones who took him in as a child when he roamed the lanes to escape his father, he also mocks the materialistic values which finally drove him away. It's difficult to imagine the writer of such a poem becoming too self-important. Doesn't thou hear me arse's legs as their canters are where? Property, property, property, that's what I hears them say. Property, property, property. Sam, thou's an ass for the pens. There's more sense in one of his legs than he ha'l thy brains. Me and thy mother, Sammy, has been a-talking to thee. Thou's been a-talking to mother, and she's been a-telling it me. Thou not marry for money, thou sweet upon parsons lass, No, thou marry for love, and we both on us think thou an ass. Don't be stunned, take time, I know as what makes us so mad, When I crest for the lassies me send when I were a lad, But I knowed a quaker fella as often as told me this, Don't thou marry for money, but go where money is. and i went where money were and thy mother come tam wi lots o money laid by and a nice tish bit o land maybe she wa'n't a beauty i never give it a thought but wa'n't she as good to cuddle and kiss as a lass as an't knout Love, what's love? They can love thy lass and her money too, making them go together as they've good right to do. Couldn't I love thy mother by cause of her money, loud boy? Nah, for I loved her a vast sight more fer it, reason why. Look thou there where Wigglesby back comes out by the hill. Farther run up to the farm, and high runs up to the mill. And high'll run up to the brig, and that thou'll live to see. And if thou marries a good'un, high'll live the land to thee. Them's me notion, Sammy, whereby I means to stake. But if thou marries a bad'un, I'll leave the land to dake. Come up. Property, property. That's what I ears them say. Property, property, property. Canter and canter away. In October 1885, Lionel and his wife, Eleanor, went to India. While they were there, Lionel contracted a fever. There was no sign of improvement, so they embarked for England. On April 20, 1886, during the voyage back, Lionel's condition worsened and he died. His body was committed to the sea. Alfred and Emily were broken with grief. Alfred said at the time, The thought of Lionel tears me to pieces. Not for the first time in his life, he turned to his work to alleviate his grief. By now Alfred was in his late 70s, but he was physically and mentally very active, still able to walk for several miles before breakfast, and still an imposing figure in his cloak and sombrero. A serious illness in 1888 confined him to a wheelchair, but by his 80th birthday he was fully recovered, and once again walking the downs, accompanied now by his nurse. He received hundreds of cards and telegrams. Of the many tributes, perhaps the finest was from Edmund Gosse, who said of him, He has expanded the treasures of his native talent, on broadening and deepening his own hold upon the English language. until that has become an instrument upon which he is able to play a greater variety of melodies to perfection than any other man. Alfred continued working over the next few years, but at the end of July 1892, while at Aldworth, he became ill with a cold which affected the right side of his face and throat. Neuralgia and gout also set in, and he was never well again. On September the 29th, he returned from a carriage drive feeling dreadful and retired to his room. Three doctors attended him and Emily sat at the foot of the bed. There was a reverential hush. At 8 a.m. on October the 3rd, he asked for a copy of Shakespeare. The following morning, he said that he was pleased that the Queen had sent a telegram of concern. On October the 5th, he uttered his last words, Hallam, Hallam, and fell into an unconsciousness from which he never returned. Controversy surrounds his last words, which could have referred to his son Hallam or his friend Arthur Hallam. The scene as he lay dying was described by Dr Dabbs, one of the doctors attending him. On the bed, a figure of breathing marble, flooded and bathed in the light of the full moon streaming through the oriole window. His hand clasping the Shakespeare which he had asked for but recently and which he kept by him to the end. The majestic figure as he lay there drawing thicker breath, irresistibly brought to our minds his own passing of Arthur. At 1.35am on October 6th 1892 he died peacefully. The funeral took place in Westminster Abbey on October the 12th. The abbey was full. The nave was lined with men of the Balaclava Light Regiment. Just about every poet in the land was there. The Queen sent two wreaths, but no member of the royal family attended, nor did Mr Gladstone. And sadder still, of the twelve pallbearers, there was not one poet, not one apostle, and not one Lincolnshire man. To many, the funeral was disappointing. Afterwards, Edward Byrne-Jones wrote... Oh, but yesterday was so flat and flattening. I'll never forgive the Queen for not coming up to it, and I wish Gladstone had. And there should have been street music, some soldiers and some trumpets and... bells muffled all over London and rumbling drums. I did hate it so heartily. But as he sleeps by Chaucer, I dare say they woke and had nice talks in the night. I suppose he'll be hurrying off to Virgil soon. I wish I hadn't gone. In the autumn of 1889, as he was crossing the Solent on his annual return trip to Farringford, Tennyson had been in reflective mood. His illness the year before had made him think about the passing of the years and how he had reached the autumn of his life. In just 20 minutes he composed Crossing the Bar. He later requested that it should always be put at the end of any collection of his work. Sunset and evening star, clear call for me, and may there be no moaning of the bar when I put up to sea, but such a tide as moves seeds asleep, too full for sound or foam, when that which drew from out the boundless deep turns to dust. Once again home, twilight, an evening bell, to that, and may there be no sadness of farewell, for though from out our bourne of time and place the flood may bear me far, I hope to see my pilot. Face to face, when I have crossed the bar.

The sad, mechanic exercise like dull narcotics numbing pain. In words, like weeds, I'll wrap me o'er, Like coarsest clothes against the cold. But that large grief which these enfold Is given in outline, and no more.

