haps but for it would never have written the Prisoner of Chillon.’ Writing, as he always wrote, at white heat, and in the manner of improvisation (the composition of this poem took two days), Byron has yet produced here a masterpiece both in structure and in style. The poet's theme is to depict the psychology of the prisoner, -a political prisoner, noble-minded and innocent of crime. There is very little action; there is very little ornament; the narrative evolves from within, and is presented with high dramatic fidelity, and with subtle gradation and progression. The situation in itself is bare and simple; the art with which the poet developes it is masterly. Who else, except Dante perhaps, as in the Ugolino episode, could do so much with so little? Note how touch is added to touch in just the right order in the building up of the poem. The irregular stanzas or verse paragraphs are the units of structure. The first stanza is introductory, presenting the personages of the poem and centering the interest in Bonivard, the narrator; in II is the Scene (the Dungeon), and, to fix our interest, a glance forward at the psychological state of the prisoner after all is over: how this state came about is the subject of the poem; III presents the details of the situation of the three brothers in prison, and the first effect of confinement ("But even these at length grew cold"); IV and V tell of the younger and the middle brother, two types of character, both ill-adapted to endure such a fate (effect of pathos through contrast; the central character heightened through picture of his devotion to them); VI the Place again, remote and scanty echoes of free Nature emphasizing by contrast their situation; VII death of the middle brother; his burial, and the effect of this on the mind of Bonivard suggested; VIII death of the younger brother, and emotional climax of the poem; a passage of pure pathos; Dantean touch ("I found him not "); IX effect on the Prisoner; reaction of apathy; X reaction of life; revival to feeling for nature; exquisite touch in the incident of the bird;* XI amelioration; XII life renewed, but with a difference; Nature the re * Cf. the similar situation and device in Coleridge's 'Ancient Mariner'; the Mariner's mental state, ll. 244 f.; and the awakening of his soul through the influence of the water-snakes, 11. 272 f., and of the sky-lark, 1, 359. storer; XIV liberation subdued ending in the manner of Wordsworth (diminuendo). The poem is one of pathos merely, in the primary sense of the term. The characters suffer, but do not act. Consequently the treatment, as here given, must be quasi-lyrical (dramatic monologue) and brief. Even thus, as Sir Walter Scott wrote, the poem is more powerful than pleasing. The form and style are in admirable keeping with the subject: vigorous octosyllabics (four-stress couplets) with frequent variations (contrast the more softly melodious movement of Coleridge's Christabel '); little imagery, and that closely directed to enforcing the emotional effect; otherwise straightforward realistic speech with no surplusage. Compare the narrative manner of 'Mazeppa.' What is the effect in each case of the various departures from the couplet rhyme in the poem? from the regular iambic flow of the rhythm? Why are certain lines of two and three feet instead of four? Is the alliteration employed artistic and effective? 155: Sonnet on Chillon, 2-4. The general meaning is made clearer in the first version of these lines: "Brightest in dungeons, Liberty thou art, Cf. the Giaour'; "To me she gave her heart, that all 156: The Poem, 18. The six sons and their father. 156 27 ff. Shelley's prose description of Chillon in his 'History of a Six Weeks' Tour' (taken in Byron's company, June, 1816) is as follows: "We passed on to the Castle of Chillon, and visited its dungeons and towers. These prisons are excavated below the lake; the principal dungeon is supported by seven columns, whose branching capitals support the roof. Close to the very walls, the lake is 800 feet deep; iron rings are fastened to these columns Close to this long and lofty dungeon was a narrow cell, and beyond it one larger and far more lofty and dark, supported upon two unornamented arches. Across one of these arches was a beam, now black and rotten, on which .... prisoners were hung in secret. I never saw a monument more terrible of that cold and inhuman tyranny, which it has been the delight of man to exercise over man [cf. 11. 136-7 of the poen] . . . "-Cf. Byron's prose description in note to 1. III below. 157: 69 ff. For the contrast between the two brothers, cf. Ariosto, Orlando Furioso,' c. xviii, st. 166. 