Lamia and La Belle Dame

Lamia

 Think about the start of the poem, and the ways in which Keats places it in the past through his mention of magic and fairies. He is employing a similar technique to that used by Chaucer in The Wife of Bath’s Tale. Again, there are echoes of Shakespeare, here with A Midsummer Night’s Dream.

 The meaning of the word ‘Lamia’ is a monster, often thought to suck blood, especially of children—in other words, Keats is romanticising a demon here. How does he create sympathy for Lamia at the start of the story, so that the reader becomes engaged by her? One of the main critical debates about the poem is whether the reader is supposed to sympathise with Lamia, and if so, to what extent.

 Look closely at the language used about Lamia by Lycius—he calls her ‘goddess’ and ‘naiad’ and ‘Pleiad’ (a star). What do all these terms imply about her? Why does she then ‘play’ a woman instead?

 The poem’s opening creates what is in effect a frame-narrative, as we find out Lamia’s origin, something unknown to Lycius. How does this gentle introduction contrast with the ending?

 What about the authorial intrusions into the narrative (most noticeable at the start of part 2). Why does Keats include these, and how do they affect the way the story is told?

 Keats uses heroic couplets (rhymed couplets of iambic pentameter) for this poem. What might this imply about the nature and authority of the story? How is it different from the ballad form of ‘La Belle Dame’ or the Spenserian stanzas of ‘The Eve of St Agnes’?

 What about the division of the story into two parts? How does this affect the narrative? Is there a lacuna between the parts—the equivalent of an authorly ellipsis that passes delicately over the lovemaking implied?

La Belle Dame Sans Merci

 Another framed narrative—though here it is a single-ended frame narrative, as although we hear the first speaker’s question answered (and repeated) by the knight at the end of the poem, we do not actually hear the voice of this first speaker again.

 It is striking how the poem creates a space for the voice of the knight, by leaving the three first stanzas unanswered. Sometimes readers do not notice the shift of speaker here—be sure that you do!

 The form of the poem is a ballad, and it has the typical features of this genre in terms of the four-line stanza, the ABCB rhyme, the archaic language, the simplicity of character and construction, the inverted syntax—what about it is not typical of a ballad?

 The structure of the poem is circular—the final stanza repeats (in part) the first. How does this repetition cause the reader to reflect upon the knight’s experience?

 The metre consists of three lines of iambic tetrameter, with a final line of varying syllabic length containing three strong stresses. How does this final line, and the strong stresses, affect the poem? How does it slow down the reader, and make us reflect on the words in that final line?

 Notice how the characters in the poem are in part stereotypical—the knight is never named, the lady’s name is a description rather than a personal name. How does this affect the message of the poem? Is Keats making more general statements about the relationships between men and women, and the ways that they view each other?

 Notice the semantic repetition as well as the lexical repetition—for instance ‘haggard’ echoes ‘starved’.