The rape of the lock. brief explanation

Canto 1,2,3,4,5, explained , brief summary, main characters and there role in the Canto , demythologising epic poetry ,mock epic strategies.

1. T h e R a p e o f the L o c k e x p l ain a l l 5 Canto . P r e s e nted b y M a h ir Pari Goswami ( T e a ching assistant ) G o p i nathji M a h i la College Sihor

2. Canto -I In this first canto, Pope exemplifies quite accurately what the mock-epic is and how the poet uses the epic conventions to downgrade and ridicule the epic genre proper [L. 79-98]. Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey and Virgil’s Aeneid present gods and goddesses that guide heroes in their adventures and substantially condition their decision-making. We could say that epic heroes are strongly controlled by the gods, who decisively intervene in most human events. In The Rape of the Lock, we perceive the same situation, although the connotations are completely different. Sylphs teach women to exalt their beauty and to cultivate their physical appearance .

3. In the final section of the first canto [L. 115-148], Pope focuses on the way Belinda eventually wakes up and gets off from bed. Once she gets up, Belinda enters the toilette and there the reader encounters a wide range of cosmetic products. One of the most important details of these final lines is how Pope identifies Belinda’s dressing table with a sort of sanctuary or religious shrine .

4. Main characters and their role in the canto Pope introduces two main characters and a series of minor figures in this first canto: we have already mentioned Belinda, the main protagonist and on whom the action of the poem is sustained. From the reading of this first section, we are able to put together her basic physical and psychological features.

5. Besides Belinda, Pope also introduces Ariel, a mysterious creature that, towards the end of the canto, addresses the reader and briefly anticipates the main traits of the supernatural characters that are going to appear in the poem. Their main function is to watch over the “belles” and “beaux” in order to protect their honour and integrity, and, at the same time, to encourage them to embellish their image. This creature also enables Pope to demystify the role that high deities such as Zeus traditionally played out in classical epic poetry.

6. Ariel resembles Zeus, since both of them observe human actions from above. But there all similarities end. Ariel is an insignificant sylph, Zeus is an almighty deity; Ariel contemplates a trivial fact that is about to take place, Zeus observes the horrors and calamities of war, death and destruction.

7. Demythologising epic poetry: mock-epic strategies However, the eighteenth century was not a particularly suitable time for epic, due mainly to the absence of figures akin to Hector or Achilles in society. Therefore, though Pope was never able to capture the bellicose and heroic atmosphere of Homer and Virgil’s, his translation experience allowed him to get acquainted with the fundamental traits of epic.

8. This explains why The Rape of the Lock, though distinctly mock-epic, shows a deeply elaborate body of connotations associated to battles or to war proper. However, the poem, instead of mirroring violence and cruelty, centres on much more trivial aspects, such as a game of cards.

9. However, it is very significant to see how Pope describes the way Belinda makes herself up, since it occasionally acquires the dimension of a rite, either pagan or religious. We have already referred to the resemblances that exist between Belinda’s toilet and a sacred sanctuary, and the way Pope approaches Belinda’s toilette as though it were a religious ceremony. Nevertheless, for his mock-epic purposes, Pope also regards Belinda as a warrior that is preparing herself to go into the battlefield .

10. Canto II After introducing the two main characters and explaining the cause that activates the conflict, Pope devotes most of this second canto to a description of the supernatural creatures he mentioned before [L. 52-90]. In this central passage, Pope insists in portraying sylphs, nymphs, gnomes and zephyrs in terms of gods and goddesses of the Olympus.

11. In principle, all of them occupy a heavenly position with respect to human beings, a position that allows them to observe and evaluate all that happens on earth. Likewise, all those nymphs and sylphs seem to be in charge of safeguarding and protecting the moral and physical integrity of ladies .

12. Main characters and their role in the canto In this second canto, the author’s focus is more on secondary characters. As we pointed out above, Belinda’s counterpart is also briefly mentioned in this second canto. The Baron, who is the fictional alter-ego of Lord Petre, is the one who contrives the rape of Belinda’s lock, although his intervention in this canto is not very significant .

13. Demythologising epic poetry: mock-epic strategies Mock-epic in this second canto is fundamentally connected with the ethereal beings we commented on before. We can see how the poet describes all the preparations that precede the battle. If we remember Homer’s Iliad or Odyssey, we can actually appreciate the solemnity of these preliminary moments In The Rape of the Lock, because the reader can witness a similar scene.

14. Therefore, what we see in this second canto are the preparations for the combat, in which Ariel is in charge of assigning duties and motivating his army to defend Belinda’s honour. Nevertheless, the duties Ariel allots establish a ridiculous comparison with respect to those of the great epics.

15. Canto III The beginning of this canto is probably the most satirical of all that appear in The Rape of the Lock [L. 1-24]. Retaking the image of the Thames illuminated by the fading sun, Pope presents a biting portrait of England at the time, concentrating mainly on the state of monarchy and the judiciary. Pope wittily criticises the excessive idleness of the noble and aristocratic classes, who spent their time drinking coffee or tea .