Alfred Lord Tennyson, one of England's greatest poets, died on October the 6th, 1892. His statue stands today in the grounds of Lincoln Cathedral, a proud memorial to a famous son of Lincolnshire. Some 20 miles east of Lincoln, nestled in the gentle splendour of the Lincolnshire wolds, is the tiny hamlet of Summersby. There, in the rectory, on August 6th 1809, Alfred Tennyson was born. He was the third surviving child of George Clayton Tennyson, rector of the parish of Summersby with Bag Enderby, and Elizabeth Fitch, daughter of a former rector of Louth. The Tennysons had eleven children, and somehow managed to find room for them, and as many as ten servants, in the limited space available in the rectory.

Alfred shared a small attic room with his elder brothers Frederick and Charles, his favourite. In a variety of ways, the rector and his wife provided a stimulating environment for their children. Alfred's warm and affectionate mother would often read poems and stories to them, and the rector, a brilliant scholar and himself an amateur poet, had a well-stocked library where Alfred read many of the books which were so important in the development of his poetry. But the major influence on Alfred, which formed the basis for his greatest work, lay outside the rectory. As a young boy, he spent many happy hours playing with his brothers and sisters in the countryside around Summersby.

It was during this period of his life that he began to develop the sensitive awareness of man's relationship with his natural surroundings, which so characterized his poetry. A favourite spot was nearby Holywell Wood, which offered the children endless opportunities for fun and games all year round. The village school was here, and also the brook, which Alfred immortalised many years later.

I come from haunts of coot and herr, and I make a sudden sally, and sparkle out among the fern to bicker down a valley. I chatter over stony ways in little sharps and trebles. I bubble into eddying bays, I babble on the pebbles. I slip, I slide, I gloom, I glance among my skimming swallows.

I make the netted sunbeam dance against my sandy shallows. I chatter, chatter as I flow to join the brimming river. For men may come and men may go, but I go on forever. As the young Alfred played with his brothers and sisters, he was absorbing the wonders of the natural world, and even then, subconsciously storing away the myriad images which were to emerge in so much of his work. The king and queen did eat their off, the noblemen beside, and what they did not eat that day, the queen next morning fried.

But the harmony and fulfilment which young Alfred found in his natural surroundings and the happiness he derived from them was in sharp contrast to the deep despair and unhappiness which clouded his life at home. His father suffered from epilepsy and was prone to long bouts of dark depression and violent, sometimes drunken rages. He was something of a tyrant and his wife and family lived much of their lives in dread of him.

A deeply unhappy and bitter man, he was rector of the parish not through a sense of vocation, but as a result of events that had taken place within his family many years before. George Tennyson, the poet's grandfather, was a solicitor in Market Raisin, a few miles from Lincoln. An overbearing and ill-tempered man, by the time he was thirty, he had acquired a sizable fortune through shrewd purchases of land all over North Lincolnshire.

As his wealth grew, it became his ambition to make the Tennysons one of the great families in the land. His eldest son, George Clayton Tennyson, Alfred's father, was, perhaps inevitably, a disappointment. He was physically awkward and disobedient.

Not only that, but at an early age, George showed signs of his epilepsy, and this, more than anything, persuaded his father to break with tradition and pass on the bulk of his inheritance to his younger son, Charles. At the village of Tealby, not far from Market Raisin, George owned some 2,000 acres. Here seemed to be the perfect site to establish the family seat. The existing estate house was a modest thatched cottage, but over the years it was transformed into a huge residence with the grand title of Bayon's Manor.

After George Tennyson died, Alfred's uncle Charles took on the title of Danecourt Tennyson and continued adding to the house, which was, in truth, a sad parody of an English ancestral home, and now it lies, perhaps appropriately, in ruins. Meanwhile, the disinherited George was conveniently pushed into a clerical life. He would always remain bitter about what had happened, and at odds with his father and brother, the Tealby Tennisons.

All this was to have a profound effect on Alfred. A constant fear of the mental illness and epilepsy which haunted the Tennysons, the so-called Tennyson Black Blood, clouded much of the first half of his life. And he inherited his father's bitterness towards the Tilby Tennysons.

He hated his grandfather and uncle. He later gave vent to these feelings in Loxley Hall, as the poet stands by his grandfather's tomb. Gone, the tyrant of my youth, and mute below the chancel stones. All his virtues, I forgive them, black on white above his bones. In 1816 Alfred started at the Grammar School in Schoolhouse Lane, Louth.

While he was there he stayed with his grandmother in a cottage in Westgate Place, which has changed little since Tennyson's day. All that remains of the original school, however, is a stone figure of its founder, Edward VI. Alfred was a pupil for four years and was, by all accounts, extremely unhappy.

He was bullied by older boys and treated harshly by the masters, the tone being set by the tyrannical rule of the headmaster, Mr Waite. Tennyson learnt very little there, and in visits to Louth in later years, he would even avoid walking in that part of the town. By 1824, there were 23 people living in the rectory, including 10 servants.

Alfred spent many hours looking after his brothers and sisters, telling them stories drawn from his fertile imagination. And he was gradually developing his poetry, encouraged by his mother and his elder brother Charles in particular. But his father's condition was exacerbated by the cramped conditions at home.

As he flew into his regular rages, the children would scatter. It was not unusual for them to be seen roaming the lanes in the middle of the night. The villagers must have understood, for they would often invite the Tennyson children into their homes.

