La Belle Dame Sans Merci. A Ballad Flashcards
What does the title mean?
The beautiful woman without feeling or compassion
What is the poem about?
A traveller comes across a sick dying knight and asks him what’s wrong. After third verse, the speaker switches to the knights who tells about when he fell in love with a woman who is half human half fairy. She bewitched him with drugs and he is deserted on the hillside.
Metaphor for heartbreak, and supernatural nature of love. Drug like, phycodelic language
Why has Keats made the first and the last verse very similar?
To add a cyclical nature. Reminder that from the beginning of time we have always chosen love so there is no saving
It also might mirror the cycle of the fairy constantly using men
Repetition of heartbreak, get in relationship then it ends. Supported by the idea of seasons that there is always a winter coming
What is a Femme Fatal?
A woman who has power over a man
Why does Keats use archaic language?
- enforces idea of being set in medieval times where knights were around - heartbreak has been happening since even this far back
- hightens the romance and sense of mystery for this strange fairy being. Supernatural
- adds gravitas
Why and how is the love interest perceived as supernatural?
Using archaic language and her repetition of a strange song
The knight does this as he is embarrassed that she has impacted her. Contrast to what a knight actually is like to show the power live can have on someone. Entertaining characters to show balance of power in relationships, the man is supposed to be in control and the woman submissive
Could also refer to the drugs and hypnotic state he is in
I
‘O what can ail thee, knight-at-arms,
Alone and palely loitering?
The sedge has withered from the lake,
And no birds sing.’
- from point of view of unseen speaker
- ‘o’ starting with long exclamation, emphasising how sick he is
- semantic field of illness, unlike a heroic knight. Pathetic fallacy and winter links to his illness
- withered implies its set in winter, uncomfortable for the knight to be in all alone. The dark place love takes you
- very similar to last stanza, cycle
II
‘O what can ail thee, knight at arms,
So haggard and so woe-begone?
The squirrel’s granary is full,
- repetition of first line but no longer shocked, more concerned - shows how a story can change with context
- archaic language ‘ail’ ‘woe-begone’
- ‘haggard’ is unusual to describe a knight - power of love on even the strongest. Described as an old woman, emasculated
- lots of questions, the knight has been unable to answer
- it describes the natural world sorting itself out - he’s hopeless and unable to move on
III
I see lily on thy brow,
With anguish moist and fever-dew,
And on thy cheeks a fading rose
fast withereth too.’
- ‘lily’ white and pure - deathly pale. Synonymous to mourning at funerals. Dying
- ‘anguish moist and fever-dew’ very ill, Keats is aware of sickness of TB
- ‘fever-dew’ archaic cyntax (order of words)
- ‘cheeks a fading rose’ implies female beauty
IV
‘I met a lady in the meads,
Full beautiful - a faery’s child,
Her hair was long, her foot was light,
And her eyes were wild.’
-new speaker of the knight - answering first speakers questions
- past tense, story
- ‘full beautiful’ not a full sentence, no pronoun, can’t put into words her perfection or a pronoun to what she is. In awe
- ‘-‘ pause to dwell
- ‘a faery’s child’ delicate over worldly, innocent, playful, vulnerable
- ‘her foot was light’ like flying, overworldly - is he over exaggerating?
V
‘I made a Garland for her head,
And bracelets too, and fragrant zone;
She looked at me as she did love,
And made sweet moan’
- ‘bracelet’ and ‘garland’ =circular, never ending cycle
- natural, simple imagery
- ‘as she did love’ ambiguous, him loving her or her him?
- ‘sweet moan’ ‘sweet’ is beautiful and natural. Sexual, or he can’t understand what she is saying
There’s a repetition of her making strange noises which he interprets ans singing or moaning but is really her putting him in a trance
VI
‘I set her on my pacing steed,
And nothing else saw all day long,
For sidelong would she bend and sing
A faery’s song.’
Saucy 6
-‘ pacing steed’ penis - egotistical man, man mixed with knight. Lying?
- ‘nothing else saw all day long’ blinded by beauty/ orgasm
- ‘she bend, and sing’ sex, him being in control when he wasn’t in reality. Starts with ‘I’
VII
‘She found me roots of relish sweet,
And honey wild, and manna-dew,
And sure in language strange she said -
I love thee true’.
He put a lot of thought in his gifts but it looks like she’s just picking whatever she can find but he is making it out to be so mystical and amazing.
Are her gifts drugs? Mushrooms? Dangerous and unfamiliar
Natural and foresty. Witches made potions
- starts with ‘she’ she is in control
- ‘roots of relish sweet’ super natural, but natural - truthfulness when he admits she was in control
- ‘honey’ easy to overindulge
- ‘manna-dew’ biblical, the bread god gave to Moses - gravitas
- ‘sure’ just what he wants to hear not what she said. Trying to justify why he fell for her
Viii
‘She took me to her elfin trot,
And there she wept and sighed full sore,
And there i shut her wild wild eyes
With kisses four.’
- ‘she took me’ she is active he is the possession. He is drugged? Switch gender roles
- supernatural language - drug induced?
- could the last three lines be misinterpreted, she just used him? God forbid a femme fatal is anything other than supernatral
- ‘wept’ sexual? As if she is the one in pain. He wants her to feel guilty for what she has done to him
- ‘wild, wild’ wants her to be so shocked with sex, he thinks he’s on top when she is. Linked to ‘eyes’ which re windows to the soul, truly evil.
IX
‘And there she lulled me asleep
And there i dreamed - Ah! Woe betide! -
The latest dream i ever dreamt
On the cold hill side.’
‘Lulled’ is euphonic and gentle - drug like
- repetition of ‘dreamed’ and ‘dreamt’, is this a fantasy or hallucination - emphasises her whimsical nature and the drug use
- two ‘!’ - trapped in this fatal nightmare. Unusual caesura which emphasises the onomatopoeic language. The ‘!’ Emphasises danger and warning
- ‘on a cold hill side’. Monosyllabic - harsh, no more whimsical language. Blunt death
