In this incredibly short poem, it is known that the Lotos-Eaters try to get the guests from the ship to eat the fruit they have by offering it as a gift. The guests then eat the fruit and are manipulated into never wanting to return to their homes because of the way the Lotos-Eaters manipulated them. I analyzed this story as paralleling the Bible and the story of Adam and Eve. Though this comparison is not exact, there are elements that parallel what takes place in the story of Adam and Eve.
The first comparison is the location/scenery of the place where they are manipulated. In the Bible, Adam and Eve are in a beautiful forest where they are manipulated by the serpent, and in "The Lotos-Eaters" the guests are awed by the streams and snowy mountaintops. "They saw the gleaming river seaward flow…three silent pinnacles of aged snow…the charmed sunset lingered low adown in the red West…" (p. 623). This is significant because it is easier to be manipulated in a beautiful environment as shown by Adam and Eve when they were manipulated into eating the fruit by the serpent, just as the sea-guests were manipulated into eating the strange fruit by the lotos-eaters.
The second comparison is that the characters of Adam & Eve and the serpent are paralleled nicely with the characters of the sea-guests and lotos-eaters. The sea-guests are the naive characters that don't know they shouldn't eat the fruit, just as (Adam &) Eve were when they mistakenly ate the fruit. "Branches they bore of that enchanted stem. laden with flower and fruit, whereof they gave to each …the gushing of the wave far far away did not seem to mourn and rave" [meaning they did not miss their home anymore because they ate it, unknowingly] (p. 623). Although Eve had a fair warning not to be manipulated, she still ate the fruit just as the sea-guests did. The lotos-eaters would then obviously resemble the serpent because they were the ones manipulating the sea-guests into eating the bad fruit.
It's not that the sea-guests eating the fruit was ultimately as bad as Adam and Eve eating the fruit, but it tore the guests away from their home and could ultimately be bad for their families back home. If all of the guests visiting the island fell into this trap, it could be harmful to their people and they could lose their population to what is assumed to be to the enemy. This parallel is significant because it shows the biblical knowledge that Tennyson had while constructing this poem, and he may have just wanted this poem to be a spin-off of the original story of Adam and Eve.
Questions:
1. Is this just a small story part of a bigger story?
2. Just a thought: maybe the lotos-eaters were just previous guests the island had given the fruit to, and now they want others of their same kind to join them?
I really like the comparison to Adam and Eve. After eating the fruit, it says, "'We will return no more'; And all at once they sang, 'Our island home is far beyond the wave; we will no longer roam.'", or, basically, that they can no longer return home, which is what happened after Adam and Eve ate the fruit. The thing that's interesting to me is that it's parallel with the Odyssey, in which, after years of suffering and turmoil, a few lucky people DO finally make it home. Perhaps by making these parallels Tennyson is suggesting that maybe we will find Eden on earth again?
ReplyDeleteThe parallel to Adam and Eve also makes me think the reverse - the fruit and the Lotus-eaters are the equivalent of the serpent tempting them, but eating the fruit has the opposite effect that it had for Adam and Eve. Adam and Eve were banished from the garden and a life without struggle, but when the guests eat the fruit, they become consumed with the idea of staying on the island where there is no struggle and never want to leave.
ReplyDeleteWell, Chase and Alex basically said everything that I was thinking. This is really a great blog! I love the thought that the lotos-eaters are previous guests who ate the fruit they are now offering. I think that opens up a trail of thought about how Adam and Eve passed down their sin on to the rest of humanity. Yet another parallel to the poem?
ReplyDeleteAs to your first question, the first gloss on page 623 says that the poem is based on a short episode from the Odyssey.