It was here that Alfred acquired the intimate knowledge of Lincolnshire culture, which came out in his remarkable dialect poetry. Another great influence on Alfred's life was the sea, and all his life he lived by or near it. His first experience of it was at Mablethorpe on the Lincolnshire coast, where his father rented a house and the family would spend many of their summer holidays. As a young boy, Alfred loved to go there.

It was yet another setting in which to indulge his creative imaginings, as he later revealed in a short poem entitled Mablethorpe. Here often, when a child I lay reclined, I took delight in this locality. Here stood the infant Ilion of the mind, and here the Grecian ships did seem to be.

And here again I come, and only find the drain-cut levels of the marshy lee, grey sandbank. and pale sunsets, dreary wind, dim shores, dense rains, and heavy clouded sea. And it was to Mablethorpe that Alfred and his brother Charles came in 1827 on the day that Jacksons of Louth published Poems of Two Brothers. Apparently they came simply to shout in their excitement to the sea. But their elation must have been tempered by the situation at the rectory, for their father was getting worse.

He had begun to physically threaten his family. He prevented the children from going to school, he refused to pay bills, and he had fits in church. People were afraid of him. There was even talk of having him committed to an asylum.

Finally, he agreed to go to France for treatment, and in that same year, 1827, Alfred was able to escape from the torments of home when he entered Cambridge University. Alfred moved into lodgings at 57 Trumpington Street with his brothers Charles and Frederick. The shy and awkward young man who arrived at the Blue Boar Inn initially found Cambridge overwhelming.

However, his brothers helped to ease him into university life and he soon began to enjoy it. In fact, it was a welcome relief after the misery and anguish of his home life. All three brothers soon established a reputation for their poetry, but it was Alfred who really shone. In 1829 he entered and won the Chancellor's Gold Medal Poetry Competition. In the course of working on this he met Arthur Hallam, with whom he was to share the deepest friendship of his life.

They were drawn together by their mutual love of poetry, but Arthur was rather an unlikely friend for Alfred, coming as he did from a wealthy background. Over the next four years, the two men became extremely close in what was for Alfred arguably the most emotionally intense period of his life. Years later, he described Hallam as being as near perfection as a mortal man can be. When Alfred went home to Summersby in the summer of 1829, he carried with him a romantic appearance and a promising reputation as a poet. He was therefore much in demand at society balls and soirees, and seemed to revel in the attention.

In fact, given his lifelong tendency towards melancholy, the next four years were probably among the happiest and most carefree of his life, partly because the atmosphere at the rectory was lightened by the long absences of his father. When Alfred returned to Cambridge in October, he and Hallam fell in with a small band of intellectuals who had formed a semi-clandestine group. known as the Apostles.

They held meetings at which they delivered papers on serious philosophical subjects. They liked him and pampered him and encouraged his poetry, urging him to write it down instead of merely storing it in his head. Above all, and perhaps most important in the development of his work, they didn't criticize him, for he was painfully sensitive to criticism throughout his life.

At the end of the Michaelmas term, Alfred took Arthur Hallam home to Summersby. The rector was in France and Alfred's mother created a warm and friendly atmosphere. Arthur liked the Tennyson's with all their eccentricities.

He was particularly drawn to Alfred's sister Emily. Following April, Alfred returned to Lincolnshire with Arthur and began to introduce him to local families, including the Selwoods of Horncastle. Henry Selwood, brother-in-law to Sir John Franklin, the famous Lincolnshire explorer, had three daughters, Anne, Louisa and Emily. Early one morning in the spring of 1830, Arthur Hallam and Emily Selwood were walking in Holywell Wood when they came upon Alfred. It was a seductive combination, the physical beauty of the place and the imposing figure of the young poet.

Emily immediately fell in love with Alfred. Meanwhile, Hallam's visits to Summersby that summer were periods of intense pleasure for Alfred and his family. and indeed for hallam himself which elms that counterchange the floor of this flat lawn with dusk and bright and thou with all thy breadth and height of foliage towering sycamore how often hither wandering down my arthur found your shadows fair and shook to all the liberal air that dust and din and steam of tau he brought an eye for all he saw he mixed in all our simple sports They pleased him, fresh from drawling courts and dusty purlieus of the law. Oh, joy to him in this retreat, emantled in ambrosial dark, to drink the cooler air and mark the landscape winking through the heat. Oh, sound to rout the brood of cares, the sweep of scythe in morning dew, the gust that round the garden flew and tumbled half the mellowing pears.

Nor less it pleased in livelier moods beyond the bounding hill to stray, and break the live-long summer day with banquet in the distant woods. In July, Alfred left Summersby to avoid meeting his father and went to stay with Arthur. Having met some Spanish exiles, he and Arthur decided to travel to Spain. Their plan was to take money and coded letters for revolutionaries plotting the overthrow of King Ferdinand. In the event, this romantic escapade ended in disappointment.

But the journey itself gave Alfred his first sight of the Pyrenees, which inspired him profoundly and provided the landscape against which he would create his classical work. The visit also left its mark in a way which would distinguish him for the rest of his life, for it was during this period that he began to wear his famous Spanish-style cloak and sombrero. Over the years, Tennyson's father had been responding to treatment, but early in 1831 he suffered a relapse. Alfred and Charles were summoned home.

Alfred knew there was little chance of his returning to Cambridge. His poetry was improving, but at the expense of his studies. And he also realised that he might soon be dependent on his grandfather.

On March 16, 1831, George Clayton Tennyson's unhappy struggle with life came to an end. His wife's hope that he would be reconciled with his family and buried at Tealby was in vain. When instead he was laid to rest in the churchyard at Summersby, not one of the Tealby Tennyson's was there.

