Elegy

An elegy is a poem of serious reflection, typically written as a mournful lament for the dead. Conventionally, elegies move past the idea of a lament or outrage at the wrongness of the world and instead offer a journey that gradually moves towards (and sometimes transcends) consolation (Perry 116). Elegies can be thought of in relation to Sigmund Freud’s “work of mourning”, in the sense that once completed, the work of grief sets “the ego… free and uninhibited again”, as “respect for reality gains the day” (cited Perry 116). Through Freud’s model, successful recovery from mourning can seem complete and healthy. But, in situations of actual grief that inspires great elegiac poetry, mourning “doesn’t exhibit merely a recuperative return to the world, but rather a kind of double headedness, which recognizes the need to move on, while staying true to the dead” (Perry 116).

The elegy originated in Classic Greece, where it originally referred to the meter of a poem, rather than its contents. First known as the elegiac distich, it referred to the distinctive meter of a hexameter followed by a pentameter. The terms //elegion// and //elegia// in Classic Greek denoted verse in elegiac meter regardless of contents. //Elegos// in classic Greek, however, referred to a sad song or lament sung to the accompaniment of a flute that paid no regard to meter (Preminger “Elegiac Distich” 321). The term elegy continued to be used in the sixteenth and seventeenth century to refer to a variety of poems, including Petrarchan sonnets as well as laments, all with the continuing underlying theme of meditation. It was not until Milton’s pastoral elegy "Lycidas" (1637) that elegy was categorized as a separate genre, focusing on the lament for the dead and the search for contemplation of some permanent principle (Preminger “Elegy” 324).

Elegies, in order to reach consolation, often focus on thinking well of the dead and the idea that the deceased are perhaps better off in death. Predating Victorian times, this was often thought of in religious or Christian terms, as if dying is not simply the end of one’s life, but rather the beginning of an afterlife. Pastoral poems also found comfort in death but, rather than using religion, they appealed to the idea that death is being made one with nature. The notion of death as persistence with the world’s natural order is another feature of a classical Pastoral elegy, as found in Milton’s "Lycidas" (Perry 116). Unfortunately for Victorians, consolation was not so easily achieved, as they had found themselves in a period of disenchantment. The supernaturalism of the afterlife was beginning to be regarded with skepticism, partly due to the debate around narratives of evolution, most famously represented by Charles Darwin’s //On the// //Origin of Species// (1859), which challenged the literal truth of Genesis while uncovering a remote pre-human past (Rosenberg 2). Discoveries such as Darwin’s not only led to a changing view of religion, but they also altered the view of nature from a magical, sublime view to a scientific one (Perry 117).

The Victorians lived in an age that John Stuart Mill termed “an age of transition” caught between a vanishing past and an uncertain future (Rosenberg 1). The uncertainty of the future and the disappearance of the past caused them to have an obsession with death and the deceased. The art of death and commemoration took many forms while Victorians struggled to cling to the memory of the deceased: elegies, deathbeds and graveyards in paintings and novels, collection of last words, grandeur necropolises, and elaborate mourning rituals (Perry 117). One example of these elaborate mourning rituals was practiced by the Queen following the death of Albert: each night his clothes were laid out with hot water and a clean towel. In this sense the Queen’s own display of bereavement is representative of the Victorian’s own elegiac feelings (Perry 115). The most popular and influential elegies of the Victorian period was Alfred Tennyson’s //In Memoriam// (1850), written after the tragic and sudden death of his dear friend Arthur Harold Hallam. Selling 5,000 copies in just weeks, the poem also caught the attention and admiration of Queen Victoria herself (Perry 115). Upon the death of her husband Albert, Queen Victoria found consolation in the verses, second only to the consolation she found in the Bible. This work of poetry was one of the longest Victorian elegies and, due to the Queen’s admiration for the poet, led to Tennyson’s appointment as Poet Laureate.

Some prominent examples of elegies written in the Victorian period include: Felicia Hemans “The Grave of a Poetess” (1828) Letitia Elizabeth Landon “Felicia Hemans” (1838) Charlotte Bronte “On the Death of Emily Jane Bronte” (1848) Alfred Tennyson //In Memoriam// (1850) Matthew Arnold “Memorial Verses” (1850) -- C.H./Engl386/UVic/Fall2012

Preminger, Alex, et al, eds. "Elegiac Distich." //The New Princeton Encyclopedia of Poetry and Poetics//. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1993. 321. Gale Virtual Reference Library. Web. 24 Oct. 2012. Preminger, Alex, et al, eds. "Elegy." //The New Princeton Encyclopedia of Poetry and Poetics//. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1993. 322-325. Gale Virtual Reference Library. Web. 24 Oct. 2012 Perry, Seamus. "Elegy." //Companion to Victorian Poetry//. Eds. Richard Cronin, Alison Chapman and Antony H. Harrison. Oxford: Blackwell, 2002. 115-33. Print. Rosenberg, John D. //Elegy for an Age: The Presence of the Past in Victorian Literature//. London: Anthem Press, 2005. Print.
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