16. Pope sarcastically justifies the visible lack of activity among these upper classes, and, even regards their idleness in terms of the socio-political and economic development of the country. The use of the word “instructive” also highlights the ironic undertones of these initial lines. Talking about instructive questions does not, in this context, mean to discuss cultural or intellectual disquisitions, but rather, to discover who gave the ball and who attended it. Pope’s satirical overview on the social machinery of his time finishes with several allusions to judges and the English legal administration. Once again, Pope draws on satire to paint the judiciary as lazy and unprofessional .

17. Line 21 gives away the kind of judges England had at the time. They go over their pending cases very quickly, simply because they want to satiate their hunger. This fact manifests the professional involvement of judges and the dubious validity of the decisions they take. After this brief but intensely satirical introduction, the poem focuses on the game of cards. Three players go in for the game: Belinda, the Baron and a third character whose identity is unknown. The game selected is Ombre, an eighteenth-century version of bridge.

18. All the paraphernalia that surrounds this game of cards reminds us of the battles Homer or Virgil depicted in their epic poems. The warfare terminology Pope uses is even more prolific than in the previous cantos, something that intensifies the mock-epic atmosphere of the poem. -The final stages of this canto [L. 130-178] move towards the poem’s climax: after a tense Ombre card-game, the Baron eventually manages to cut off Belinda’s lock

19. Main characters and their role in the canto We again find references to Belinda and the Baron, and a new character whose identity is not revealed in the poem. The formal and thematic novelty is articulated around the presence of a series of cards. This game of cards can also be helpful in order to better approach the personal and psychological profile of the characters.

20. Throughout the poem, we have regarded Belinda as a trivial and superficial lady, exclusively concerned with her outward appearance and dedicated to the numerous social events she has to attend. Once the game commences, she gets to know the Baron’s intentions, which leads her to adopt a much more vigilant position, distrusting the Baron’s advances and trying to position adequately her “troops of cards”. The terminology that is associated with Belinda usually has an underlying sexual connotation, especially when the lock is mentioned .

21. What Pope is describing here is the Baron’s various attempts to cut off the lock from Belinda’s hair. However, if we read in close-up we can see that his words can be interpreted in a different way. The Baron’s desire to get Belinda’s lock projects in some sense his own sexual appetites - even the title of the poem is quite ambiguous in this respect. The allusion to virginity in line 140 turns out to be significant and proves the fact that what Pope is describing is not merely a lock being cut off.

22. Demythologising epic poetry: mock-epic strategies Once the armies are ready, Pope sets them in a very peculiar battlefield. Although the scene appears ordinary, Pope evokes an epic atmosphere in which cards compete to defeat each other. The mock-heroic background resides mainly in how Pope substitutes epic heroes for mere cards.

23. The language used for the description of this pseudo-battle is elaborate and highly rhetorical: there are many terms related to warfare and military strategies, as well as to its life and hierarchy. Pope’s grandiloquent style manages to turn this dispute into something as transcendental as, for instance, the Battle of Troy .

24. Canto IV The opening lines of the canto [L.1-16] depict the aftermath of the combat. Belinda and her sheltering nymphs and sylphs are distressed because of the loss of her lock. One of the most outstanding elements in the poem is the so-called “Cave of Spleen” Pope mentions in line 16. This Cave is entirely filled with crooked creatures performing the most grotesque activities .

25. Following very typical epic patterns, Umbriel addresses the Goddess of Spleen [L. 57- 78]. His speech, though dramatic and emotional, is also tinged by the same sense of triviality and looseness. On his return, Umbriel contemplates a touching and disconcerting scene: Belinda, absolutely out of her wits, is laying in bed . Belinda is now transformed due to the effects of Spleen, and emerges as an enraged and hysterical woman, two attitudes that Pope and many eighteenth-century satirists criticised about woman’s behaviour .

26. The last lines of the poem portray a tense dialogue between Sir Plume, one of the characters who strives for the protection of Belinda’s honour, and the Baron, who still insists in keeping the trophy he has won. This conversation shows how the finesse that has been the key in the previous cantos is suddenly dropped. Sir Plume uses oaths and, even, four letter words, but the Baron remains firm in his position. The canto ends with Belinda’s sorrowful words in which she laments having been placed in this situation. She would have preferred to be driven into exile to an isolated island instead of being humiliated in this way .

27. Main characters and their role in the canto This canto gravitates around two dialogues and one final monologue, in which several characters take part. The first dialogue between Umbriel and Goddess Spleen portrays how women were considered at that time. According to Umbriel’s words, women were ruled by Spleen, a fact that encouraged the most changeable and hysterical behaviour [l. 59-61]. Spleen can make a woman turn towards poetic or intellectual issues, or alternatively, as Umbriel states, become moody or hysteric.