The bitterness between the Summersby and Tealby Tennyson's was worse than it had ever been, and in a grim echo of his father's fate, there was talk of Alfred being ordained. He was severely depressed and became ill. His overriding...

fear was still of mental illness, of having inherited the Tennyson black blood, a fear that was to overshadow him for many years. The Tealby Tennysons represented all that was unjust and iniquitous in Alfred's life, but the shallow and materialistic values which his grandfather and uncle espoused were to be found in many of the people he had met at society gatherings in Lincolnshire, even if he had wanted to. Alfred could never have been accepted by the county set, for he was poor, and this was brought home to him in 1834, when he fell in love with Rosa Baring, who lived at nearby Harrington Hall. She was very pretty, and Alfred must have been fascinated.

June on many a flower reposes, many a blossom May discloses. But in autumn unto me blooms a rose, the rose of roses. Rose of roses, bliss of blisses, rosebud lips for honey kisses.

East and west and north and south bear not such a rose as this is. Perfect world of winning graces, music made for love's embraces. Many a face I see, but thine sweeter than all human.

Roses of roses, bliss of blisses, Were not thine the kiss of kisses? Ah, for such a kiss as that! Ah, for such a rose as this is!

Although Alfred realized that Rosa did not love him, still more painful was the realization that even if she had, he was not by any means an eligible suitor. This last disappointment added to the growing alienation he felt towards the county of his birth. Many years later, when he was wealthy and successful, he wrote the hugely popular poem Maud, drawing on his experiences with Rosa.

But tomorrow, if we live, our ponderous squire will give a grand political dinner to half the squirelings near. And Maud will wear her jewels, and the bird of prey will hover, and the titmouse hope to win her with his chirrup at her ear. A grand political dinner to the men of many acres, a gathering of the Tory.

A dinner and then a dance for the maids and marriage makers. And every eye but mine will glance at Maud in all her glory. For I am not invited.

But with all the Sultan's pardon I am as well delighted, for I know her own rose garden, and mean to linger in it till the dancing will be over, and then, oh then, come out to me for a minute. But for a minute come out to your own true lover, that your true lover may see your glory also, and render all homage to his own darling, Queen Maud, in all her splendour. Come into the garden, Maud, for the black bat night has flown. Come into the garden, Maud. I am here at the gate, alone.

and the woodbine spices are wafted abroad and the musk of the rose is blown in 1836 alfred's brother charles married louisa selwood whose sister emily had been waiting patiently in the background ever since the meeting with Tennyson in Holywell Wood. Emily and Rosa were very different. Rosa was attractive and coquettish, while Emily was deeply religious and rather plain. Soon after Charles and Louisa's wedding, Alfred and Emily became engaged.

It was to be a very long engagement, for it coincided with an extremely unsettled period for Alfred. The pity is that he did not realise sooner the part that Emily could play in bringing much-needed stability into his life. It was Arthur Hallam who helped Alfred through the difficult years after his father's death.

Their friendship and his own poetry gave meaning and purpose to Alfred's life. In 1831, Hallam became his manager. The welcoming atmosphere at Summersby Rectory induced him to stay for ever longer periods. His relationship with Emily Tennyson became still more intense, and by December 1832 they were engaged.

He and Alfred shared a deep and warm friendship. If anyone could bully Alfred into producing poetry, it was Arthur Hallam. This was not an easy task, and Arthur would often become irritated with Alfred's laziness. By the early 1830s, however, Alfred had begun to realise there was a possibility of earning a living through his poetry, and in December of 1832, The Lady of Shalott, one of his most successful poems, was published.

Alfred's friendship with Arthur Hallam was troubled by the fact that Arthur had been suffering for some time from severe headaches. Following a visit to Summersby in April, he once again became very ill. At the end of July, he went to Europe with his father.

The night before he left, Alfred rushed to London to see him. It was the last time they met. Hallam wrote letters to Summersby all through the summer.

In September, his condition deteriorated and he died. The Tennyson's were devastated, but for Alfred the loss was particularly hard to bear. I suffered what seemed to me to shatter all my life, so that I desired to die rather than to live. For solace he turned to his poetry, and began to work on what was to become one of his greatest poems. He didn't go to Hallam's funeral, the experience would have been too painful.

By the late 1830s, Alfred was anxious to leave Lincolnshire. He was frustrated by the narrow-minded snobbery he had experienced, as well as the general lack of intellectual stimulation. He later reflected...

Its dullness came not from lack of dissipation, but from the provincial stuffiness and unintellectual interests of the harmless, stout, fox-hunting Lincolnshire squires. Despite all this, he left Lincolnshire with very mixed feelings, for Somersby was full of special memories. His childhood, the death of his father, Hallam's visits.

He had lived in Lincolnshire for 28 years, and the thought of life going on there without him was painful. Unwatched, the garden bough shall sway, the tender blossom flutter down, unloved. That beech will gather brown, this maple burn itself away. Unloved, the sunflower shining fair, Ray round with flames her disk of seed, And many a rose carnation feed with summer spice the humming air. Unloved by many a sandy bar, the brook shall babble down the plain, At noon or when the lesser wane is twisting round the polar star, Till from the garden and the wild a fresh association blow, And year by year the landscape grow familiar to the stranger's child.

