This week, I treated myself to a visit to Farringford House, in Freshwater on the Isle of Wight. It had been the home of Alfred Lord Tennyson for nearly forty years, from 1853 until his death in 1892.
Before we began the tour, the guide gleefully compared Tennyson’s fame to that of Taylor Swift, today. He bought the house and its 100 acre estate with the proceeds from the sale of a poem. YES! One poem – Maud – which garnered him £2,000 from his publisher and, along with other revenue from earlier works, helped him buy the estate for £6,900.
You may not know the poem, but the opening line may be familiar: Come into the garden, Maud.
It’s a romantic poem, in so far as the narrator is fixated by the daughter of a neighbouring squire, but there’s no Happy Ever After for the lovelorn chap. (Let’s call him ‘Ernest’ because he is, very.)
Ernest and Maud were childhood friends, with an unspoken understanding they were betrothed. That is, until her father drives his father to bankruptcy, and the latter kills himself.
Despite this conflict, Ernest and Maud have a romantic tryst in the garden but are discovered by her brother, who kicks off alarmingly – a fight develops into a duel, and Ernest kills the brother. Gah! More emotional conflict.
Ernest flees to France, presumably to avoid arrest and, whilst in hiding, learns his lovely Maud has now died of grief. Poor Ernest, lost his father, killed his potential brother-in-law and now the object of his deepest affection has died.
It’s at this point, you realize we’re reading a tragedy.
Ernest is so crazed that he is confined in an asylum for the insane, where he hallucinates he has been buried alive under the streets of London. Fortunately for him, Maud visits as an angel to urge him from his despair.
Finally, he decides that his recovery will best be achieved by heading off to fight in the Crimean War; national duty will be the salve to his deep personal trauma and selfish despair.
You have to hand it to those Victorians – they certainly knew how to rock the emotions and stir the blood.
It is an extraordinary poem, and not one I’d studied until now, but had it not been for Tennyson’s genius, popularity, and desire to escape the hoards of pestering fans in London, he would not have bought Farringford House, and I would not have had such a lovely time on Tuesday and thus been introduced to his poetry.
If you ever visit the island, I whole-heartedly encourage you to visit Farringford House.
