Then to the still small voice I said;"Let me not cast in endless shadeWhat is so wonderfully made."
To which the voice did urge reply;"To-day I saw the dragon-flyCome from the wells where he did lie.
"An inner impulse rent the veilOf his old husk: from head to tailCame out clear plates of sapphire mail.
"He dried his wings: like gauze they grew;Thro' crofts and pastures wet with dewA living flash of light he flew."
I said, "When first the world began,Young Nature thro' five cycles ran,And in the sixth she moulded man.
"She gave him mind, the lordliestProportion, and, above the rest,Dominion in the head and breast."
Thereto the silent voice replied;"Self-blinded are you by your pride:Look up thro' night: the world is wide.
"This truth within thy mind rehearse,That in a boundless universeIs boundless better, boundless worse.
"Think you this mould of hopes and fearsCould find no statelier than his peersIn yonder hundred million spheres?"
It spake, moreover, in my mind:"Tho' thou wert scatter'd to the wind,Yet is there plenty of the kind."
Then did my response clearer fall:"No compound of this earthly ballIs like another, all in all."
To which he answer'd scoffingly;"Good soul! suppose I grant it thee,Who'll weep for thy deficiency?
"Or will one beam be less intense,When thy peculiar differenceIs cancell'd in the world of sense?"
I would have said, "Thou canst not know,"But my full heart, that work'd below,Rain'd thro' my sight its overflow.
Again the voice spake unto me:"Thou art so steep'd in misery,Surely 'twere better not to be.
"Thine anguish will not let thee sleep,Nor any train of reason keep:Thou canst not think, but thou wilt weep."
I said, "The years with change advance:If I make dark my countenance,I shut my life from happier chance.
"Some turn this sickness yet might take,Ev'n yet." But he: "What drug can makeA wither'd palsy cease to shake?"
I wept, "Tho' I should die, I knowThat all about the thorn will blowIn tufts of rosy-tinted snow;
"And men, thro' novel spheres of thoughtStill moving after truth long sought,Will learn new things when I am not."
"Yet," said the secret voice, "some time,Sooner or later, will gray primeMake thy grass hoar with early rime.
"Not less swift souls that yearn for light,Rapt after heaven's starry flight,Would sweep the tracts of day and night.
"Not less the bee would range her cells,The furzy prickle fire the dells,The foxglove cluster dappled bells."
I said that "all the years invent;Each month is various to presentThe world with some development.
"Were this not well, to bide mine hour,Tho' watching from a ruin'd towerHow grows the day of human power?"
"The highest-mounted mind," he said,"Still sees the sacred morning spreadThe silent summit overhead.
"Will thirty seasons render plainThose lonely lights that still remain,Just breaking over land and main?
"Or make that morn, from his cold crownAnd crystal silence creeping down,Flood with full daylight glebe and town?
"Forerun thy peers, thy time, and letThy feet, millenniums hence, be setIn midst of knowledge, dream'd not yet.
"Thou hast not gain'd a real height,Nor art thou nearer to the light,Because the scale is infinite.
"'Twere better not to breathe or speak,Than cry for strength, remaining weak,And seem to find, but still to seek.
"Moreover, but to seem to findAsks what thou lackest, thought resign'd,A healthy frame, a quiet mind."
I said, "When I am gone away,‘He dared not tarry,' men will say,Doing dishonour to my clay."
"This is more vile," he made reply,"To breathe and loathe, to live and sigh,Than once from dread of pain to die.
"Sick art thou—a divided willStill heaping on the fear of illThe fear of men, a coward still.
"Do men love thee? Art thou so boundTo men, that how thy name may soundWill vex thee lying underground?
"The memory of the wither'd leafIn endless time is scarce more briefThan of the garner'd Autumn-sheaf.
"Go, vexed Spirit, sleep in trust;The right ear, that is fill'd with dust,Hears little of the false or just."
"Hard task, to pluck resolve," I cried,"From emptiness and the waste wideOf that abyss, or scornful pride!
"Nay—rather yet that I could raiseOne hope that warm'd me in the daysWhile still I yearn'd for human praise.
"When, wide in soul and bold of tongue,Among the tents I paused and sung,The distant battle flash'd and rung.
