1. The poem is dominated by nightmarish images. If the poem is indeed a kind of psychological insight, how should we interpret the closing lines of the poem?
2. Browning's "landscapes are generally brief and entirely subservient to narrative and character" according to W. C. DeVane in A Browning then Handbook. Why in this poem has Browning lavished so much attention on the physical setting and described it in such detail?
3. "Childe Roland has no foes to fight; that may be past. His critical fight is . . . in the soul and against the whole appearance of things . . . . — James Fotheringham, Studies in the Poetry of Robert Browning, p. 381) Explain how such elements as the crippled gatekeeper, "The Band," and the omnipresent noise at the poem support this analysis.
4. Judith Weissman regards the object of Roland's quest, the "Dark Tower," as an "architectural symbol of a corrupt political order. What internal evidence do we find in the former poem to support Weissman's interpretation? What else may the Dark Tower symbolize?
5. Weissman groups "Childe Roland to the Dark Tower Came" with such nineteenth-century anti-war texts as Thackeray's Vanity Fair, Crane's The Red Badge of Courage, and Tolstoy's War and Peace "as one of many demystifications of military heroism" (18). She sees Browning's central message in the poem as how the military code of honour and glory "destroys the inner life of the would-be hero, by making us see a world hellishly distorted through Roland's eyes" (18). What clues suggest that Roland is projecting his own disillusionment and despair onto the landscape, and that his physical surroundings are not in fact "a particularly blighted part of the world" (14)?
6. Weissman interprets "Childe Roland to the Dark Tower Came" as reflecting Browning's belief "that energy is easier to sustain for the sake of an ethical goal than for the sake of mere worldly honor or worldly ease, and that our psychological and spiritual natures make ethical action rewarding" (20) What elements in the poem seem to support this statement? What other thematic statements can you propose for the poem?
7. The poem takes its title from Edgar's mad song in King Lear, III, iv, 187-189:
i. Child Rowland to the dark tower came, His word was still — Fie, foh, and fum,I smell the blood of a British Man.
Critics have asserted that this song by a leading character in disguise, unfriended in a wasteland and attempting to escape the kingdom with a price on his head, is merely a point of imaginative departure for the poet's realistic romanticism. What connections, however, may one make between Edgar's song and Browning's poem?
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Browning's "landscapes are generally brief and entirely subservient to narrativr and character" according to W.C. DeVane in A Browning then Handbook. Why in this poem has Browning lavished so much attention on the physical setting and described it in so much detail?
In the poem "Childe Roland to the Dark Tower came", Browning places a lot of emphasis on the setting. Throughout the poem he makes sure it is described thoroughly, which is a contrast to his other poem "My Last Duchess." This poem is entirely focused on narrative and there is not much reference to the setting. I think the reason that Browning has placed a considerable amount of focus on the setting in "Childe Roland to the Dark Tower came", is to emphasise to the reader that he is undergoing the journey alone, and he is completely isolated apart from the people in his mind; "The Band". It also gives the reader a psychological insight into Roland's state of mind. Perhaps he feels as though the journey is something he needs to accomplish on his own, and the attention Browning places on the setting accentuates this. It could also be his way of representing society at the time. The Victorian era was a period when women were oppressed and new discoveries were being made. However, it appears it lacked soul and depth, and Browning's descrption of a full landscape that's essentially empty could be a reflection of this.
The poem is dominated by nightmarish images. If the poem is indeed a kind of psychological insight, how should we interpret the closing lines of the poem?
Childe Roland to the dark tower came is a gothic poem by Robert Browning. In this poem, the persona is apparently journeying to a dark tower. He asks for directions from an old man that he does not trust and then does not follow them. After many hurdles in his path, childe Roland manages to find the dark tower. However, the nightmarish images presented in the poem prompt the reader to doubt whether this is a literal journey or a symbol for something that is not evident at first glance.
It may be strongly argued that this poem is indeed a psychological insight, or at least most of it is. The nightmarish horrors reveal the persona’s fears, which are not usually described in a physical journey. The fact that Roland’s journey is very lonely and isolated makes it seem as if he had to achieve his destination alone, without any support. The closing lines suggest that the journey may symbolise death, and the final destination may be immortality; ‘to view the last of me, a living frame’. Evidence is to support this claim is ‘in a sheet of flame, I saw them and I knew them all’; which suggests that he may not be seen living alone in flesh. Also, death and immortality underline the gothic theme, with elements of supernatural horrors and dark and lonely journeys.
These closing lines could also be interpretated as symbolising the achievement of experience, or simply the stage from innocence to experience. At the beginning of the poem, ‘the hoary cripple’ that was misleading him may represent the temptations that accompany adolescence, and his tough journey may symbolise him overcoming these hurdles. In the closing lines, Roland may have reached the point of becoming an adult; ‘to view the last of me’, suggest that he was about to go through the transition point. Also, the journey may have seemed daunting and difficult but once he passed the difficult phrase, he became fearless, ‘dauntless the slug-horn to my lips I set’. It also implies that it is not the final destination, but the journey itself that gives him a sense of achievement.
It could also be supposed that the closing lines could embody his achievement of being in a band, in other words the whole poem could be his seek for acceptance in a particular group that he is finally accepted in at the end, ‘I saw them and I knew them all’, ‘there they stood, ranged along hill sides’, the journey he describes may all be the psychological aspects of his experience of becoming one of them; maybe ‘the band’ he mentions.
Childe Roland to the dark tower came has mostly psychological insights which are often supernatural. The closing lines of the poem confirm the doubt that the journey is psychological and not physical, as it seems on the surface, however when studying the poem in depths, there can be many interpretations that can be drawn out.
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