Author: sadoko4

“A Pause of Thought” written by Christina Rossetti perfectly encapsulates what it’s like to have a crush on someone. The poem is written in an ABBA pattern and it seems to mirror the theme of push and pull or the reality vs. daydream scenarios we often play in our minds regarding our special someone.

The first stanza begins with,

“I looked for that which is not, nor can be,
And hope deferred made my heart sick in truth
But years must pass before a hope of youth
Is resigned utterly.”

It begins with Rossetti acknowledging the person whom she is admiring is unattainable or unrealistic from her position. It is not like today where we can easily DM or yet alone email those we fancy. There were probably only a few occasions where Rossetti was able to meet a male counterpart, at least those she found at least mildly attractive. Even then, there was no guarantee that she would see him again (it’s not like she could look him up). And if she did have the chance to mail him letters, it would take too much time and effort and she would never know if he had other women or if he would vanish into the sea!

Rossetti knows it’s not logical, but she still longs for it.

“I watched and waited with a steadfast will:
And though the object seemed to flee away
That I so longed for, every day by day
I watched and waited still.”

As a girl who has once had big crushes, I get this. There is something so forbidden and addicting about fanaticizing what we could have been.

Rosseti goes on to go back and forth with her thoughts in the next three stanzas.
“Sometimes I said: This thing shall be no more;
My expectation wearies and shall cease;
I will resign it now and be at peace:
Yet never gave it o’er.

Sometimes I said: It is an empty name
I long for; a name why should I give
The peace of all the days I have to live?–
Yet gave it all the same.
Alas, thou foolish one! alike unfit
For healthy joy and salutary pain:
Thou knowest the chase useless, and again
Turnest to follow it.”

She knows that she lives a life of peace without the thought of the nameless man she secretly admires, but the fact that this person could be her potential lover drives her crazy.

When your expectations aren’t broken, there is more room to daydream and more time to spend thinking about wasted potential. What if? How come? One day? It is a struggle to let go of the thoughts that give hope and comfort. Christina Rossetti acknowledges how love is not simple. As humans, we desire to be loved, but we also fear rejection and unfulfilled expectations. We know when to be logical but still go against our own good judgments. Humans are not sound when it comes to love. Obviously, Rossetti knows better. But frankly, it doesn’t matter who she’s convinced herself of loving, because what she really loves is the thrill/chase of unrequited love.

In The Lady of Shalott, the poem written by Alfred, Lord Tennyson encapsulates a story of a woman and her ill-awaited fate. The thirteenth stanza reads almost like a nursery rhyme and is what I deem the climax of the story.

“She left the web, she left the loom

She made three paces thro’ the room

She saw the water-flower bloom

She saw the helmet and the plume,

            She look’d down to Camelot

Out flew the web and floated wide;

The mirror crack’d from side to side;

‘The curse is come upon me,’ cried

            The Lady of Shalott”

Many interesting gems are hidden in this stanza. First, the usage of anaphora and the repetition and emphasis of “she”, not only brings attention to the end of the sentence, like what poems usually do, but it also brings attention to the beginning of the sentence. This creates a theatrical and powerful effect and sets the tone and tension for how the next stanzas would read.

An example of a similar poem is “Humpty Dumpty” written by Samuel Arnold

“Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall,
Humpty Dumpty had a great fall.
Four-score Men and Four-score more,
Could not make Humpty Dumpty where he was before.”

Humpty Dumpty now is known as a children’s nursery rhyme, but it is only because of its addictive repetition that it can be so. The use of anaphora can create a subconscious rhythm that gives it a childish and youthful flow to the poem and a similar effect is shown in the 13^th stanza.

This stanza is also the first time the word “me” is mentioned as the Lady of Shalott is speaking for the first time. Right before she does so, “the mirror crack’d from side to side”. There is nothing good about this line. Whether it is an egg or a mirror, something breaking or cracking is significant at any given moment. The poem could end right after this stanza, and it could be easy for anyone to predict what would happen to the Lady of Shalott.

The way this stanza was structured and written is significant because it shows the kind of person the Lady of Shalott is, childish and ignorant. It is said that Humpty Dumpty was rumored to be an egg because no sane person would be stupid enough to fall off a wall that would send you to death. In the same way, the crack of the mirror signifies not only her death but the ignorant actions that brought her to her own death that no one would be able to save, not even eighty men.

