English 11.67
Writing Exercise: Image Analysis & Issues of Representation

How do the three paintings in this slide show--derived from the same poem (below)--work to tell three different stories with significantly different characterizations and tensions?

 
John Keats's "La Belle Dame Sans Merci"
 
 
I.
O WHAT can ail thee, knight-at-arms,
   Alone and palely loitering?
The sedge has wither’d from the lake,
   And no birds sing.
 
II.
O what can ail thee, knight-at-arms!         5
   So haggard and so woe-begone?
The squirrel’s granary is full,
   And the harvest’s done.
 
III.
I see a lily on thy brow
   With anguish moist and fever dew,         10
And on thy cheeks a fading rose
   Fast withereth too.
 
IV.
I met a lady in the meads,
   Full beautiful—a faery’s child,
Her hair was long, her foot was light,         15
   And her eyes were wild.
 
V.
I made a garland for her head,
   And bracelets too, and fragrant zone;
She look’d at me as she did love,
   And made sweet moan.         20
 
VI.
I set her on my pacing steed,
   And nothing else saw all day long,
For sidelong would she bend, and sing
   A faery’s song.
 
VII.
She found me roots of relish sweet,         25
   And honey wild, and manna dew,
And sure in language strange she said—
  “ I love thee true.”
 
VIII.
She took me to her elfin grot,
   And there she wept, and sigh’d fill sore,         30
And there I shut her wild wild eyes
   With kisses four.
 
IX.
And there she lulled me asleep,
   And there I dream’d—Ah! woe betide!
The latest dream I ever dream’d         35
   On the cold hill’s side.
 
X.
I saw pale kings and princes too,
   Pale warriors, death-pale were they all;
They cried—“La Belle Dame sans Merci
   Hath thee in thrall!”         40
 
XI.
I saw their starved lips in the gloam,
   With horrid warning gaped wide,
And I awoke and found me here,
   On the cold hill’s side.
 
XII.
And this is why I sojourn here,         45
   Alone and palely loitering,
Though the sedge is wither’d from the lake,
   And no birds sing.

Paul Marchbanks
marchban@email.unc.edu