Idylls of the King and a New Selection of Poems: 150th Anniversary Edition

by Alfred Lord Tennyson, Glenn Everett (Introduction)

Overview

Alfred, Lord Tennyson evokes past and present, seeking to reconcile the Victorian zeal for public progress with private despair. Full of eloquence, epic grandeur, and myth, his haunting, rhapsodic poems still cast their lyrical spell today.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781101157671
Publisher:	Penguin Publishing Group
Publication date:	03/04/2003
Sold by:	Penguin Group
Format:	eBook
Pages:	384
Sales rank:	104,534
File size:	435 KB
Age Range:	18 - 17 Years

About the Author

Alfred, Lord Tennyson was born in 1809 at Somersby, Lincolnshire. Schooled at Louth and by his father, a rector, he began to write early, and at the age of twelve he composed “an epic of 6,000 lines.” In 1828 he matriculated at Cambridge—but only after the elder Tennyson had approved his recitation by heart of the odes of Horace. Poems, Chiefly Lyrical, published in 1830, revealed Tennyson’s swiftly maturing talent, a talent which was augmented by his friendship with Edward FitzGerald and A.H. Hallam. In 1830, the poet and Hallam volunteered in the army of a Spanish insurgent; and Poems (1833) derived largely from experience gained on the Continent. Hallam’s death in the same year gave rise to The Two Voices (1834)—a black period in Tennyson’s life. After a lengthy silence he published Poems (1842), earning the admiration of Carlyle and Dickens. The year 1850 witnessed his marriage to Emily Sarah Sellwood and his appointment as poet laureate, succeeding Wordsworth. The gravity with which he took his office was reflected in many poems on state occasions. His later years produced his acknowledged masterpieces: In Memoriam (1850), Maud (1855), Ballads and Other Poems (1880), Locksley Hall Sixty Years After (1886), and scattered sections of what would eventually become his epic, Idylls of the King (1859-1885). In 1892, reading his favorite Shakespeare, Tennyson died at Aldworth and received a public funeral in Westminster Abbey.

Table of Contents

Idylls of the King Introduction
Idylls of the King
Dedication
The Coming of Arthur

The Round Table:
Gareth and Lynette
The Marriage of Geraint
Geraint and Enid
Balin and Balan
Merlin and Vivien
Lancelot and Elaine
The Holy Grail
Pelleas and Ettarre
The Last Tournament
Guinevere

The Passing of Arthur
To the Queen
A Selection of Poems
The Kraken
Mariana
Song
The Poet
The Lady of Shalott
The Lotos-Eaters
Choric Song
Break, Break, Break
The Two Voices
Ulysses