be her life. This is a Victorian device, called a paysage interieur, the creation of an interior landscape. Alfred Lord Tennyson was one of the most exceptional word painters of the nineteenth century. This is blatantly obvio!
             us in his poem, 'Mariana'. The poem is cyclical, and has a very static feeling – there is no movement other than of night and day, no other distinguishable events. There is no climax, and yet, Tennyson's use of word painting does create a "narrative of landscape". From the very first sentence one can detect word painting in both the words, and the images they create. The poem starts with a sentence full of 'hard' sounds. The tongue trips over 'blackest' and the alliteration of 'thickly crusted'. The double consonants surrounding a short vowel in both words, creates a harsh, unfriendly atmosphere, and successfully sets the mood of the poem; helped by the use of the word 'black', in the first line. Tennyson also uses onomatopoeia in 'the clinking latch' to heighten, and add sound to the image. After these short, hard sounds, the assonance of the line 'upon the lonely moated grange', sounds hollow and empty, emphasising Mariana's solitude, and adding atmosphere. Thus, ev!
             en after the first stanza, the sound of the words alone have created the atmosphere and set the mood. Imagery is also at work. We gather that the house is derelict, uncared for, again reflecting its owner's own life - the flowerpots are 'thickly crusted' with moss, and the 'ancient thatch' is 'weeded and worn'. She lives in solitude – 'unlifted was the clinking latch', and the use of the Victorian simile of fruit - natural imagery is very important - we are told that 'the rusted nails fell from the knots, that held the pear to the gable wall'. Mariana will never...