This passage occurs after Undead Lucy has been found after finding her empty coffin. They see a standing and a version of Lucy that remains alive. In religion, virginity, and sex are truly sacred. Girls have always been taught that if they were to get their virginities taken away, they would go to hell. This idea has always placed the blame on women and in return, villainized those who choose not to stay confined in misogynistic norms. In the same way, we see Dracula’s version of going to hell, which is resurrecting to life by becoming a vampire. It is interesting to note the contrasting words Dr. Seward chooses to use when describing Undead Lucy, “The sweetness was turned to adamantine, heartless cruelty, and the purity to voluptuous wantonness.” (Chapter 16). Dr. Seward’s choice of words is very telling of how men react when an unmarried woman is sexually active. The usage of the brutal opposing words gives the sense that women evolve into another person when they lose their virginity. Although it can be made to sound that because they lack the spirituality and goodness of religion, they become influenced by evil, this is untrue. They willingly choose to believe that a person has changed due to their biases towards that certain stigmatized group (in this case before and after Lucy became a vampire after exchanging blood with another vampire). It appears that the men in the novel have a difficult time seeing just Lucy behind her vampire image. Metaphors aside, men have a difficult time just seeing Lucy without associating her sexual history. This aspect of Dracula screams madness because it is those who steal the innocence of women who create “monsters” of women who do not abide by the systems set by men.

 

The Speckled Band

“’My name is Sherlock Holmes… Pray draw up to it, and I shall order you a cup of hot coffee, for I observe that you are shivering.’

“It is not cold which makes me shiver,” said that woman in a low voice, changing her seat as requested.

‘It is fear, Mr. Holmes. It is terror.’ She raised her veil as she spoke, and we could see that she was indeed in a pitiable state of agitation, her face all drawn and grey, with restless, frightened eyes, like those of some haunted animal. Her features and figure were those of a woman of thirty, but her hair was shot with premature grey, and her expression was weary and haggard. Sherlock Holmes ran her over with one of his quick, all-comprehensive glances.” (Doyle 132)

 

After reading strictly Lady Audley and how women and their actions were interpreted by Robert, the way Holmes interacts with the ladies he encounters is impressive. First, he begins by offering Helen Stoner hot coffee as he notices she is shivering. Then as she removes her black veil, Watson narrates all the details and inferences he can make just by the state of her face. Had Stoner been a character in LA, Robert would have deducted that she was a powerful woman with great acting skills and that he would fear the people she could manipulate.

 

Unless it was romance, I don’t think men took women seriously during this period. Women were not able to work, they couldn’t really own property, and they were deemed too emotional and sensitive. Sherlock Holmes is a feminist detective in the way that he was able to resolve this issue without ever once concluding that Stoner was mad. Of course, this is the bare minimum, however, that is easier to say as a reader in the twenty-first century where this is the norm. Had it been Robert, or any other detective, they would have thought Stoner was mad and that she had a hidden object the men were unaware of.

 

That is what makes this novel sensational. They include many of the gothic motifs, like place & time, crisis, and supernatural, and the real, without the sexism/power aspect between the main protagonist and the victims he encounters which allows readers to focus solely on the mystery of the cases Holmes solves.

Ah, Heaven help a strong man’s tender weakness for the woman he loves! Heaven pity him when the guilty creature has deceived him and comes with her tears and lamentations to throw herself at his feet in self-abandonment and remorse; torturing him with the sight of her agony; rending his heart with her sobs, lacerating his breast with her groans—multiplying her sufferings into a great anguish for him to bear! multiplying them by twenty-fold; multiplying them in a ratio of a brave man’s capacity for endurance. Heaven forgive him, if maddened by that cruel agony, the balance wavers for a moment, and he is ready to forgive anything; ready to take this wretched one to the shelter of his breast, and to pardon that which the stern voice of manly honor urges must not be pardoned. Pity him, pity him! (Chapter XXX online) (vol II chapter 11?)

 

This passage occurs right after Lady Audley is caught with smiling a triumphant wicked smile. Knowing that she has the confidence to manipulate things to her favor, this passage is the aftermath of what happens when a man believes the woman he loves.

This passage, at first glance, describes a man in absolute pain from the deceit his woman has fed him. It describes a man who has the capacity to feel more than what his woman could feel, absolutely destroying his whole heart with the amount of suffering he is managing when seeing his woman cry. Could it be that love makes man empathetic? Or what about the pity aspect? What is exactly so pitiful in this situation?

This passage reminds me of Adam and Eve. To the narrator, Lady Audley probably appears as a tempting seductive snake… or maybe even Eve herself. With the premise that George could be the narrator of this novel, this passage would make sense if Lady Audley were to be represented as Eve. It was previously mentioned how Robert hates women (chapter 24 online). I think that him hating Eve as well is a safe assumption. Throughout this novel, he has mourned the disappearance of his friend George. He is distraught that such an event could have happened to him. Just like how many blame Eve for the fall of all mankind, he blames Lady Audley for the “fall” of George. He pities Sir Audley for being such a fool for being tempted and taking a bite of Lady Audley’s “truth”.