George Meredith (1838-1909)
Modern Love (18XX) [excerpts]
Reading Questions
- What kind of sonnet is Meredith using here?
- How do these sonnets counter Victorian ideals of marriage and relationship?
- How does point of view shift between the sonnets?
- How does Modern Love counter the expected conventions of the amatory sonnet sequence?
1.
By this he knew she wept with waking eyes:
That, at his hand’s light quiver by her head,
The strange low sobs that shook their common bed
Were called into her with a sharp surprise,
And strangled mute, like little gaping snakes,
Dreadfully venomous to him. She lay
Stone-still, and the long darkness flowed away
With muffled pulses. Then, as midnight makes
Her giant heart of Memory and Tears
Drink the pale drug of silence, and so beat 10
Sleep’s heavy measure, they from head to feet
Were moveless, looking through their dead black years,
By vain regret scrawled over the blank wall.
Like sculptured effigies they might be seen
Upon their marriage-tomb, the sword between;
Each wishing for the sword that severs all.
2
It ended, and the morrow brought the task.
Her eyes were guilty gates, that let him in
by shutting all too zealous for their sin:
Each sucked a secret, and each wore a mask.
But, oh, the bitter taste her beauty had!
He sickened as at breath of poison-flowers:
A languid humor stole among the hours,
And if their smiles encountered, he went mad,
And raged deep inward, till the light was brown
Before his vision, and the world, forgot, 10
Looked wicked as some dull murder spot.
A star with lurid beams, she seemed to crown
The pit of infamy: and then again
He gained on his vengefulness, and strove
To ape the magnanimity of love.
And smote himself, a shuddering heap of pain.
17
At dinner, she is hostess, I am host.
Went the feast ever cheerfuller? She keeps
The Topic over intellectual deeps
In buoyancy afloat. They see no ghost.
With sparkling surface-eyes we ply the ball:
It is in truth a most contagious game:
‘Hiding the skeleton,’ shall be its name.
Such play as this, the devils might appal!
But here’s the greater wonder; in that we
Enamoured of an acting naught can tire, 10
Each other, like true hypocrites, admire;
Warm-lighted looks, Love’s ephemoerioe,
Shoot gaily o’er the dishes and the wine.
We waken envy of our happy lot.
Fast, sweet, and golden, shows the marriage-knot.
Dear guests, you now have seen Love’s corpse-light shine.
