la belle dame sans merci

Question 1

La Belle Dame Sans Merci

Answer 1

-creates negative female stereotypes
-‘belle dame’ - means old women which could refer to witches - could foreshadows her manipulation and control

Question 2

(beginning quote )
‘oh what can ail thee, knights-at-arms,
Alone and palely loitering?’

Answer 2

‘O’ - interjection which suggests heightened emotion of disbelief.
‘knights’ - contrasts chivalrous and strong imagery of knight
‘loitering’ - implies a sense of purposeless

Question 3

‘haggard’
‘woe-begone’
‘moist’
‘fever-dew’

Answer 3

¬convey a sense of distress which creates a semantic field of anxiety
also illustrates his awareness of his mortality of his diagnosis of turberculosis

Question 4

i see a lily on thy brow

Answer 4

lily - is a metaphor for death
lilys are also white so could have connotations of pure and inoccence to reflect the external state of the women he likes
could be linked to his love for fanny brawne

Question 5

‘garland’
‘bracelets’
‘fragrant zone’

Answer 5

-all gifts are circular which could show a sense of entrapment the knight makes the lady feel
-also may convey how he doesnt want to lose her as his disease is slowly taking him away

Question 6

‘made sweet moan’

Answer 6

-has sexual connotations
-alternatively could refer to her being in pain due to ‘moan’

Question 7

‘relish sweet’
‘honey wild’

Answer 7

could be collecting food to show her love
alternatively could be to poison the knight which has witch connotations

Question 8

‘pale kings ‘princes’
‘pale warriors, death-pale’

Answer 8

all male authorative powers’
-also refers to keats life
-‘pale warriors’- contradictory words as warriors are meant to be strong

Question 9

alone and palely loitering

Answer 9

cyclical structure to show endless cycle of suffering
could be refering to his own life involving many medical issues

Question 10

CONTEXT FOR JOHN KEATS

Answer 10

prominent figure in the romantic era - his exploration of emotion and intense imagination is clearly reflected in la belle
-suffered from tuberculosis and so did his mother and brother who died from it so he understood he would share a similar fate
-engaged to fanny Brawne but could’nt get married due to poverty and his condition