As year by year the labourer tills his wanted glebe or lops the glades, and year by year our memory fades from all the circle of the hills. The whole family left Lincolnshire and rented a house in London. Alfred soon became acquainted with some of the luminaries of the literary circle, including Thackeray and Thomas Carlyle.

Alfred got on well with Carlyle, who said of him, One of the finest looking men in the world. A great shock of rough, dusty dark hair, bright laughing hazel eyes, massive aquiline face, most massive yet most delicate, of sallow brown complexion, almost Indian looking. His voice is musical. Metallic, fit for loud laughter and piercing wail and all that may be between. Speech and speculation free and plenteous.

I do not meet in the late decades such good company over a pipe. In 1842 a collection of Tennyson's work was published and called simply Poems. It was this work which established him for the first time as a serious poet. There drew he forth the brand Excalibur, and o'er him, drawing it, the winter moon, brightening the skirts of a long cloud, ran forth and sparkled keen with frost against the hilt, for all the half twinkled with diamond sparks, myriads of topaz lights and jacinth work of subtlest jewel.

Meanwhile, Alfred's obsession with his physical and mental state continued. Two of his brothers were by now in mental asylums, and Alfred himself, over the next five years, took prolonged periods of treatment for his physical and mental condition. His close friends did their best to understand his behaviour, but at times they despaired of him. Edward Fitzgerald, who gave him financial as well as moral support, said, This really great man thinks more about his bowels and nerves than about the laureate's wreath he was born to inherit. I believe the trumpet can wake Tennyson no longer to do great deeds.

In 1848, a Dr. Gurley convinced Alfred that his illness was not inherited epilepsy, but gout, and ordered him to drastically curtail his drinking. A great cloud was lifted from him. Marriage was now conceivable and, it seems, desirable.

For once, in the depth of depression, he had told Aubrey de Vere that he could no longer bear to be knocked about by the world and that he must marry and find peace and love or die. The only remaining obstacle to marriage was money. By the end of 1848, copies of The Princess were selling well, but his publisher, Edward Moxon, wanted something new. Alfred was rather dismissive about a manuscript he had been working on.

It was a very private piece of writing and would probably be of no interest to the public. What Moxon read delighted him, and he wrote Alfred a cheque for £300 on the spot, promising him a regular income for exclusive publishing rights on future work. The manuscript contained In Memoriam, which was published in 1850 and regarded by many as his finest work, dedicated to the memory of Arthur Hallam, the poet of the year.

The poem reveals the depth of Alfred's grief over the death of his friend. I passed beside the reverend walls in which of old I wore the gown. I roved at random through the town and saw the tumult of the halls and caught once more the distant shout, the measured pulse of racing oars among the willows.

Paced the shores of many a bridge and all about the same grey flats again. and felt the same but not the same. And last, up that long walk of limes I passed to see the rooms in which he dwelt. Despite his changing circumstances, Alfred was still unsettled and lonely.

In November 1849, he returned to Lincolnshire and rekindled his relationship with Emily Selwood. Although Alfred was now resolved to marry her, part of him still feared the loss of his freedom. It was his brother Charles who finally helped to bring them together.

He knew Alfred well and wished to make sure that, as he put it, no more morbid thoughts, shilly-shallying and such-like nonsense should cause any last-minute changes of mind. So, Charles it was. who finally grabbed an unusually well-scrubbed Alfred by a surprisingly clean and pressed collar and led him to the altar of a church in Ship Lake in Berkshire on June 13, 1850, for his marriage to Emily. Alfred was 41, his bride 37. After the wedding, he said, The peace of God came into my life before the altar when I wedded her. And so a new order came into his life.

His bills were paid, his clothes were clean, his letters were answered, his meals were on time. His marriage clearly saved him from total dissipation and possibly an early death. Emily was a devoted wife who did everything she could to provide Alfred with an environment in which he could work and be content.

When Alfred and Emily returned to London in October, after their honeymoon, they found that Alfred's reputation as a poet had changed dramatically. The reviews of In Memoriam were very good, and amongst those who were impressed by it was Prince Albert. In November, Alfred was invited to become poet laureate.

The following February, he went to the palace to receive the laureateship from Queen Victoria. At about the same time, the Tennysons moved into a house in Montpelier Row, Twickenham. It was near to London, and in that respect suited them well, since Alfred now enjoyed a much busier, and indeed a much grander, social life.

However, In many ways it was not to their liking. Twickenham was suburban and there was nowhere for Alfred to indulge in his favourite pastime of walking. Worse still, the house itself was damp and not at all suitable for Emily's frail constitution. Their first child was stillborn and she almost died. On August 11th, 1852, their first son, Hallam, was born.

That same year, they decided that they must leave Twickenham, for now Alfred's health was also deteriorating. In 1846, he had visited the Isle of Wight, where he had walked the South Downs. Clearly it was a place in which he felt he could settle down.

In 1853, he heard that Farringford House in the freshwater area of the island was available, and at once took Emily to see it. In spite, or perhaps because of its remoteness, Emily fell in love with it straight away. She recorded that first visit in her journal.

Looking from the drawing room window, I thought, I must have that view, and I said so to him when alone. On November the 11th, 1853, they took out a three-year lease on Farringford. Three years later, they bought it.

Life at Farringford soon settled down to a routine which revolved around Alfred and his work. Emily was single-minded in her devotion to him, and despite her poor health, kept a tight rein on the domestic staff so that things ran smoothly. Alfred usually took a long walk before breakfast, which he ate alone.