28. There are two important aspects we should concentrate upon in these lines. First of all, Belinda assumes that her life can no longer be sustained on her external appearance because it is ephemeral. She establishes a very sound comparison with the roses that blossom and die to exemplify how quickly youth goes by. Secondly, Belinda partially blames herself for her flirtatious disposition [L. 159], and she believes that nothing would have happened if she had not behaved in that way. Belinda also longs for solitude in a place where riches and material possessions are no longer important .

29. Demythologising epic poetry: mock-epic strategies Canto IV contains two moments that come to demystify classical epic narratives. One of the most important moments in Homer’s epic is Ulysses’s ordeal in the world of the dead in which he encounters important characters and listens to mythical stories about the past of their nations. Pope also uses an analogous framework to this in order to subvert one of the most significant aspects of epic poetry.

30. What Ulysses encounters in the underworld is sorrow and death, an experience that makes him feel anguished. The reader cannot perceive this same grief when Umbriel descends to the Cave of Spleen. We pointed out before that he also sees ghosts and visions around him, but he is principally shocked by the grotesque combination of objects and people . He sees jars, bottles, and instead of distinguished personalities, he sees Pain, Affectation, Ill Nature and Megrim, Goddess Spleen’s advocates. Moreover, he does not listen to stories about the mythical past of any nation, but only “Goose-pye” talks.

31. The second moment in which mock-epic forcefully arises is Belinda’s lament at the end of the canto. Once again, Pope toys with incongruous parallelisms and tone. Achilles’ mourn is caused by the death of his closest friend, whilst Belinda’s grief is brought about by a nuisance. However, Pope disguises this apparent triviality by means of a language that almost impels us to sympathise with Belinda’s sorrow, as we do with Achilles’ .

32. Canto V This set of questions are conceived to cast doubts upon the attitude that Belinda, and generally speaking, many members of the upper classes, were adopting at that time. Clarissa wonders why beauty is praised and good sense discarded, and why men can fall exclusively for the lady’s physical appearance, disregarding her spiritual or intellectual capacities. She considers these glories something vain and worthless if good sense do not preserve them [L. 15-16].

33. Clarissa also refers to the fact that ageing can also affects ugly and beautiful alike. The nymph argues that cultivating one’s image so much can lead to impoverishing your mental faculties, since we are all destined to get old [L. 25-28]. The way Clarissa criticises people’s frailties is reflected on how her complete indifference about the manner in which the hair is combed or the face made-up. She recommends, then, to keep good humour as the best way to come to terms with our own ageing [L. 31-32].

34. Nevertheless, in spite of Clarissa’s sound words, nobody listening to her speech seem to agree with her. Then, the confrontation for the recovery of the lock breaks out again. Belinda counterattacks and pursues the Baron with fierceness ([L. 75]). The Baron resists Belinda’s assault, but is overcome by her snuff .

35. Main characters and their role in the canto The last section in The Rape of the Lock introduces Clarissa, who appears as the most reasonable and stable of all the characters that appear in the poem. Her speech dismantles all the values of the English upper classes. It seems that Pope’s decision to add a new canto to the original The Rape of the Lock was due to the fact that all the characters that appear in it required a kind of counterpart to refute and contradict the ideas they defend.

36. It is also interesting to note how Belinda’s mood changes completely in this final section. At the end of canto IV, she appeared as a resigned woman who has apparently decided to begin a new life. After listening to Clarissa’s speech, we see how this character starts off the struggle again, adopting an aggressive position and leading a violent attack against the Baron.

37. Apparently, Pope wanted to prove that women’s mood varied rapidly and unexpectedly [L. 35- 38]. The reason that apparently triggers off this assault is the fact that she cannot bear the idea of losing her physical beauty, which also explains why she completely changes her mind from one canto to the other.

38. Demythologising epic poetry: mock-epic strategie Perhaps, it is canto V that best exemplifies what mock-epic is. The reason why Pope added a new section to the four-canto version he published in 1714 was because he wanted to insert a modern rendering of Sarpedon’s speech to Glaucus, taken from Homer’s Iliad. The similarities between them are worth noting in order to check the mock-epic alterations Pope introduces in The Rape of the Lock. The essence of both fragments - they are both conceived as a warning about how ephemeral life is _ is basically the same .

39. Issues such as the triviality of fame, the passing of time or the eagerness to gather riches and material possessions run almost parallel courses in both texts. There are some other moments in the text in which mock-epic can be perfectly appreciated. When Belinda eventually attacks the Baron, we can see how she uses the weapons she has at her disposal. However, her military outfit is very unorthodox.

40. Belinda’s weapons are not swords, spears, daggers, shields or helmets, simply puffs and powders [L. 81-82]. Instead of throwing spears or arrows, Belinda blows a kind of tobacco powder towards the Baron in order to make him sneeze .

41. W o r k C i t ation Palma, A. (n.d.). THE RAPE OF THE LOCK reading guide. Retrieved from https://www.academia.edu/20795927/THE_RAPE_OF_THE_LOCK_reading_guide