the lifetime of the hero, the imaginary Sir Launfal, from early
manhood to old age, and includes his wanderings in distant lands. The
poem is constructed on the principles of contrast and parallelism. By
holding to this method of structure throughout Lowell sacrificed the
important artistic element of unity, especially in breaking the
narrative with the Prelude to the second part. The first Prelude
describing the beauty and inspiring joy of spring, typifying the
buoyant youth and aspiring soul of Sir Launfal, corresponds to the
second Prelude, describing the bleakness and desolation of winter,
typifying the old age and desolated life of the hero. But beneath the
surface of this wintry age there is a new soul of summer beauty, the
warm love of suffering humanity, just as beneath the surface of the
frozen brook there is an ice-palace of summer beauty. In Part First
the gloomy castle with its joyless interior stands as the only cold
and forbidding thing in the landscape, "like an outpost of winter;" so
in Part Second the same castle with Christmas joys within is the only
bright and gladsome object in the landscape. In Part First the castle
gates never "might opened be"; in Part Second the "castle gates stand
open now." And thus the student may find various details contrasted
and paralleled. The symbolic meaning must be kept constantly in mind,
or it will escape unobserved; for example, the cost of earthly things
in comparison with the generosity of June corresponds to the churlish
castle opposed to the inviting warmth of summer; and each symbolizes
the proud, selfish, misguided heart of Sir Launfal in youth, in
comparison with the humility and large Christian charity in old age.
The student should search for these symbolic hints, passages in which
"more is meant than meets the ear," but if he does not find all that
the poet may or may not have intended in his dreamy design, there need
be no detraction from the enjoyment of the poem.