Referenced By / Alfred, Lord Tennyson

Art

• The Lady of Shalott (Waterhouse) portrays the moment when Elaine embarks on a boat to Camelot despite knowing she's already doomed.
• The Lady of Shalott (Holman Hunt) is an illustration of the part where the Lady realizes the curse has been activated.

Film

• Kind Hearts and Coronets' title is adapted from a line in "Lady Clara Vere de Vere": Kind hearts are more than coronets.... One of the characters makes this obvious by quoting the poem.

Literature

• In the 19th Lancers trilogy by Max Hennessey, a cavalry soldier is shoveling manure out of the stalls and misquotes Tennyson accordingly.
  "Shit to right of them, shit to left of them, shit in front of them. Some bastard had blundered..."
• "Talma Gordon": A writer watching Talma at the garden party quotes Tennyson's "Madeline" to express his admiration.
  "Smiling, frowning, evermore,
  Thou art perfect in love-lore,
  Ever varying Madeline,"
  quoted a celebrated writer as he stood apart with me, gazing upon the scene before us.
• The title of the John Wyndham novel The Kraken Wakes is a reference to the Tennyson sonnet The Kraken.
• The title of Agatha Christie's novel The Mirror Crack'd from Side to Side comes from The Lady of Shalott.
• In L.M. Montgomery's Anne of Green Gables, Anne and her friends decide to act out The Lady of Shalott, with Anne as the ill-fated Elaine. Everything's fine until the boat they borrowed springs a leak...
• In Memoriam by Alice Winn: Tennyson's poems (especially Charge of the Light Brigade and In Memoriam A. H. H.) are referenced throughout. The book's title may be a reference to Tennyson's poem, or it may refer to the memorials to the soldiers. Or both.

Live-Action TV

• Cranford: Mr. Holbrook recites part of Locksley Hall during Miss Matty's visit. Miss Matty and Miss Pole later quote more of the poem after Mr. Holbrook's death. Notably, the series makes the poem sound much more romantic than it actually is. (It's about a rejected lover returning to his old home and thinking bitterly about his girlfriend marrying someone else.)
• In the Star Trek: Deep Space Nine episode "Sacrifice of Angels", Chief O'Brien and Dr. Bashir recite part of "Charge of the Light Brigade" before the Defiant leads a Federation fleet of 600 ships against a Dominion armada that outnumbers them two-to-one.
  O'Brien: Cannon to the right of them, cannon to the left of them, cannon in front of them, volley'd and thunder'd.
  Bashir: Storm'd at with shot and shell, Boldly they rode and well into the jaws of death. Into the mouth of hell rode the six hundred.

Music

• Kate Bush: "The Coming of Arthur" was a source of inspiration for The Ninth Wave, a mini-Rock Opera that occupies side two of Hounds of Love. An excerpt from the poem additionally appears on the back cover.
• Tangerine Dream: "Pilots of the Purple Twilight" from the album Exit derives its title from a line in Tennyson's poem "Locksley Hall".

Webcomics

• Hark! A Vagrant: Kate Beaton questions the Lady of Shalott's reasoning and priorities, depicting her dying in annoyance after watching Lancelot take a dump on the path by her tower.

Western Animation

• Classic Disney Shorts: In the Goofy short "The Olympic Champ", the narrator stops Goofy in the middle of his pole vault jump to show his form, and then goes off on a tangent and recites a passage from Tennyson's "Crossing the Bar", as Goofy struggles to maintain balance.
• The Simpsons: "In Marge We Trust" ends with Reverend Lovejoy, having rediscovered his passion for preaching, delivering an energetic sermon at the Springfield Church which paraphrases "Charge Of The Light Brigade":
  Lovejoy: Baboons to the left of me. Baboons to the right. The speeding locomotive tore through a sea of inhuman fangs. A pair of the great apes rose up at me but — bam, bam! — I sent them flying like two hairy footballs. A third came screaming at me... (imitates hissing baboon, then quietly resolved) and that's when I got mad.
  Homer: Now, that's religion!
• Top Cat quotes a line from Locksley Hall in "The Long Hot Winter".
  T.C.: "In the spring a young man's fancy lightly turns to thoughts of you-know-what^note in the poem, the line reads "thoughts of love"", and there's not much of that around here.

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