157:57. the pure elements of earth, is apparently a vague and general phrase for 'the elementary things which the earth gives to all, as air and water and sunshine,' 158 105. gulf: used with the sense given it by Byron in · Sardanapalus,' IV, 1 : 159: III. "All that the dead dare gloomily raise up From their black gulf to daunt the living." "The Château de Chillon is situated between Clarens and Villeneuve, which last is at one extremity of the Lake of Geneva. On its left are the entrances of the Rhone, and opposite are the heights of Meillerie and the range of Alps above Bouveret and St. Gingo. Near it, on a hill behind, is a torrent; below it, washing its walls, the lake has been fathomed to the depth of 800 feet (French measure); within it are a range of dungeons in which the early reformers, and subsequently prisoners of state, were confined. Across one of the vaults is a beam black with age, on which we were informed that the condemned were formerly executed. In the cells are seven pillars, or rather eight, one being half merged in the wall; in some of these are rings for the fetters and the fettered. In the pavement the steps of Bonnivard have left their traces. He was confined here sev [Byron's note. the very rock hath rock'd. The play on words is reproduced in Manfred' I, i: "with the shock Rocking their Alpine brethren." For the stylistic point, compare Shakspere's Sonnet civ: "For as you were when first your eye I eyed." Also 'Richard II,' act V, iii, 85: "This fester'd joint cut off, the rest rest sound." 161: 186 ff. What points of resemblance are there between this passage and the account of the death of the shipwrecked boy in Don Juan' II, lxxxviii (above, p. 254)? ... 162 215, 216. The last link. The only one that was the eternal brink. The brink of eternity. left. : 163 245. ff. For the conception and the images, cf. Byron's poem 'Darkness' (above, p. 220). 163: 265. which.' through the crevice = 'in_the_crevice through 164: 292. twice so doubly lone. If it had been his brother's soul, he would never have left him a second time, and consequently doubly lonely and alone from the loss of so bright a hope. 164: 294 ff. Is the simile as expanded merely ornamental and a flourish, or are ll. 295-299 strictly connected with the picture of the prisoner's mental condition? Cf. Wordsworth's 'To a Daffodil' (1804): "I wandered lonely as a cloud." 165 323. Cf. Dryden's version of Chaucer's tale of Palamon and Arcite, where Palamon, looking out from the tower of his prison, "sighed, and turned his eyes, because he knew 'Twas but a larger jail he had in view." 165: 331. Poet's Epitaph': The quiet of a loving eye. Cf. Wordsworth, ‘A "The harvest of a quiet eye." 165: 336. Is the Rhone blue where it enters the lake, not far from Chillon? Or is Byron thinking of its color at some other point in its course? Cf. Childe Harold,' III, lxxi (of the Rhone at Geneva): By the blue rushing of the arrowy Rhone." But cf. also Don Juan,' XIV, lxxxvii : "Or like the Rhone by Leman's waters wash'd, It is a matter of common observation that water which, under certain conditions of atmosphere and light will appear green or other color, under other conditions will appear blue. 165 339. The town is perhaps Vevey (five miles down the lake), or it may be Meillerie (ten miles below on the opposite shore). The latter is especially mentioned in Byron's note tol. III, above. 166: 341. "Between the entrances of the Rhone and Villeneuve, not far from Chillon, is a very small island; the only one I could perceive, in my voyage round and over the lake, within its circumference. It contains a few trees (I think not above three), and from its singleness and diminutive size has a peculiar effect upon the view." [Byron's note.-The island referred to (Ile de la Paix) is artificial and did not exist in Bonivard's time, but was built about a century ago. On it three elms were planted. MANFRED. 'Manfred' was begun during Byron's Swiss tour of 1816. It was finished (in the original version) by February 15, 1817. In its revised form it was published in June, 1817. ... We are assured in the 'Recollections of Byron,' ascribed to the Countess Guiccioli, that "the origin of 'Manfred' lies in the midst of sublime Alpine scenery, where, on a rock, Bryon discovered an inscription bearing the names of two brothers, one of whom had murdered the other at that spot." In Byron's Swiss Journal, September 22 [1816] appears this entry: "Left Thoun in a boat . . . passed Interlachen; entered upon a range of scenes beyond all description or previous conception. Passed a rock; inscription-two brothers-one murdered the other; just the place for it." Nothing of this story appears in 'Manfred.' It, however, perhaps suggested the theme of remorse, the poet first substituting, it may be, a sister, Astarte, for the murdered brother, and then transferring the actual deed of blood from Manfred's to some other hands. So II, iii, 120: ‘ I have shed Blood, but not hers-and yet her blood was shed." However this may be, there is no doubt that the Alps furnished the chief inspiration of the poem. "As to the germs of 'Manfred,'" Byron wrote from Venice, "they may be found in the Journal which I sent to Mrs. Leigh, shortly before I left Switzerland. I have the whole scene of 'Manfred before me, as ... |