Essay Comparing The Seafarer And The Wife's Lament
688 Words3 Pages
In “The Seafarer,” “The Wanderer,” and “The Wife’s Lament” the narrator reveals many Anglo-Saxon ideals that present loneliness as a terrifying prospect. In each poem, a person is stranded to face the terrors of the Anglo-Saxon era on their own, with little to no reconcile for their hardships. While many aspects of the narrators change, such as gender or occupation, they are all elegies that present a mournful tone. In “The Seafarer,” “The wanderer,” and “The Wife’s Lament” the narrators discuss humanities dread of isolation and need of companionship to show how these needs are alleviated. In “The Seafarer,” a lonely fisherman presents an extremely pessimistic view of the world. Early on in the elegy the narrator personifies the ocean to say that it “swept me back and forth in fear and pain”(The Seafarer, 104). This shows that the fisherman thinks of his occupation as a burden that physically removes him from the comfortable life he wishes to live. His isolation from “worldly pleasures” leaves him in a state of despair, and there appears to…show more content… The concept of isolation is also presented in this poem when the narrator says “I know the dark of my exile”(The Wife’s Lament, 112). Both her lord and her husband abandoned the woman. Perhaps the most starling revelation in the poem is that she was simply told to leave. This may serve to remind the reader of the lack of women’s rights in Anglo-Saxon society but as the women claims, the order she was given was a clear violation of her vows. Therefore, this narrator’s journey is unique in that she has social limitations placed upon her. This poem is the only one to not touch the topic of religious faith. The woman seems to have no comfort in her life and her only wish is for her husband to “be sad-minded always”(The Wife’s Lament, 114). The desperation of the woman leads her to hate the people that made her life