"I sung the joyful P¾an clear,And, sitting, burnish'd without fearThe brand, the buckler, and the spear—
"Waiting to strive a happy strife,To war with falsehood to the knife,And not to lose the good of life—
"Some hidden principle to move,To put together, part and prove,And mete the bounds of hate and love—
"As far as might be, to carve outFree space for every human doubt,That the whole mind might orb about—
"To search thro' all I felt or saw,The springs of life, the depths of awe,And reach the law within the law:
"At least, not rotting like a weed,But, having sown some generous seed,Fruitful of further thought and deed,
"To pass, when Life her light withdraws,Not void of righteous self-applause,Nor in a merely selfish cause—
"In some good cause, not in mine own,To perish, wept for, honour'd, known,And like a warrior overthrown;
"Whose eyes are dim with glorious tears,When, soil'd with noble dust, he hearsHis country's war-song thrill his ears:
"Then dying of a mortal stroke,What time the foeman's line is broke,And all the war is roll'd in smoke."
"Yea!" said the voice, "thy dream was good,While thou abodest in the bud.It was the stirring of the blood.
"If Nature put not forth her powerAbout the opening of the flower,Who is it that could live an hour?
"Then comes the check, the change, the fall,Pain rises up, old pleasures pall.There is one remedy for all.
"Yet hadst thou, thro' enduring pain,Link'd month to month with such a chainOf knitted purport, all were vain.
"Thou hadst not between death and birthDissolved the riddle of the earth.So were thy labour little-worth.
"That men with knowledge merely play'd,I told thee—hardly nigher made,Tho' scaling slow from grade to grade;
"Much less this dreamer, deaf and blind,Named man, may hope some truth to find,That bears relation to the mind.
"For every worm beneath the moonDraws different threads, and late and soonSpins, toiling out his own cocoon.
"Cry, faint not: either Truth is bornBeyond the polar gleam forlorn,Or in the gateways of the morn.
"Cry, faint not, climb: the summits slopeBeyond the furthest flights of hope,Wrapt in dense cloud from base to cope.
"Sometimes a little corner shines,As over rainy mist inclinesA gleaming crag with belts of pines.
"I will go forward, sayest thou,I shall not fail to find her now.Look up, the fold is on her brow.
"If straight thy track, or if oblique,Thou know'st not. Shadows thou dost strike,Embracing cloud, Ixion-like;
"And owning but a little moreThan beasts, abidest lame and poor,Calling thyself a little lower
"Than angels. Cease to wail and brawl!Why inch by inch to darkness crawl?There is one remedy for all."
"O dull, one-sided voice," said I,"Wilt thou make everything a lie,To flatter me that I may die?
"I know that age to age succeeds,Blowing a noise of tongues and deeds,A dust of systems and of creeds.
"I cannot hide that some have striven,Achieving calm, to whom was givenThe joy that mixes man with Heaven:
"Who, rowing hard against the stream,Saw distant gates of Eden gleam,And did not dream it was a dream;
"But heard, by secret transport led,Ev'n in the charnels of the dead,The murmur of the fountain-head—
"Which did accomplish their desire,Bore and forebore, and did not tire,Like Stephen, an unquenched fire.
"He heeded not reviling tones,Nor sold his heart to idle moans,Tho' cursed and scorn'd, and bruised with stones:
"But looking upward, full of grace,He pray'd, and from a happy placeGod's glory smote him on the face."
The sullen answer slid betwixt:"Not that the grounds of hope were fix'd,The elements were kindlier mix'd."
I said, "I toil beneath the curse,But, knowing not the universe,I fear to slide from bad to worse.
"And that, in seeking to undoOne riddle, and to find the true,I knit a hundred others new:
"Or that this anguish fleeting hence,Unmanacled from bonds of sense,Be fix'd and froz'n to permanence:
"For I go, weak from suffering here:Naked I go, and void of cheer:What is it that I may not fear?"
"Consider well," the voice replied,"His face, that two hours since hath died;Wilt thou find passion, pain or pride?
"Will he obey when one commands?Or answer should one press his hands?He answers not, nor understands.
"His palms are folded on his breast:There is no other thing express'dBut long disquiet merged in rest.
"His lips are very mild and meek:Tho' one should smite him on the cheek,And on the mouth, he will not speak.
"His little daughter, whose sweet faceHe kiss'd, taking his last embrace,Becomes dishonour to her race—
"His sons grow up that bear his name,Some grow to honour, some to shame,—But he is chill to praise or blame.
