Early in 1848 in a letter to his friend Briggs, Lowell speaks of _The
Vision of Sir Launfal_ as "a sort of story, and more likely to be
popular than what I write generally. Maria thinks very highly of it."
And in another letter he calls it "a little narrative poem." In
December, 1848, it was published in a thin volume alone, and at once
justified the poet's expectations of popularity. The poem was an
improvisation, like that of his "musing organist," for it was written,
we are told, almost at a single sitting, entirely within two days. The
theme may have been suggested by Tennyson's _Sir Galahad_, but his
familiarity with the old romances and his love of the mystical and
symbolic sense of these good old-time tales were a quite ample source
for such suggestion. Moreover Lowell in his early years was much given
to seeing visions and dreaming dreams. "During that part of my life,"
he says, "which I lived most alone, I was never a single night
unvisited by visions, and once I thought I had a personal revelation
from God Himself." The _Fairie Queen_ was "the first poem I ever
read," he says, and the bosky glades of Elmwood were often transformed
into an enchanted forest where the Knight of the Red Cross, and Una
and others in medieval costume passed up and down before his wondering
eyes. This medieval romanticism was a perfectly natural accompaniment
of his intense idealism.
_The Vision of Sir Launfal_ and the _Fable for Critics_, published in
the same year, illustrate the two dominant and strikingly contrasted
qualities of his nature, a contrast of opposites which he himself
clearly perceived. "I find myself very curiously compounded of two
utterly distinct characters. One half of me is clear mystic and
enthusiast, and the other, humorist," and he adds that "it would have
taken very little to have made a Saint Francis" of him. It was the
Saint Francis of New England, the moral and spiritual enthusiast in
Lowell's nature that produced the poem and gave it power. Thus we see
that notwithstanding its antique style and artificial structure, it
was a perfectly direct and spontaneous expression of himself.
The allegory of the _Vision_ is easily interpreted, in its main
significance. There is nothing original in the lesson, the humility of
true charity, and it is a common criticism that the moral purpose of
the poem is lost sight of in the beautiful nature pictures. But a
knowledge of the events which were commanding Lowell's attention at
this time and quickening his native feelings into purposeful utterance
gives to the poem a much deeper significance. In 1844, when the
discussion over the annexation of Texas was going on, he wrote _The
Present Crisis_, a noble appeal to his countrymen to improve and
elevate their principles. During the next four years he was writing
editorially for the _Standard_, the official organ of the Anti-Slavery
Society, at the same time he was bringing out the _Biglow Papers_. In
all these forms of expression he voiced constantly the sentiment of
reform, which now filled his heart like a holy zeal. The national
disgrace of slavery rested heavily upon his soul. He burned with the
desire to make God's justice prevail where man's justice had failed.
In 1846 he said in a letter, "It seems as if my heart would break in
pouring out one glorious song that should be the gospel of Reform,
full of consolation and strength to the oppressed, yet falling gently
and restoringly as dew on the withered youth-flowers of the oppressor.
That way my madness lies, if any." This passionate yearning for reform
is embodied poetically in the _Vision_. In a broad sense, therefore,
the poem is an expression of ideal democracy, in which equality,
sympathy, and a sense of the common brotherhood of man are the basis
of all ethical actions and standards. It is the Christ-like conception
of human society that is always so alluring in the poetry and so
discouraging in the prose of life.
The following explanation appeared in the early editions of the poem
as an introductory note:
"According to the mythology of the Romancers, the San Greal,
or Holy Grail, was the cup out of which Jesus Christ partook
of the last supper with his disciples. It was brought into
England by Joseph of Arimathea, and remained there, an
object of pilgrimage and adoration, for many years in the
keeping of his lineal descendants. It was incumbent upon
those who had charge of it to be chaste in thought, word,
and deed; but, one of the keepers having broken this
condition, the Holy Grail disappeared. From that time it was
a favorite enterprise of the Knights of Arthur's court to go
in search of it. Sir Galahad was at last successful in
finding it, as may be read in the seventeenth book of the
Romance of King Arthur. Tennyson has made Sir Galahad the
subject of one of the most exquisite of his poems.
"The plot (if I may give that name to anything so slight) of
the following poem is my own, and, to serve its purposes, I
have enlarged the circle of competition in search of the
miraculous cup in such a manner as to include not only other
persons than the heroes of the Round Table, but also a
period of time subsequent to the date of King Arthur's
reign."
In the last sentence there is a sly suggestion of Lowell's
playfulness. Of course every one may compete in the search for the
Grail, and the "time subsequent to King Arthur's reign" includes the
present time. The Romance of King Arthur is the _Morte Darthur_ of Sir
Thomas Malory. Lowell's specific indebtedness to the medieval romances
extended only to the use of the symbol of consecration to some noble
purpose in the search for the Grail, and to the name of his hero. It
is a free version of older French romances belonging to the Arthurian
cycle. _Sir Launfal_ is the title of a poem written by Sir Thomas
Chestre in the reign of Henry VI, which may be found in Ritson's
_Ancient English Metrical Romances_. There is nothing suggestive of
Lowell's poem except the quality of generosity in the hero, who--
"gaf gyftys largelyche,
Gold and sylver; and clodes ryche,
To squyer and to knight."
