The Manyfacd Glass

The hazy settings and amorphous auditors of Tennysons dramatic monologues are often contrastedat Tennysons expensewith Brownings more vivid, concrete realizations. Hughes argues that Tennysons achievements in the genre are, in fact, considerable, that his influence can be traced in such major figures as T. S. Eliot, and that the monologue occupies a far more central position in Tennysons poetic achievement than has hitherto been acknowledged. Hughes study challenges the traditional view of Tennysons inferior achievement, and her account of the elements and operation of the dramatic monologue, especially as demonstrated by three of its most important practitioners, will be of interest to all those concerned with the monologue as a poetic mode.