"He will not hear the north-wind rave,Nor, moaning, household shelter craveFrom winter rains that beat his grave.
"High up the vapours fold and swim:About him broods the twilight dim:The place he knew forgetteth him."
"If all be dark, vague voice," I said,"These things are wrapt in doubt and dread,Nor canst thou show the dead are dead.
"The sap dries up: the plant declines.A deeper tale my heart divines.Know I not Death? the outward signs?
"I found him when my years were few;A shadow on the graves I knew,And darkness in the village yew.
"From grave to grave the shadow crept:In her still place the morning wept:Touch'd by his feet the daisy slept.
"The simple senses crown'd his head:‘Omega! thou art Lord,' they said,‘We find no motion in the dead.'
"Why, if man rot in dreamless ease,Should that plain fact, as taught by these,Not make him sure that he shall cease?
"Who forged that other influence,That heat of inward evidence,By which he doubts against the sense?
"He owns the fatal gift of eyes,That read his spirit blindly wise,Not simple as a thing that dies.
"Here sits he shaping wings to fly:His heart forebodes a mystery:He names the name Eternity.
"That type of Perfect in his mindIn Nature can he nowhere find.He sows himself on every wind.
"He seems to hear a Heavenly Friend,And thro' thick veils to apprehendA labour working to an end.
"The end and the beginning vexHis reason: many things perplex,With motions, checks, and counterchecks.
"He knows a baseness in his bloodAt such strange war with something good,He may not do the thing he would.
"Heaven opens inward, chasms yawn,Vast images in glimmering dawn,Half shown, are broken and withdrawn.
"Ah! sure within him and without,Could his dark wisdom find it out,There must be answer to his doubt,
"But thou canst answer not again.With thine own weapon art thou slain,Or thou wilt answer but in vain.
"The doubt would rest, I dare not solve.In the same circle we revolve.Assurance only breeds resolve."
As when a billow, blown against,Falls back, the voice with which I fencedA little ceased, but recommenced.
"Where wert thou when thy father play'dIn his free field, and pastime made,A merry boy in sun and shade?
"A merry boy they call'd him then,He sat upon the knees of menIn days that never come again.
"Before the little ducts beganTo feed thy bones with lime, and ranTheir course, till thou wert also man:
"Who took a wife, who rear'd his race,Whose wrinkles gather'd on his face,Whose troubles number with his days:
"A life of nothings, nothing-worth,From that first nothing ere his birthTo that last nothing under earth!"
"These words," I said, "are like the rest;No certain clearness, but at bestA vague suspicion of the breast:
"But if I grant, thou mightst defendThe thesis which thy words intend—That to begin implies to end;
"Yet how should I for certain hold,Because my memory is so cold,That I first was in human mould?
"I cannot make this matter plain,But I would shoot, howe'er in vain,A random arrow from the brain.
"It may be that no life is found,Which only to one engine boundFalls off, but cycles always round.
"As old mythologies relate,Some draught of Lethe might awaitThe slipping thro' from state to state.
"As here we find in trances, menForget the dream that happens then,Until they fall in trance again.
"So might we, if our state were suchAs one before, remember much,For those two likes might meet and touch.
"But, if I lapsed from nobler place,Some legend of a fallen raceAlone might hint of my disgrace;
"Some vague emotion of delightIn gazing up an Alpine height,Some yeaming toward the lamps of night;
"Or if thro' lower lives I came—Tho' all experience past becameConsolidate in mind and frame—
"I might forget my weaker lot;For is not our first year forgot?The haunts of memory echo not.
"And men, whose reason long was blind,From cells of madness unconfined,Oft lose whole years of darker mind.
"Much more, if first I floated free,As naked essence, must I beIncompetent of memory:
"For memory dealing but with time,And he with matter, could she climbBeyond her own material prime?
"Moreover, something is or seems,That touches me with mystic gleams,Like glimpses of forgotten dreams—
"Of something felt, like something here;Of something done, I know not where;Such as no language may declare."
The still voice laugh'd. "I talk," said he,"Not with thy dreams. Suffice it theeThy pain is a reality."
"But thou," said I, "hast missed thy mark,Who sought'st to wreck my mortal ark,By making all the horizon dark.
"Why not set forth, if I should doThis rashness, that which might ensueWith this old soul in organs new?
"Whatever crazy sorrow saith,No life that breathes with human breathHas ever truly long'd for death.
