Ulysses

Fiction | Poem | Adult | Published in 1842

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Related Poems

“My Last Duchess” by Robert Browning (1842)

Browning’s poem vies with “Ulysses” for the distinction of the most famous dramatic monologue of the Victorian era. Like Tennyson’s “Ulysses,” Browning’s “My Last Duchess” reveals flaws and foibles in the character speaking the poem. Browning’s “My Last Duchess,” however, contains more dramatic irony than “Ulysses” and is written in heroic couplets not blank verse.

"In Memoriam A. H. H." by Alfred, Lord Tennyson (1850)

In Memoriam is among Tennyson’s most famous poems. While formally very different from “Ulysses,” both poems were written in response to the death of Tennyson’s friend Hallam.

“The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” by T.S. Eliot (1915)

Like “Ulysses,” Eliot’s “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” is a dramatic monologue. Unlike “Ulysses,” Eliot’s poem is a modernist poem written in free verse and dramatizes the perspective of a fearful, unadventurous, and unconfident man.

Further Literary Resources

"Alfred Lord Tennyson’s page" from The Victorian Web

This page includes links to Biography, Religion, Works, Science, Gender Matters, Victorianism, Genre & Style, Literary Relations, Visual Arts, Poetic Structure, Image & Symbol, Theme & Subject, Setting, and Web Resources.

Alfred Tennyson’s “Ulysses” from The Victorian Web

On this page from The Victorian Web, Professor George P. Landow gives an brief but thorough overview of the “critical appraisals” of Tennyson’s “Ulysses,” including a couple of the less mainstream theories—for example, that the entire poem is not, in fact, a dramatic monologue, but a “monologue interieur, and there is no quest. It is merely the utterance of a super-annuated hero indulging himself in the fantasy that his beloved mariners are still alive. It is a kind of dream, a means of escape momentarily from the uncongenial environment of Ithaca.”

“Senator Ted Kennedy at the 1980 Democratic Convention” posted to YouTube by JFK Libraries

The Kennedy family was fond of Tennyson’s “Ulysses,” and several members quoted from the poem in their public speeches. At the end of this clip from the 1980 Democratic National Convention, Ted Kennedy says, “In the words of Tennyson that my brothers quoted and loved, and that have special meaning for me now,” then proceeds to quote Tennyson’s poem (4:18-4:45).

“Skyfall 2012 - Tennyson – Full Scene” posted to YouTube by Nikhil Sonje

In this important scene from the James Bond movie Skyfall, M (played by Judi Dench) quotes the final lines of Tennyson’s “Ulysses” while defending the 00 program in front of a government board of inquiry.