John Keats

La Belle Dame Sans Merci, 1819 (original version)

Oh what can ail thee, knight-at-arms,
    Alone and palely loitering?
The sedge has withered from the lake,
    And no birds sing.

Oh what can ail thee, knight-at-arms,
    So haggard and so woe-begone?
The squirrel's granary is full,
    And the harvest's done.

I see a lily on thy brow,
    With anguish moist and fever-dew,
And on thy cheeks a fading rose
    Fast withereth too.

I met a lady in the meads,
    Full beautiful - a faery's child,
Her hair was long, her foot was light,
    And her eyes were wild.

I made a garland for her head,
    And bracelets too, and fragrant zone;
She looked at me as she did love,
    And made sweet moan.

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.

She found me roots of relish sweet,
    And honey wild, and manna-dew,
And sure in language strange she said -
    'I love thee true'.

She took me to her elfin grot,
    And there she wept and sighed full sore,
And there I shut her wild wild eyes
    With kisses four.

And there she lulled me asleep
    And there I dreamed - Ah! woe betide! -
The latest dream I ever dreamt
    On the cold hill side.

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!'

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.

And this is why I sojourn here
    Alone and palely loitering,
Though the sedge is withered from the lake,
    And no birds sing.

Questions:

1. What made the ballad (as a genre) attractive to the Romantics?

2. La Belle Dame sans Merci is a dialogue between the two speakers. Who are they and what is their function?

3. Point to the elements of allegorical romance as well as gothic elements in Keats's poem. How do they shape the atmosphere in the ballad? What else makes this ballad a romantic poem?

4. The ballad introduces a number of signals associated with death/sleep as well as nature. How are they linked with the motif of love?

5. Keats's imagery ranges among all our physical sensations: sight, hearing, taste, touch, smell, temperature, weight, pressure, hunger, thirst, sexuality, and movement. Find examples in the poem.

6. Although the ballad is short (only twelve stanzas of four lines each, with an ABCB rhyme scheme), it is full of enigmas. Why is the knight associated with images of death? Why is he doomed to remain on the hillside? What is the cause of his fate? Who is responsible for his suffering? A beautiful fairy's child he “met in the meads” or some other belle Dame? And who is this fairy's child? Is she a truthful lover, or the belle Dame sans merci, or both? Who are pale kings, princess and warriors the knight encounters in his latest dream?

7. Is the dream (or vision) a positive experience which enriches the dreamer? or is it a negative experience which has the potential to cut off the dreamer from the real world and destroy him? What happens to the dreamers who awaken from the dream? La Belle Dame sans Merci is often interpreted as a poem about poets and poetic inspiration. What metaphors make such an interpretation possible?

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