Elegiacs - Analysis

Introduction

This poem creates a calm, twilight atmosphere that moves toward a tone of longing and mild accusation. The speaker frames a pastoral scene—breezes, pines, rivulets, and evening creatures—then contrasts the soothing natural world with personal absence and disappointment. There is a steady shift from serene description to emotional plea and reproach.

Relevant background

Alfred Lord Tennyson, a Victorian poet, often paired classical references with intimate feeling; here the invocation of Hesper and a Naiad reflects that classical influence while the rural setting and direct address to Rosalind ground the emotion in personal loss.

Main themes

Longing and absence. The speaker repeatedly asks for Rosalind—"bring me my love, Rosalind"—and then laments that she does not come, turning the tranquil evening into a context for yearning. Nature as mirror of feeling. The poem uses the calm of dusk and the murmuring rivulets to reflect a desire for comfort that remains unfulfilled. Betrayal or broken expectation. The final epithet "False-eyed Hesper" transforms a celestial guide into an untrustworthy figure, making cosmic forces complicit in the speaker’s disappointment.

Imagery and recurring symbols

The evening and Hesper (the evening star) recur as symbols of promise and transition; Hesper is first pictured as gently presiding between peaks and then as something held by a Naiad, suggesting both allure and containment. Water images—rivulets, pools, murmuring watergnats—evoke continuity and melancholy, while animal sounds (turtle, owlet, grasshopper) build a sensory dusk that heightens the speaker's isolation. The shift from soothing images to the epithet "False-eyed Hesper" invites an ambiguous reading: is the star simply absent, or has it actively betrayed the lover?

Conclusion

The poem juxtaposes a richly observed natural evening with a short, intense personal lament, using classical reference and pastoral detail to amplify a simple but piercing grief. Its significance lies in how the world’s calm contrasts with human yearning, and how a once-reassuring symbol becomes the target of reproach.