Tennyson’s In Memoriam: Explanation 1 / Reference to Context

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"The dawn, the dawn", and died away;

And East and West, without a breath,

Mixt their dim lights, like life and death,

To broaden into boundless day.

 

These lines have been taken from Lord Tennyson’s elegiac poem In Memoriam.

The poet, after the untimely death of his intimate friend named Arthur Henry Hallam, was mentally broken down. That is to say, he composed these lines in the remembrance of his deceased chum.

In this elegy, we find Tennyson oscillating like a pendulum between the Christian faith in the immortality of Hallam’s soul and the scientific doubts that was typical of the Victorian Age. Here, the poet states that it is ‘dawn’; the night has ‘died away’. It feels as if ‘dawn’ is like a mirage that tries to allure him to even more despair. Moreover, both the Orient and the Occident become mixed up in life’s ‘dim lights’ breathlessly, just as ‘life and death’ become fused with each other in the natural cycle.

Moreover, it may be evident that there is no distinction between the East and the West, because the final destiny of each and every human being must be the same. Again, another elucidation may be found in this regard. That is to say, at this point of time, the rising sun in the east and his setting beams in the west epitomise emerging faith and fading doubt as if ‘life and death’ are getting merged with each other with ‘their dim lights’. Doubt constitutes the darkness of mind and soul, whereas the advent of light refers to the emergence of faith in immortality.

We see that Tennyson, gradually, overcomes his doubts, fears and uncertainties to come back to the usual course of life. Hence, the commotion raised in human hearts by demise becomes calmed down with the passage of time. We have to accept our ultimate end because it is too normal to nature. By and large, we must realise that this life is too frail and that everything does ‘broaden into boundless day’. The speaker, at the end of the day, has become competent to believe wholeheartedly in the religious faith.

This stanza is written in the rhyme scheme of ABBA that constitutes a quatrain. His step-by-step movement from doubt to faith is discernible here.

 

 

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