"'Tis life, whereof our nerves are scant,Oh life, not death, for which we pant;More life, and fuller, that I want."
I ceased, and sat as one forlorn.Then said the voice, in quiet scorn,"Behold, it is the Sabbath morn."
And I arose, and I releasedThe casement, and the light increasedWith freshness in the dawning east.
Like soften'd airs that blowing steal,When meres begin to uncongeal,The sweet church bells began to peal.
On to God's house the people prest:Passing the place where each must rest,Each enter'd like a welcome guest.
One walk'd between his wife and child,With measured footfall firm and mild,And now and then he gravely smiled.
The prudent partner of his bloodLean'd on him, faithful, gentle, good,Wearing the rose of womanhood.
And in their double love secure,The little maiden walk'd demure,Pacing with downward eyelids pure.
These three made unity so sweet,My frozen heart began to beat,Remembering its ancient heat.
I blest them, and they wander'd on:I spoke, but answer came there none:The dull and bitter voice was gone.
A second voice was at mine ear,A little whisper silver-clear,A murmur, "Be of better cheer."
As from some blissful neighbourhood,A notice faintly understood,"I see the end, and know the good."
A little hint to solace woe,A hint, a whisper breathing low,"I may not speak of what I know."
Like an Æolian harp that wakesNo certain air, but overtakesFar thought with music that it makes:
Such seem'd the whisper at my side:"What is it thou knowest, sweet voice?" I cried."A hidden hope," the voice replied:
So heavenly-toned, that in that hourFrom out my sullen heart a powerBroke, like the rainbow from the shower,
To feel, altho' no tongue can prove,That every cloud, that spreads aboveAnd veileth love, itself is love.
And forth into the fields I went,And Nature's living motion lentThe pulse of hope to discontent.
I wonder'd at the bounteous hours,The slow result of winter showers:You scarce could see the grass for flowers.
I wonder'd, while I paced along:The woods were fill'd so full with song,There seem'd no room for sense of wrong;
And all so variously wrought,I marvell'd how the mind was broughtTo anchor by one gloomy thought;
And wherefore rather I made choiceTo commune with that barren voice,Than him that said, "Rejoice! Rejoice!"
About the author
About the poet
Alfred Tennyson, 1st Baron Tennyson, FRS was Poet Laureate of the United Kingdom during much of Queen Victoria's reign and remains one of the most popular poets in the English language.
Tennyson excelled at penning short lyrics, such as "In the Valley of Cauteretz", "Break, Break, Break", "The Charge of the Light Brigade", "Tears, Idle Tears" and "Crossing the Bar". Much of his verse was based on classical mythological themes, such as Ulysses, although In Memoriam A.H.H. was written to commemorate his best friend Arthur Hallam, a fellow poet and fellow student at Trinity College, Cambridge, who was engaged to Tennyson's sister, but died from a brain haemorrhage before they could marry. Tennyson also wrote some notable blank verse including Idylls of the King, "Ulysses," and "Tithonus." During his career, Tennyson attempted drama, but his plays enjoyed little success.
A number of phrases from Tennyson's work have become commonplaces of the English language, including "Nature, red in tooth and claw", "'Tis better to have loved and lost / Than never to have loved at all", "Theirs not to reason why, / Theirs but to do and die", "My strength is as the strength of ten, / Because my heart is pure", "Knowledge comes, but Wisdom lingers", and "The old order changeth, yielding place to new". He is the ninth most frequently quoted writer in The Oxford Dictionary of Quotations.
Early Life
Tennyson was born in Somersby, Lincolnshire, a rector's son and fourth of 12 children. He derived from a middle-class line of Tennysons, but also had noble and royal ancestry.
His father, George Clayton Tennyson (1778–1831), was rector of Somersby (1807–1831), also rector of Benniworth and Bag Enderby, and vicar of Grimsby (1815). The rector was the elder of two sons, but was disinherited at an early age by his father, the landowner George Tennyson (1750–1835) (owner of Bayons Manor and Usselby Hall), in favour of his younger brother Charles, who later took the name Charles Tennyson d'Eyncourt. Rev. George Clayton Tennyson raised a large family and "was a man of superior abilities and varied attainments, who tried his hand with fair success in architecture, painting, music, and poetry. He was comfortably well off for a country clergyman and his shrewd money management enabled the family to spend summers at Mablethorpe and Skegness, on the eastern coast of England." Alfred Tennyson's mother, Elizabeth Fytche (1781–1865), was the daughter of Stephen Fytche (1734–1799), vicar of St. James Church, Louth (1764) and rector of Withcall (1780), a small village between Horncastle and Louth. Tennyson's father "carefully attended to the education and training of his children."
