37 pages • 1 hour read
James Russell LowellThe Vision of Sir Launfal
Fiction | Poem | Adult | Published in 1848A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
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BetaSymbols & Motifs
The Seasons
The seasons are symbolic of the natural life cycle. The June day depicted in the Prelude to Part First represents early summer, which is the most beautiful of the seasons to the speaker. This particular day represents all “perfect days” in the season. The implication is that these days are not forced. They appear without effort, as they always have and always will.
There are also many references to the passage of time and examples of life renewing itself in the natural order of things. Prelude to Part First depicts the inevitable cycle of regrowth and restoration, and how this is the natural flow of life to which humans should succumb in order to forget their worries and feel at one with the Earth.
The speaker references the symbolism of other seasons as well. The following line, “[w]armed with the new wine of the year” (Line 78), would seemingly reference autumn, the season of the grape harvest and therefore wine production. The final word in the excerpt is “snow,” clearly a winter element. These references to seasons other than summer may seem incongruous but perhaps imply that it is not only in June, or early summer, that nature and humanity can be in harmony.
In contrast, winter is depicted in the last two parts of the poem. Winter is harsh and unyielding to Launfal, especially because he is denied access to the hall where Christmas is celebrated. Nature itself is still shown in a positive light, with the busy brook adapting to the icy temperatures, but the season of winter is a metaphor for the lack of compassion and warmth that humans often show to each other. When Launfal develops empathy for the poor leper, humanity comes closer to God and summer returns, in harmony with this internal growth.
Water
There are many water-related images in the poem. Water is, of course, an essential component for life to exist, and here it often symbolizes life itself. In Prelude to Part First, the word “glisten” implies a wet surface, and summer’s “deluge” initially refers to sunlight but is a word normally associated with an abundance of water. In the penultimate stanza, the symbol of water comes to the fore:
Now is the high-tide of the year,
And whatever of life hath ebbed away
Comes flooding back with a ripply cheer,
Into every bare inlet and creek and bay;
Now the heart is so full that a drop over-fills it (Lines 57-61).
The speaker uses the metaphor of water as life itself, and this contrasts with the word “barren,” or dry, in the next two lines. When the heart is full of joy, it can overflow like a cup full of liquid. This echoes the word “chalice,” which is a drinking vessel and a reference to the Holy Grail of Arthurian legend. The cup with which Launfal offers water to the leper in Part Second represents the Holy Grail in that it is a manifestation of charity and Godliness.
“Sap” and “wine” are other watery manifestations of vitality and life. Water is present too as a major element of the landscape: “streams are flowing, / That the river is bluer than the sky” (Lines 71-72). These positive images contrast with the unhappy human “tears” in the section.
In the Prelude to Part Second, the wintry scene focuses in great detail on the actions of the brook. The icy formations that the personified stream builds represent shelter as well as art and are compared favorably to the creations of humankind. Water again is given power and importance, and the humble stream provides the offering of Launfal to the leper in his moment of epiphany at the end of the poem: “He broke the ice on the streamlet's brink” (Line 296). The simple water becomes as powerful as red wine that would quench the leper’s “thirsty soul” (Line 301).
