Considering the poem as a whole, how does poet make the descriptions of the setting striking and vivid? Remember to give evidence to support your answers.

The poet uses contrasts to compare life on land and at sea. The poet uses the metaphor “barren crags” as if the kingdom were lifeless. The poet also uses repetition “forever and forever” to emphasise that there is no limit in the untravelled worlds. Because the narrator was persuading his old comrades to go out to sea with him, the contrast of the two settings makes exploring new worlds at sea without bound stand out from the routine on land: the land is dull and boring with nothing that attracts his interest, whereas at sea, anything is possible for the narrator. This creates clear and vivid images of two different lives in the two settings.

The poet uses language related to “the baths of western stars” and “gleams …fades” to create the imagery of the vast and lively sea to convey the narrator’s desire to continue exploring the sea until the end of the day. "untravelled world whose margin fades” is a metaphor. It implies the sea is infinite without a boundary. “gleams…fades” suggests that sun rays are in front of the narrator. Whenever he gets to the end of the world, the edge gets blurry, and he can see more things beyond it. There isn’t really a margin. “The baths of westerns stars” is a metaphor suggesting stars in abundance in the western sky, and stars imply hope for the narrator’s old comrades together with him to drink life to the lees. “Sunset” suggests that the narrator is old and his time to die (nighttime) has nearly come. However, stars in the dark night show hope and “baths” suggests a lot of hope. Even in darkness, sailing at sea is still full of hope and joy, because he is with his old comrades to live life to the full.

The poet creates a pattern of imagery in the readers’ head, using asyndeton - “the long day wanes: the slow moon climbs: and the deep moans round with many voices”- to emphasise the change in time settings – from day to night. This powerful phrase helps the reader to visualise the fact that everyone is getting old as time passes and will die inevitably. Therefore, they need to join him to fully utilise the remaining time.

Ulysses

BY ALFRED, LORD TENNYSON

It little profits that an idle king,

By this still hearth, among these barren crags,

Match'd with an aged wife, I mete and dole

Unequal laws unto a savage race,

That hoard, and sleep, and feed, and know not me.

I cannot rest from travel: I will drink

Life to the lees: All times I have enjoy'd

Greatly, have suffer'd greatly, both with those

That loved me, and alone, on shore, and when

Thro' scudding drifts the rainy Hyades

Vext the dim sea: I am become a name;

For always roaming with a hungry heart

Much have I seen and known; cities of men

And manners, climates, councils, governments,

Myself not least, but honour'd of them all;

And drunk delight of battle with my peers,

Far on the ringing plains of windy Troy.

I am a part of all that I have met;

Yet all experience is an arch wherethro'

Gleams that untravell'd world whose margin fades

For ever and forever when I move.

How dull it is to pause, to make an end,

To rust unburnish'd, not to shine in use!

As tho' to breathe were life! Life piled on life

Were all too little, and of one to me

Little remains: but every hour is saved

From that eternal silence, something more,

A bringer of new things; and vile it were

For some three suns to store and hoard myself,

And this gray spirit yearning in desire

To follow knowledge like a sinking star,

Beyond the utmost bound of human thought.

         This is my son, mine own Telemachus,

To whom I leave the sceptre and the isle,—

Well-loved of me, discerning to fulfil

This labour, by slow prudence to make mild

A rugged people, and thro' soft degrees

Subdue them to the useful and the good.

Most blameless is he, centred in the sphere

Of common duties, decent not to fail

In offices of tenderness, and pay

Meet adoration to my household gods,

When I am gone. He works his work, I mine.

         There lies the port; the vessel puffs her sail:

There gloom the dark, broad seas. My mariners,

Souls that have toil'd, and wrought, and thought with me—

That ever with a frolic welcome took

The thunder and the sunshine, and opposed

Free hearts, free foreheads—you and I are old;

Old age hath yet his honour and his toil;

Death closes all: but something ere the end,

Some work of noble note, may yet be done,

Not unbecoming men that strove with Gods.

The lights begin to twinkle from the rocks:

The long day wanes: the slow moon climbs: the deep

Moans round with many voices. Come, my friends,

'T is not too late to seek a newer world.

Push off, and sitting well in order smite

The sounding furrows; for my purpose holds

To sail beyond the sunset, and the baths

Of all the western stars, until I die.

It may be that the gulfs will wash us down:

It may be we shall touch the Happy Isles,

And see the great Achilles, whom we knew.

Tho' much is taken, much abides; and tho'

We are not now that strength which in old days

Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are;

One equal temper of heroic hearts,

Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will

To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.