Tennyson and two of his elder brothers were writing poetry in their teens, and a collection of poems by all three were published locally when Alfred was only 17. One of those brothers, Charles Tennyson Turner later married Louisa Sellwood, the younger sister of Alfred's future wife; the other was Frederick Tennyson. Another of Tennyson's brothers, Edward Tennyson, was institutionalised at a private asylum, where he died.
Education and First Publication
Tennyson was first a student of Louth Grammar School for four years (1816–1820) and then attended Scaitcliffe School, Englefield Green and King Edward VI Grammar School, Louth. He entered Trinity College, Cambridge in 1827,[4] where he joined a secret society called the Cambridge Apostles. At Cambridge Tennyson met Arthur Henry Hallam, who became his closest friend. His first publication was a collection of "his boyish rhymes and those of his elder brother Charles" entitled Poems by Two Brothers published in 1827.
In 1829 he was awarded the Chancellor's Gold Medal at Cambridge for one of his first pieces, "Timbuctoo." Reportedly, "it was thought to be no slight honour for a young man of twenty to win the chancellor's gold medal."He published his first solo collection of poems, Poems Chiefly Lyrical in 1830. "Claribel" and "Mariana", which later took their place among Tennyson's most celebrated poems, were included in this volume. Although decried by some critics as overly sentimental, his verse soon proved popular and brought Tennyson to the attention of well-known writers of the day, including Samuel Taylor Coleridge.
Return to Lincolnshire and Second Publication
In the spring of 1831 Tennyson's father died, requiring him to leave Cambridge before taking his degree. He returned to the rectory, where he was permitted to live for another six years, and shared responsibility for his widowed mother and the family. Arthur Hallam came to stay with his family during the summer and became engaged to Tennyson's sister, Emilia Tennyson.
In 1833, Tennyson published his second book of poetry, which included his well-known poem, The Lady of Shalott. The volume met heavy criticism, which so discouraged Tennyson that he did not publish again for 10 years, although he continued to write. That same year, Hallam died suddenly and unexpectedly after suffering a cerebral haemorrhage while on vacation in Vienna. Hallam's sudden and unexpected death in 1833 had a profound impact on Tennyson, and inspired several masterpieces, including "In the Valley of Cauteretz" and In Memoriam A.H.H., a long poem detailing the 'Way of the Soul'.
Tennyson and his family were allowed to stay in the rectory for some time, but later moved to High Beach, Essex in 1837. An unwise investment in an ecclesiastical wood-carving enterprise soon led to the loss of much of the family fortune. Tennyson then moved to London, and lived for a time at Chapel House, Twickenham.
Third Publication
In 1842, while living modestly in London, Tennyson published two volumes of Poems, of which the first included works already published and the second was made up almost entirely of new poems. They met with immediate success. Poems from this collection, such as Locksley Hall, "Tithonus", and "Ulysses" have met enduring fame. The Princess: A Medley, a satire on women's education, which came out in 1847, was also popular for its lyrics. W. S. Gilbert later adapted and parodied the piece twice: in The Princess (1870) and in Princess Ida (1884).
It was in 1850 that Tennyson reached the pinnacle of his career, finally publishing his masterpiece, In Memoriam A.H.H., dedicated to Hallam. Later the same year he was appointed Poet Laureate, succeeding William Wordsworth . In the same year (on 13 June), Tennyson married Emily Sellwood, whom he had known since childhood, in the village of Shiplake. They had two sons, Hallam Tennyson (b. 11 August 1852) – named after his friend – and Lionel (b. 16 March 1854).
Poet Laureate
After Wordsworth's death in 1850, and Samuel Rogers' refusal, Tennyson was appointed to the position of Poet Laureate, which he held until his own death in 1892, by far the longest tenure of any laureate before or since. He fulfilled the requirements of this position by turning out appropriate but often uninspired verse, such as a poem of greeting to Alexandra of Denmark when she arrived in Britain to marry the future King Edward VII. In 1855, Tennyson produced one of his best known works, "The Charge of the Light Brigade", a dramatic tribute to the British cavalrymen involved in an ill-advised charge on 25 October 1854, during the Crimean War. Other esteemed works written in the post of Poet Laureate include Ode on the Death of the Duke of Wellington and Ode Sung at the Opening of the International Exhibition.
