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The Triumph of Life
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Themes
The Dualities of Life
Shelley investigates several different dualities in The Triumph of Life, including light and dark, young and old, as well as passion and restraint. The poem opens with the duality of night and day, which is part of the imagery of light and dark. In the introductory section of the poem, the “Sun sprang forth / Rejoicing in his splendour, and the mask / Of darkness fell from the awakened Earth” (Lines 2-4). The light of the sun replaces the darkness of night. The poem covers the visionary events of a day, with images of the day growing old at the end of the fourth section. Rousseau discusses when “the day / was old” (Lines 537-38). Here, darkness is associated with aging and eventual death. The duality of light and dark is also used to describe the “strange trance” (Line 29) that comes over Shelley. The “shade it spread / Was so transparent that the scene came through / As clear as when a veil of light is drawn / O’er evening hills” (Lines 30-33). Shade usually represents an element of darkness but, here, it is compared to light. This simile is a blending of light and dark.
The investigation of dualities continues within the visions of Shelley and Rousseau. Shelley notes “a dun and faint aetherial gloom / Tempering the light; upon the chariot’s beam / A Janus-visaged Shadow” (Lines 92-94). Tempering, or mixing, of different aspects of a duality is repeated many times in the poem. Here, there is a dun, or dark, aspect within the chariot’s bright lunar light: the charioteer who is referred to as a “Shadow” (Line 94) with multiple blindfolded faces. There is also mixing of different lights. Rousseau describes seeing a “shape all light” (Line 353) within the “light’s severe excess” (Line 424) of life’s chariot. The smaller, female shape is tempered within the much stronger light given off by the chariot. Both Rousseau and Shelley discuss “shadows” (Lines 63, 528), which interact with the light of the chariot and develop a duality rather than the blending of similar elements in the mysterious shape.
Dualities also appear in the crowd that surrounds the chariot of life. The young dancers are associated with fire, while the old dancers are associated with frost: “frost in these performs what fire in those” (Line 175). The young dancers are ahead of the old dancers, but they are all part of the same processional. In other words, they mix with one another. The ancient Greek poets, or “bards of old […] inly quelled / The passions which they sung” (Lines 274-75). The characters in their poems, such as Achilles, are passionate, but their author, Homer, is restrained. There are a number of other dualities, including mentions of both heaven and hell, which Dante also wrote about.
Overall, at the heart of the poem is the central duality of life and death. Life is presented as a conquering force and, through its inherent duality, includes death. Rousseau describes this quality of life: “For in the battle Life and they did wage / She remained conqueror” (Lines 239-40). Life, in this fragment of Shelley’s unfinished work, is presented as power over humans. This power is mortality.
The Power of Love
The other power that is discussed in The Triumph of Life is love. Rousseau associates his life with love when he introduces himself for the first time in the poem. He says to Shelley, “Before thy memory / I feared, loved, hated, suffered, did, and died” (Lines 199-200). Rousseau died before Shelley was born, and asserts that love was central to his life. He elaborates on this: “I was overcome / By my heart alone” (Lines 240-41). While the captives of the chariot of life succumbed to forces such as sorrow or infamy, Rousseau succumbs to love. Love is a conquering power in his life: “Life, where long that flower of Heaven grew not, / Conquered the heart by love” (Lines 257-58). Here, love has more power than money, pain, aging, and other destructive influences. He also describes himself as passionate, and writes about passion. In real life, Rousseau is known for writing about his polyamorous affairs. Shelley also had polyamorous experiences in real life. Romantic love, to them, can be shared among multiple people.
Love comes up again in relation to the river of forgetfulness and in the allusions to Dante. Love is one of the important aspects of life that people will forget when they hear the river—the river’s “sound which all who hear must needs forget / All pleasure and all pain, all hate and love” (Lines 318-19). As in the previous examples, love is associated with other powerful emotions that are essential qualities of life, such as pain. The epitome of love is seen in Dante’s poetry, such as in The Divine Comedy, when Dante is guided through heaven by his beloved Beatrice. This scene is recalled in The Triumph of Life:
‘Of him whom from the lowest depths of Hell
Through every Paradise & through all glory
Love led serene, & who returned to tell
‘In words of hate & awe the wondrous story
How all things are transfigured, except Love (Lines 472-76);
Both Dante and Rousseau place love above other aspects of life. It is life’s most important and defining feature.
The Power of Nature
The visionary elements of The Triumph of Life can be contrasted with the power of the natural elements. Before he sees the processional around life’s chariot in a vision, Shelley observes a sunrise. The sun’s power is emphasized through Shelley’s use of capitalization: “Sun” (Line 2)—with a capital “s”—appears in the first section of the poem, highlighting the sun’s power and importance before the vision begins. At the end of the first section, “Vision” (Line 40) is also capitalized, indicating that both it and the sun are sources of light and inspiration. Other natural elements are capitalized in this first section, including the “Earth” (Line 4) and the “Ocean” (Lines 7, 16, 38). Shelley, as an English Romantic poet and an atheist, believes nature is a mystical place, more powerful than a church, and can inspire visions.
Rousseau is also linked to nature. Shelley first thinks Rousseau is:
an old root which grew
To strange distortion out of the hill side
………………………………
And that the grass which methought hung so wide
And white, was but his thin discoloured hair (Lines 182-86).
The shade of Rousseau is initially perceived as a tree, hill, and grass. This can be compared with how Shelley is introduced in the poem. He first appears in the poem as stretching under “old chestnut flung athwart the steep / Of a green Apennine” (Lines 25-26). Here, Shelley identifies a real location: the Apennines, an Italian mountain range. Mountains are considered powerful aspects of nature. Nature is the site of the visionary; it is where a conversation between the living and the dead can occur. Also, both Rousseau and Shelley argued for the importance of living a simple life in nature.
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By Percy Bysshe Shelley