Much of the rest of the day he would spend working in his study. Emily was conscious of the fact that Alfred missed London, and so she made sure that a constant stream of guests came to the house. One of his friends, Edward Fitzgerald, who visited him once and never came back, thought that perhaps Alfred was becoming a little too grand.

If Tennyson did not live on a somewhat large scale with perpetual visitors, I might go once more to see him. Tennyson was, of course, becoming a great celebrity, and more and more people began to search him out. Small crowds would gather by the gates at Farringford, hoping to catch a glimpse of the poet laureate. Alfred referred to them collectively as the Cockneys. This adulation made him increasingly worried about the invasion of his privacy.

On March 16, 1854, their second son, Lionel, was born. The two brothers were to emerge with markedly different personalities. Hallam was the conventional and obedient son, devoted to his parents. Lionel was much more of a rebel and a source of concern. Both of them, however, were brought up in a rarefied atmosphere, dressed in fine clothes with their hair unusually long for the period.

They had no friends of their own age, and so were taught games by their father. The experience of their early years did little to prepare them for the world outside. Indeed, when Alfred's friends suggested that they ought to go away to school, he rejected the idea on the grounds that the boys would have to have their hair cut. In 1854, the war in the Crimea was very much in the news.

When Alfred read the account in the Times of the charge of the light brigade at Balaclava, he was moved to write a poem to commemorate the bravery of the men. The poem was an instant success, and a thousand copies were sent out to the troops, along with a letter from Tennyson. Thirty-six years later, Thomas Edison was to record Tennyson reading some of his poems. One of those poems was The Charge of the Light Brigade.

Happily, that recording, though deteriorated and barely audible, is still in existence. Was there a man dismayed? Not though the soldier knew someone had blundered.

There's not to make reply, there's not to reason why, there's but to do and die. Into the valley of death rode the six hundred. Cannon to right of them, cannon to left of them, cannon in front of them, volleyed and thundered.

Storm back with shot and shell, boldly they rode and well. Into the jaws of death, into the mouth of hell, rode the six hundred. Flashed all their sabres bare, flashed as they turned in air, sabring the gunners there, charging an army while all the world wondered. Plunged in the battery smoke, right through the line they broke.

Cossack and Russian reeled from the sabre stroke, shattered and thundered. Then they rode back, but not, not the 600. Cannon to right of them, cannon to left of them, cannon behind them, volleyed and thundered, stormed at with shot and shell, while horse and hero fell, they that had fought so well, came through the jaws of death, back from the mouth of hell, all that was left of them, left of six hundred. When can their glory fade?

Oh, the wild charge they made. All the world wondered. Honor the charge they made. Honor the light brigade.

Noble 600. Tennyson was by now a figure of national importance, and as such was quite used to being in distinguished company. However, he was not quite prepared for a particular unexpected visitor to Farringford one day in May 1855. It had been decided to buy the house when the lease finished. Boxes containing the Tennyson's effects and those of their landlord were scattered all over the house.

Into the midst of this scene of total confusion walked Prince Albert. He and the Queen were at Osborne House, their summer retreat on the Isle of Wight, and he had decided to call in on the poet laureate unannounced. In the event, the visit was informal and friendly. A visit from Queen Victoria was proposed, though in fact she never came to Farringford. The Tennysons visited Osborne several times, and Alfred became quite close to the Queen over the years.

In fact... Shortly after Albert's death, she sent for Alfred. In his poetry, she had seen his own poignant expressions of grief and must have thought of him as someone with whom she could share her own.

Alfred's closest friend at this time was Sir John Simeon, who lived not far away at Swainstone Hall. They spent a lot of time together, and Swainstone became almost a second home for Alfred. In the spring of 54, the poem Maud was taking shape in Alfred's mind, and it was Sir John who encouraged him to get on with it.

The cedar tree mentioned in the poem was in the garden at Swainston, and Alfred often sat beneath it to work. Maud was published in July 1855 to huge critical acclaim. The public apparently thought well of it too, for 8,000 copies were sold in the first two months. Tennyson denied that it was autobiographical, but much of the material clearly referred to some of the more traumatic experiences in his life.

Not all the critics were kind, however, and one rather caustically remarked that there was one too many vowels in the title of the poem, and it mattered not which one was removed. Tennyson's epic work on the Arthurian legends, The Idols of the King, took up a major part of his life. As he travelled throughout Europe, his natural sensitivity to the atmosphere and feel of certain locations provided him with sources of inspiration for his work on the idols.

The first four idols were published in 1859, and 10,000 copies were sold in the first week. Gladstone apparently carried a copy around in his pocket, and the Duke of Argyll warned Alfred that he might be responsible for a spoilt budget. In 1860, Julia Margaret Cameron, an early pioneer in the field of photography, came to live at Freshwater.

She was not unlike Alfred, intelligent and unaware of being a little odd, and they soon became good friends. She bought two cottages in freshwater and turned them into one house called Dimbola Lodge. Here she established a literary and artistic salon, hosting social events for Tennyson and his guests, and transporting many of the London literati to this remote village. Distinguished visitors such as Darwin, Thackeray, Lewis Carroll and Edward Lear came for long summer holidays.

But Alfred held a special place in her life and exchanges between Farringford and Dimbolla were frequent, often unannounced and sometimes at unseemly hours. Julia even had a special gate built, now called Tennyson's Gate, which he could approach across the fields and so avoid being spotted on the road. Her first passion, however, was photography.

