The Legend Endures...Lady Shalott/If I Die Young

There is nothing better to help with "Blog Block" than to have a friend make a request for information. That happened yesterday when my friend Anna wanted to know more about Alfred Lord Tennyson's (1809-1892) The Lady of Shalott. This interest was stirred by the contemporary song by The Band Perry, If I Die Young. I am thrilled when modern culture makes reference to old art and artists, creating renewed interest and exposure. I have doubt that The Lady of Shallot was on the song writer's mind when If I Die Young was written, but it was definitely on the mind of the producer of the song's video. And if you are familiar with the Tennyson ballad written in 1883, you can't listen to The Band Perry song without picturing his Lady, dressed in white, floating in a boat to her death.
Scenes from the video of The Band Perry's song, If I Die Young. A book of Tennyson's poetry is clutched to the singer's chest and the last scene shows the book opened to The Lady of Shalott. The lighting in this video reminds me of the light in Waterhouse's painting below.

Tennyson loved Arthurian subject matter and his poem was loosely based on the Arthurian legend of Elaine of Astolat, as told in a 13th century Italian novella, Donna di Scalotta. Tennyson's poem tells the story of a suffering young woman who lives in an isolated tower near King Arthur's castle. She is under the spell of an undisclosed curse allowing her to only see the outside world through it's reflection in a mirror. She spends her days singing songs and weaving a beautiful tapestry from the scenes she observes in the mirror...of life passing her by. But she says she is "half sick of shadows" and when the handsome Lancelot passes by her window with his black curls, it is more than she can bear to merely look at him in the mirror, so she goes to the window to have a real look. For all the trouble that Lancelot got women into, he must have been something to behold. The mirror cracks, the curse begins, and she sets herself adrift in a boat drifting downstream to Camelot and Lance, dying on the voyage as she sings her "last song". When her funeral barge arrives at Camelot, Lancelot sees her and acknowledges her beauty. Her dying wish has come true.

Alfred Lord Tennyson (1809-1892) Poet Laureate of England.

Some consider the Lady of Shalott to be a statement on the treatment of Victorian women but more truth may be in its allegory of the dilemma facing some artists, writers, and musicians- whether to create work about the world, therefore viewing the world in a filtered sense, or to enjoy the world by simply living in it. Tennyson himself explained the allegory of the poem as the "new-born love for something, for some one in the wide world from which she has been so long excluded, takes her out of the region of shadows into that of realities." Remember that Tennyson is also responsible for "tis better to have loved and lost, than never to have loved at all."

There can not be a discussion of the Lady of Shalott without turning to one of the three paintings done by Waterhouse on the subject. His Lady of Shalott done in 1888 shows careful attention to the setting described in the the poem. She is "robed in snowy white" and has written her name on the prow of the boat so that Lancelot, at least, will know who she is. She has the boat's loosened chain in her hand, symbolically freeing herself from her imprisonment. She has the trance-like stare Tennyson called the "glassy countenance." She takes with her the tapestry representing her prior life as an observer; a life worth surrendering for love. The tapestry represents the life she has dreamed of enjoying, but there should be no regrets for her last action somehow makes up for lost time. There is a haunting reference to this same idea in The Band Perry song..."what I never did is done". Waterhouse takes the artistic liberty of adding the crucifix and three candles reinforcing the funereal tone of her adventure. The single leaf that has fallen in her lap tells the whole story-she has fallen and will soon be dead. She has renounced her life for the love of Lancelot. She is a martyr for love. The lighting in Waterhouse's painting is beautiful and symbolic. The muted earth and gray skies around her are in contrast to to the richness of color in the tapestry. The broken reeds in the foreground are also highlighted to symbolize her impending death.
The appeal for me in Waterhouse's painting is in the strength of his Lady Shalott. She took action with the ultimate price, but it is worth it all. "What she never did is done".

So the legend continues...from Elaine of Astolat, to the Lady of Shalott, to The Band Perry. Watch the video of the song and read Tennyson's poem. Keep finding the old in the new.


Another famous Pre-Raphaelite painting of the Lady of Shallot was done by Arthur Hughes who takes the liberty of demonstrating the theme of the punished Victorian woman by adding the female voyeurs (including a nun) passing judgment as they stand on the bank of the river. The Lady is a definite "victim" in this one. I do like the transparent red heart on the front of the boat.

Lightning Debate Sheds Some Light

Does lightning come from the lightning kitty? More true than I thought....
image by Ben Grelle


I received a phone call tonight from two people wishing to settle a debate on the source of lightning. One person said lightning came from the sky and the other said it came from the ground. Dinner at a nice Thai restaurant was at stake. My first response was "from the sky, of course". But I couldn't disregard the notion of ground origination since it came from what I knew to be an intelligent person. Well it turns out they are both right and I learned something new. This is how it goes: a path of negative electricity (that we cannot see) starts in the sky and travels toward the ground in a series of spurts. Since objects on the ground (like lightning kitty) are generally positively charged, and we all know that opposites attract, an upward positively charged stream, or channel, is sent out from the unfortunate object about to be struck. When the two paths meet, electricity begins flowing and a return stroke zips back up to the sky. Here comes the part I never knew (or forgot)...it is the return stroke from the ground that produces the visible flash that we see in the sky....so I guess you would say the actual flash of lightning we see does come from the ground, but the invisible force that starts the whole process is from the sky. So the real question here may be "is it called lightning before we can see it?" Sounds like each person may have to pay for their own Thai dinner.