One of Lowell's earlier poems, _The Search_, contains the germ of _The
Vision of Sir Launfal_. It represents a search for Christ, first in
nature's fair woods and fields, then in the "proud world" amid "power
and wealth," and the search finally ends in "a hovel rude" where--
"The King I sought for meekly stood:
A naked, hungry child
Clung round his gracious knee,
And a poor hunted slave looked up and smiled
To bless the smile that set him free."
And Christ, the seeker learns, is not to be found by wandering through
the world.
"His throne is with the outcast and the weak."
A similar fancy also is embodied in a little poem entitled _A
Parable_. Christ goes through the world to see "How the men, my
brethren, believe in me," and he finds "in church, and palace, and
judgment-hall," a disregard for the primary principles of his
teaching.
"Have ye founded your throne and altars, then,
On the bodies and souls of living men?
And think ye that building shall endure,
Which shelters the noble and crushes the poor?"
These early poems and passages in others written at about the same
time, taken in connection with the _Vision_, show how strongly the
theme had seized upon Lowell's mind.
The structure of the poem is complicated and sometimes confusing. At
the outset the student must notice that there is a story within a
story. The action of the major story covers only a single night, and
the hero of this story is the real Sir Launfal, who in his sleep
dreams the minor story, the Vision. The action of this story covers
the lifetime of the hero, the imaginary Sir Launfal, from early
manhood to old age, and includes his wanderings in distant lands. The
poem is constructed on the principles of contrast and parallelism. By
holding to this method of structure throughout Lowell sacrificed the
important artistic element of unity, especially in breaking the
narrative with the Prelude to the second part. The first Prelude
describing the beauty and inspiring joy of spring, typifying the
buoyant youth and aspiring soul of Sir Launfal, corresponds to the
second Prelude, describing the bleakness and desolation of winter,
typifying the old age and desolated life of the hero. But beneath the
surface of this wintry age there is a new soul of summer beauty, the
warm love of suffering humanity, just as beneath the surface of the
frozen brook there is an ice-palace of summer beauty. In Part First
the gloomy castle with its joyless interior stands as the only cold
and forbidding thing in the landscape, "like an outpost of winter;" so
in Part Second the same castle with Christmas joys within is the only
bright and gladsome object in the landscape. In Part First the castle
gates never "might opened be"; in Part Second the "castle gates stand
open now." And thus the student may find various details contrasted
and paralleled. The symbolic meaning must be kept constantly in mind,
or it will escape unobserved; for example, the cost of earthly things
in comparison with the generosity of June corresponds to the churlish
castle opposed to the inviting warmth of summer; and each symbolizes
the proud, selfish, misguided heart of Sir Launfal in youth, in
comparison with the humility and large Christian charity in old age.
The student should search for these symbolic hints, passages in which
"more is meant than meets the ear," but if he does not find all that
the poet may or may not have intended in his dreamy design, there need
be no detraction from the enjoyment of the poem.
Critical judgment upon _The Vision of Sir Launfal_ is generally severe
in respect to its structural faults. Mr. Greenslet declares that
"through half a century, nine readers out of ten have mistaken
Lowell's meaning," even the "numerous commentators" have "interpreted
the poem as if the young knight actually adventured the quest and
returned from it at the end of years, broken and old." This, however,
must be regarded as a rather exaggerated estimate of the lack of unity
and consistency in the poem. Stedman says: "I think that _The Vision
of Sir Launfal_ owed its success quite as much to a presentation of
nature as to its misty legend. It really is a landscape poem, of which
the lovely passage, 'And what is so rare as a day in June?' and the
wintry prelude to Part Second, are the specific features." And the
English critic, J. Churton Collins, thinks that "_Sir Launfal_, except
for the beautiful nature pictures, scarcely rises above the level of
an Ingoldsby Legend."
The popular judgment of the poem (which after all is the important
judgment) is fairly stated by Mr. Greenslet: "There is probably no
poem in American literature in which a visionary faculty like that [of
Lowell] is expressed with such a firm command of poetic background and
variety of music as in _Sir Launfal_ ... its structure is far from
perfect; yet for all that it has stood the searching test of time: it
is beloved now by thousands of young American readers, for whom it has
been a first initiation to the beauty of poetic idealism."
While studying _The Vision of Sir Launfal_ the student should be made
familiar with Tennyson's _Sir Galahad_ and _The Holy Grail_, and the
libretto of Wagner's _Parsifal_. Also Henry A. Abbey's magnificent
series of mural paintings in the Boston Public Library, representing
the Quest of the Holy Grail, may be utilized in the _Copley Prints_.
If possible the story of Sir Galahad's search for the Grail in the
seventeenth book of Sir Thomas Malory's _Morte Darthur_ should be
read. It would be well also to read Longfellow's _King Robert of
Sicily_, which to some extent presents a likeness of motive and
treatment.