Tennyson's Language

Louis Buchanan is a professor of English at the Ryerson Polytechnical
Institute in Toronto.

Tennyson’s Language is a detailed examination of Alfred Tennyson’s
views of the linguistic theories of his time as well as an analysis of
the use he made of these theories in writing some of his poems.

Tennyson lived during a transitional period in the study of language:
linguistic thinkers were starting to move away from Locke’s empiricist
view that words as the signs of ideas were arbitrary and conventional,
and toward the Germanic view (transmitted in England mainly through
Coleridge) that “words are living powers and that these powers are
revealed by their history.” The “New Philology,” a more scientific
view of world languages, was based on the pioneering work of Sir William
Jones.

Tennyson was neither a linguistic theorist nor a systematic thinker
about language. Still, he had an excellent understanding of the current
linguistic ideas of the time. Hair is excellent at guiding the reader
through these often difficult linguistic ideas. In his very fine
readings of some of Tennyson’s poetry, especially Idylls of the King,
he is able to show how Tennyson used the new approach to philology in
some of his poems (e.g., avoiding words of French and Latin origin in
favor of Germanic words, to make the Idylls more authentic-sounding).

Hair has many interesting insights into Tennyson’s views on language,
including the convincing argument that he did not reject Locke’s
empiricist views but attempted to fuse them with the Coleridgian
tradition (based on the views of Kant).

This is highly recommended for readers interested in Tennyson’s
poetry and thought or in the development of linguistic theory in England
during the time.