Camille Turner channel firing essay

Channel Firing Essay- Camille Turner

Out of the authors that we have been assigned throughout the semester, Elizabeth Barrett Browning was one of my favorites. A lot of her writing could be analyzed through the lens of Victorian ladies and gentlemen. Her poem, “The Lady’s ‘Yes,’” follows in some of the footsteps of her other poems that we have studied in class. Like “A Musical Instrument,” “A Man’s Requirements,” “Sonnet 22,” “To George Sand: A Desire,” and “To George Sand: A Recognition—” all poems that were discussed in class— “The Lady’s ‘Yes’” depicts the Victorian world in which men drastically undervalued women.

“The Lady’s ‘Yes’” is about a woman who accepts a man’s proposal at night, only to change her answer in the morning, when she is not being influenced by gay festivities. It is split into seven quatrains; the first and second quatrains show that the speaker is addressing her gentlemen caller, and that she is changing her answer because the lively party of the night before caused her to be carried away with false emotion. The third quatrain begs the man to not let her refusal discourage him and allow his friends to notice and look down upon him. The last four quatrains argue that it is not only the woman’s fault for being carried away by feelings, but also the man’s fault for using flattery to woo her. She describes the way that a real man should woo a woman— “Bravely, as for life and death/ With a loyal gravity” (Browning 46) and with “truthful words/Pure from courtship’s flatteries” (Browning 46).

In Elizabeth Browning’s poem, she portrays the idea that women were viewed as beings that are easy to fool and please. In the Victorian period, women were seen as weak and dependent, with very low standards for the men that they chose to marry. The poem’s tone shows that the man whom the speaker is addressing is shocked that she would change her mind in favor of cancelling their engagement. The speaker retaliates by explaining that he should “learn to win a lady’s faith/ Nobly, as the thing is high” (Browning 46). By referring to a lady’s faith as something of high importance, Browning shows how a woman should be treated— which is nothing like how they actually were treated.

Browning’s speaker dares the refused man to “call [her] false or call [her] free” (Browning 46). This alludes to the Browning’s idea that a woman who rejected a man’s marriage offer was attempting to be free. Though unmarried women did not have many options in Victorian society, getting married just for the sake of being a wife was wrong. Through her poem, Browning makes the point that it was almost better to be some sort of free than to be tied down to a man who one didn’t love and who didn’t treat one as good as deserved.

Another of Browning’s main points in her poem is that men are deceivers; this idea corresponds to many things in the Victorian period of how women were treated and viewed by men. Men falsely flattered women into marriage; they thought that they could easily manipulate them into being their property. Men also tricked women into thinking that their position in society was respectable and natural. Women were taught that it was normal for their place to be in the home, married and raising children. Browning’s poem shows that women were not as content with their position in society as men assumed that they were. Women were tired of being treated as though a man’s proposal was the greatest honor that they were capable of receiving, and that they barely deserved even that. Browning shows that women were aware of their position in society and that they were not fooled by man’s flattery.

In the poem, the contrast between the nighttime “yes” and the morning-time “no” to the man’s proposal shows the difference between a time when women would accept their treatment without opposition and the time in which women would finally decide to stand up for themselves. The poem calls for women to speak out against oppressive Victorian society and show their worth. The speaker continually repeats the words “true,” “truth,” and “truthfully” (Browning 46-47), emphasizing that men need to become aware that what they are doing to women is wrong and deceitful.

Elizabeth Browning’s poem, “The Lady’s ‘Yes,’” is an important work that expresses one of her main writing goals: that women will no longer stand for a society in which men consistently undervalue them.