A Newer World

 

When I decided to force myself to write, I looked for a title that would say something about me and what I have to say. I thought of several things, several of my favorite authors, but I finally settled on a phrase from Alfred, Lord Tennyson's “Ulysses.”

This poem contains not only one of my all-time favorite phrases, "to strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield," but also, as I read it again, I realized that it is a commentary on my current life. 

When first I read “Ulysses,” it must have been my senior year of high school. I had an extraordinary English teacher who pushed us to the brink (sometimes over, we adolescents thought.) I fastened upon the above quote at that time, not really taking in the rest of the poem; although I'm sure our teacher taught it to us. After all, I was seventeen years old, and the entire world was ahead of me. What context could I bring to this poem?

Later on, when I became a teacher, I taught English in addition to theatre (which was my true love.) I taught Brit Lit (as British Literature was referred to) during my first year of teaching which required me to return to all the literature that I had studied in my own senior year and really learn it. There is nothing like teaching a subject to make you get inside a piece.

I taught this poem to other hordes of 17 year olds during my English teaching career, but even then, I did not internalize the meaning until this last week when I re-read it again for the first time in years.

Most of us have heard of Ulysses. Some of us have even read of him. Ulysses is the Latinized name of Odysseus, the hero of Homer's epic poem The Odyssey. Unfortunately, my knowledge of the classics is woefully abysmal. Somehow, through my fractured education journey, I missed out on Greek mythology to my detriment. Percy Jackson has given me more of a grounding than all my years of school, sad to say.

Tennyson’s poem is more of a dramatic monologue.  Ulysses says "You and I are old." He is speaking to me. He describes his restlessness upon returning to his kingdom. Despite his reunion with his wife Penelope and his son Telemachus, Ulysses yearns to explore again. He knows his kingdom is in good hands with his son. Why should he stay?

Tennyson sees Ulysses realizing that he doesn’t have to, in modern jargon, retire to the porch rocking chair and become a spectator. "It is not too late to seek a newer world."

“tho'
We are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are;”

As long as he's alive, he doesn’t want to quit. He yearns for one more quest, “I cannot rest from travel.”Tennyson tells me that I may be 71 years, closing on 72, but “something ere the end,
Some work of noble note, may yet be done,”

I hope my work of noble note, may yet be done.

 

Here is “Uylysses” in its entirety. I hope it too, inspires you. 

Ulysses by Alfred, Lord Tennyson

It little profits that an idle king,
By this still hearth, among these barren crags,
Match'd with an aged wife, I mete and dole
Unequal laws unto a savage race,
That hoard, and sleep, and feed, and know not me.
I cannot rest from travel: I will drink
Life to the lees: All times I have enjoy'd
Greatly, have suffer'd greatly, both with those
That loved me, and alone, on shore, and when
Thro' scudding drifts the rainy Hyades
Vext the dim sea: I am become a name;
For always roaming with a hungry heart
Much have I seen and known; cities of men
And manners, climates, councils, governments,
Myself not least, but honour'd of them all;
And drunk delight of battle with my peers,
Far on the ringing plains of windy Troy.
I am a part of all that I have met;
Yet all experience is an arch wherethro'
Gleams that untravell'd world whose margin fades
For ever and forever when I move.
How dull it is to pause, to make an end,
To rust unburnish'd, not to shine in use!
As tho' to breathe were life! Life piled on life
Were all too little, and of one to me
Little remains: but every hour is saved
From that eternal silence, something more,
A bringer of new things; and vile it were
For some three suns to store and hoard myself,
And this gray spirit yearning in desire
To follow knowledge like a sinking star,
Beyond the utmost bound of human thought.
` This is my son, mine own Telemachus,
To whom I leave the sceptre and the isle,—
Well-loved of me, discerning to fulfil
This labour, by slow prudence to make mild
A rugged people, and thro' soft degrees
Subdue them to the useful and the good.
Most blameless is he, centred in the sphere
Of common duties, decent not to fail
In offices of tenderness, and pay
Meet adoration to my household gods,
When I am gone. He works his work, I mine.
` There lies the port; the vessel puffs her sail:
There gloom the dark, broad seas. My mariners,
Souls that have toil'd, and wrought, and thought with me—
That ever with a frolic welcome took
The thunder and the sunshine, and opposed
Free hearts, free foreheads—you and I are old;
Old age hath yet his honour and his toil;
Death closes all: but something ere the end,
Some work of noble note, may yet be done,
Not unbecoming men that strove with Gods.
The lights begin to twinkle from the rocks:
The long day wanes: the slow moon climbs: the deep
Moans round with many voices. Come, my friends,
'T is not too late to seek a newer world.
Push off, and sitting well in order smite
The sounding furrows; for my purpose holds
To sail beyond the sunset, and the baths
Of all the western stars, until I die.
It may be that the gulfs will wash us down:
It may be we shall touch the Happy Isles,
And see the great Achilles, whom we knew.
Tho' much is taken, much abides; and tho'
We are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are;
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.