Queen Victoria was an ardent admirer of Tennyson's work, and in 1884 created him Baron Tennyson, of Aldworth in the County of Sussex and of Freshwater in the Isle of Wight. Tennyson initially declined a baronetcy in 1865 and 1868 (when tendered by Disraeli), finally accepting a peerage in 1883 at Gladstone's earnest solicitation. He took his seat in the House of Lords on 11 March 1884.
Tennyson also wrote a substantial quantity of non-official political verse, from the bellicose "Form, Riflemen, Form", on the French crisis of 1859, to "Steersman, be not precipitate in thine act/of steering", deploring Gladstone's Home Rule Bill.
Tennyson was the first to be raised to a British Peerage for his writing. A passionate man with some peculiarities of nature, he was never particularly comfortable as a peer, and it is widely held that he took the peerage in order to secure a future for his son Hallam.
Thomas Edison made sound recordings of Tennyson reading his own poetry, late in his life. They include recordings of The Charge of the Light Brigade, and excerpts from "The splendour falls" (from The Princess), "Come into the garden" (from Maud), "Ask me no more", "Ode on the death of the Duke of Wellington", "Charge of the Heavy Brigade", and "Lancelot and Elaine"; the sound quality is as poor as wax cylinder recordings usually are.
Towards the end of his life Tennyson revealed that his "religious beliefs also defied convention, leaning towards agnosticism and pandeism": Famously, he wrote in In Memoriam: "There lives more faith in honest doubt, believe me, than in half the creeds." [The context directly contradicts the apparent meaning of this quote.] In Maud, 1855, he wrote: "The churches have killed their Christ." In "Locksley Hall Sixty Years After," Tennyson wrote: "Christian love among the churches look'd the twin of heathen hate." In his play, Becket, he wrote: "We are self-uncertain creatures, and we may, Yea, even when we know not, mix our spites and private hates with our defence of Heaven." Tennyson recorded in his Diary (p. 127): "I believe in Pantheism of a sort." His son's biography confirms that Tennyson was not an orthodox Christian, noting that Tennyson praised Giordano Bruno and Spinoza on his deathbed, saying of Bruno, "His view of God is in some ways mine," in 1892.
Tennyson continued writing into his eighties. He died on 6 October 1892 at Aldworth, aged 83. He was buried at Westminster Abbey. A memorial was erected in All Saints' Church, Freshwater. His last words were; "Oh that press will have me now!".
He was succeeded as 2nd Baron Tennyson by his son, Hallam, who produced an authorised biography of his father in 1897, and was later the second Governor-General of Australia.
The art of Tennyson's Poetry
Tennyson used a wide range of subject matter, ranging from medieval legends to classical myths and from domestic situations to observations of nature, as source material for his poetry. The influence of John Keats and other Romantic poets published before and during his childhood is evident from the richness of his imagery and descriptive writing. He also handled rhythm masterfully. The insistent beat of Break, Break, Break emphasises the relentless sadness of the subject matter. Tennyson's use of the musical qualities of words to emphasise his rhythms and meanings is sensitive. The language of "I come from haunts of coot and hern" lilts and ripples like the brook in the poem and the last two lines of "Come down O maid from yonder mountain height" illustrate his telling combination of onomatopoeia, alliteration and assonance:
The moan of doves in immemorial elms
And murmuring of innumerable bees.
Tennyson was a craftsman who polished and revised his manuscripts extensively. Few poets have used such a variety of styles with such an exact understanding of metre; like many Victorian poets, he experimented in adapting the quantitative metres of Greek and Latin poetry to English. He reflects the Victorian period of his maturity in his feeling for order and his tendency towards moralising and self-indulgent melancholy. He also reflects a concern common among Victorian writers in being troubled by the conflict between religious faith and expanding scientific knowledge. Like many writers who write a great deal over a long time, he can be pompous or banal, but his personality rings throughout all his works – work that reflects a grand and special variability in its quality. Tennyson possessed the strongest poetic power; he put great length into many works, most famous of which are Maud and Idylls of the King, the latter one of literature's treatments of the legend of King Arthur and The Knights of the Round Table.