In her constant quest for interesting subjects, she would sometimes drag passers-by in from the street if they suited the profile she wished to portray. Even Alfred was cajoled into posing for one of her better-known portraits of the Dirty Monk. And it was her inspired genius for creating extraordinarily sensitive and evocative photographic images that she brought into the romantic world of the Arthurian legends. One of her last projects was to illustrate the idylls. One cold April afternoon in 1864, the great Italian revolutionary Gary Baldy arrived at Farringford.

He had apparently decided that he would like to meet the poet laureate, and so a short meeting took place. Before he left, he was asked to plant a wellingtonia tree. Unfortunately, the young tree fell prey to souvenir hunters who stripped off many of its branches.

To this day, its bizarre form is a striking reminder of Garibaldi's visit. The regime at Farringford masterminded by Emily seemed to work, certainly if it were to be measured in the volume of Alfred's creative output. The sanctity of his study and his working hours was rigidly enforced, even to the extent of Alfred having a private staircase by which he could avoid certain visitors. Emily would alert him to the pending arrival of unwanted guests, and he would make his escape. Alfred's output was matched by the sales of his work.

which often far exceeded even his own predictions. In the summer of 64, Enoch Arden was published, from which he anticipated an income of £2,000. In the event, 40,000 copies were sold, earning him the staggering sum for those days of £8,000.

But there were those who felt that the years following his marriage signalled a decline in his poetic powers, a capitulation to vulgar tastes. His good friend Fitzgerald in particular was saddened by this. He had supported Alfred financially for many years prior to his success. He believed that the adulation he had received in London had been the beginning of the rot, but he also blamed Emily.

As far as Fitzgerald was concerned, Alfred should have married in Lincolnshire to a jolly woman who would have laughed and cried without reason why. There were those, however, who disagreed. Edward Lear, A close friend of the Tennyson's, and of Emily in particular, said, I believe no other woman in the world could live with him for a month.

Whatever can be said of her, she was clearly a loving and devoted wife. Physically, she was very fragile, and was confined to a couch for long periods. But she had great strength of spirit, and a truly Victorian sense of duty towards her husband.

But she was also very much in love with him. And her journal entries tell of how much she missed her Ali when he was away, and how she longed for his return. When she died, four years after Alfred, she said, I have tried to be a good wife. Following a trip to Scotland in 1857, Emily became very ill and never really recovered. Sir John Simeon gave her an invalid chair which was an ideal present because Alfred was able to take her with him on his long walks.

His favourite walk started in the lane at the back of the garden and up onto the downs. He had a special bridge built so that Emily could join him. Alfred's success brought with it more assaults on the family's privacy at Farringford.

The adulation he received was comparable to that of a 20th century film star. People bowed to him in the streets and companies used his name in advertisements, usually without his permission. His wealth had allowed him to purchase a lot of the land around Farringford, but the idea of another home to which they could escape seemed an increasingly attractive proposition.

In June of 1867, Alfred visited Greenhill on the south face of Blackdown, just inside the Sussex border near Hazlemere. It was an ideal site on which to build, the view was wonderful, and it was a very secluded spot. He purchased 36 acres for £1,400, and on April 23rd the following year, the ceremonial laying of the cornerstone of Aldworth took place.

Designed by Alfred's friend, the architect James Knowles, it was a very grand building, larger than Farringford, and in the French Gothic style. Ironically, the lavish extravagance of Aldworth was not unlike that of his uncle Charles's house, Bayon's Manor in Lincolnshire, which had once symbolised to Alfred all that he abhorred. Nevertheless, Aldworth provided him with a very comfortable second home, and he spent the rest of his life between there and Farringford.

Especially to his liking was the fact that his new house had hot running water. He loved bathing and would sometimes have several baths a day. The seclusion of Oldworth and its magnificent setting gave him both privacy and an abundance of walks.

One he particularly liked was a long black down on the southern edge of the ridge. Here he built a summer house from which to enjoy the panoramic view. On a good day it was possible to see the sea. In an effort to maximise his privacy, he would blow a whistle from time to time as he walked.

This warned people of his approach and, with luck, warded them off. By 1873, Hallam and Lionel were at Cambridge. Lionel was the more carefree of the two, enjoying music, poetry and the company of women. Yet he was emotionally less stable than Hallam. and it seemed that the Tennyson black blood had resurfaced in him.

Or, as Edward Lear remarked, he had the morbid Tennysonian turn. Hallam was much more the devoted and dedicated son, qualities which were soon to be put to good use. In 1874, following a trip to Europe, Emily became very ill and was no longer able to manage the family's affairs. Hallam was summoned from Cambridge to become his father's secretary.

Like his mother, he single-mindedly devoted his life to managing his father's affairs, even to the point of neglecting his own marriage. Tennyson evidently appreciated Hallam's devotion to him, for between 1865 and 1874, he refused the offer of a baronetcy three times because he wanted an hereditary peerage for Hallam. In 1883, the Prime Minister, Gladstone, offered Tennyson a peerage. Surprisingly, Alfred wanted the title Baron Tennyson Dane Court, but the College of Arms refused.

Finally, Baron Tennyson of Aldworth and Freshwater was accepted, and on March 11, 1884, Tennyson took his seat in the House of Lords. It was ironic that he had now achieved all that his grandfather and uncle had strived for in vain. The bitterness between Summersby and Tealby must have seemed a long way off, though he might well have reflected upon it as he accepted his peerage.

He certainly thought a lot about Lincolnshire, and his deep affection for his birthplace is never more evident than in his dialect poetry. Northern Farmer New Style was published 33 years after he left Summersby. In celebrating the rich language of the ordinary Lincolnshire people, the same ones who took him in as a child when he roamed the lanes to escape his father, he also mocks the materialistic values which finally drove him away.

It's difficult to imagine the writer of such a poem becoming too self-important. Doesn't thou hear me arse's legs as their canters are where? Property, property, property, that's what I hears them say.

Property, property, property. Sam, thou's an ass for the pens. There's more sense in one of his legs than he ha'l thy brains. Me and thy mother, Sammy, has been a-talking to thee.

Thou's been a-talking to mother, and she's been a-telling it me. Thou not marry for money, thou sweet upon parsons lass, No, thou marry for love, and we both on us think thou an ass. Don't be stunned, take time, I know as what makes us so mad, When I crest for the lassies me send when I were a lad, But I knowed a quaker fella as often as told me this, Don't thou marry for money, but go where money is. and i went where money were and thy mother come tam wi lots o money laid by and a nice tish bit o land maybe she wa'n't a beauty i never give it a thought but wa'n't she as good to cuddle and kiss as a lass as an't knout Love, what's love? They can love thy lass and her money too, making them go together as they've good right to do.

Couldn't I love thy mother by cause of her money, loud boy? Nah, for I loved her a vast sight more fer it, reason why. Look thou there where Wigglesby back comes out by the hill.

Farther run up to the farm, and high runs up to the mill. And high'll run up to the brig, and that thou'll live to see. And if thou marries a good'un, high'll live the land to thee.

Them's me notion, Sammy, whereby I means to stake. But if thou marries a bad'un, I'll leave the land to dake. Come up. Property, property. That's what I ears them say.

Property, property, property. Canter and canter away. In October 1885, Lionel and his wife, Eleanor, went to India.

While they were there, Lionel contracted a fever. There was no sign of improvement, so they embarked for England. On April 20, 1886, during the voyage back, Lionel's condition worsened and he died. His body was committed to the sea. Alfred and Emily were broken with grief.

Alfred said at the time, The thought of Lionel tears me to pieces. Not for the first time in his life, he turned to his work to alleviate his grief. By now Alfred was in his late 70s, but he was physically and mentally very active, still able to walk for several miles before breakfast, and still an imposing figure in his cloak and sombrero.

A serious illness in 1888 confined him to a wheelchair, but by his 80th birthday he was fully recovered, and once again walking the downs, accompanied now by his nurse. He received hundreds of cards and telegrams. Of the many tributes, perhaps the finest was from Edmund Gosse, who said of him, He has expanded the treasures of his native talent, on broadening and deepening his own hold upon the English language.

until that has become an instrument upon which he is able to play a greater variety of melodies to perfection than any other man. Alfred continued working over the next few years, but at the end of July 1892, while at Aldworth, he became ill with a cold which affected the right side of his face and throat. Neuralgia and gout also set in, and he was never well again. On September the 29th, he returned from a carriage drive feeling dreadful and retired to his room.

Three doctors attended him and Emily sat at the foot of the bed. There was a reverential hush. At 8 a.m.

on October the 3rd, he asked for a copy of Shakespeare. The following morning, he said that he was pleased that the Queen had sent a telegram of concern. On October the 5th, he uttered his last words, Hallam, Hallam, and fell into an unconsciousness from which he never returned.

Controversy surrounds his last words, which could have referred to his son Hallam or his friend Arthur Hallam. The scene as he lay dying was described by Dr Dabbs, one of the doctors attending him. On the bed, a figure of breathing marble, flooded and bathed in the light of the full moon streaming through the oriole window. His hand clasping the Shakespeare which he had asked for but recently and which he kept by him to the end. The majestic figure as he lay there drawing thicker breath, irresistibly brought to our minds his own passing of Arthur.

At 1.35am on October 6th 1892 he died peacefully. The funeral took place in Westminster Abbey on October the 12th. The abbey was full.

The nave was lined with men of the Balaclava Light Regiment. Just about every poet in the land was there. The Queen sent two wreaths, but no member of the royal family attended, nor did Mr Gladstone. And sadder still, of the twelve pallbearers, there was not one poet, not one apostle, and not one Lincolnshire man.

To many, the funeral was disappointing. Afterwards, Edward Byrne-Jones wrote... Oh, but yesterday was so flat and flattening. I'll never forgive the Queen for not coming up to it, and I wish Gladstone had.

And there should have been street music, some soldiers and some trumpets and... bells muffled all over London and rumbling drums. I did hate it so heartily.

But as he sleeps by Chaucer, I dare say they woke and had nice talks in the night. I suppose he'll be hurrying off to Virgil soon. I wish I hadn't gone.

In the autumn of 1889, as he was crossing the Solent on his annual return trip to Farringford, Tennyson had been in reflective mood. His illness the year before had made him think about the passing of the years and how he had reached the autumn of his life. In just 20 minutes he composed Crossing the Bar.

He later requested that it should always be put at the end of any collection of his work. Sunset and evening star, clear call for me, and may there be no moaning of the bar when I put up to sea, but such a tide as moves seeds asleep, too full for sound or foam, when that which drew from out the boundless deep turns to dust. Once again home, twilight, an evening bell, to that, and may there be no sadness of farewell, for though from out our bourne of time and place the flood may bear me far, I hope to see my pilot. Face to face, when I have crossed the bar.

Transcript for:Alfred Lord Tennyson's Life and Impact

Transcript for:
Alfred Lord Tennyson's Life and Impact