The social image of "the breach of the lock"
Alexander Pope (1688-1744), one of the most quotable poets and satirists of the English Augustan period, gently mocks eighteenth-century aristocrats who, like Belinda, spend so much time on appearances through the poem The Rape of the Lock , The pope’s brilliant satirical masterpiece. Now let’s take a look at society as seen in the poem.
Pope was inspired to write the poem by an incident among his acquaintances in which Robert, Lord Petre, cut off a lock of Arabella Fermor’s hair, and as a result a feud developed between the families of two young men. Pope’s friend John Caryll then encouraged him to write a light poem to calm things down and reconcile the two families, as well as encourage his friends to laugh at his own folly.
In reality, Pope’s mocking epic is not meant to mock form itself, but to mock the vanities, idleness, and ridiculousness of eighteenth-century high society in which values have lost all proportion, and the trivial has become Drive with gravity. The society depicted in this poem fails to distinguish between things that matter and things that don’t.
As the poet says:
“…Stain your honor, or your new brocade;
Forget your prayers, or lose a masque;
Pope draws the portrait of the fashionable ladies of society indirectly, through the character of Belinda. At the very beginning of the poem, we learn about the idleness, pomp and vanity of the so-called ladies of fashion, such as getting up late and taking care of dogs.
As the poet comments:
Now the lapdogs give themselves the noisy shake,
And the sleepless Lovers, barely at twelve, awake:
Pope’s portrait of Belinda on her boudoir depicts the exaggeration of women in their ornamentation. Women spent much of their time grooming. They used different embellishments and absorbent things like rouge, puff pastry, and powder for their embellishment.
As the poet comments:
“And now, unveiled, the toilet supports exposed,
Every Silver Vase in the Mystic Order is ugly.
First, stolen in white, the intention of the nymph adore
Bareheaded, cosmetic powers.”
The women were mostly fond of their own beauty and felt very excited standing in front of the mirror. Sometimes it seemed that they worshiped their own image appearing in the crystal as the Goddess they serve. As the poet satirically comments on Belinda looking in the mirror:
“A Heavenly Image Appears in the Mirror”
Then we find another common trend of the beautiful ladies of that time. They loved to be admired but none of the admirers gave any sign of budging; they simply smiled at them in thanks. Many times they had to turn down offers, but they never caused anyone any harm.
As the poet says about Belinda:
“Favors to no one, to everyone that she smiles extends,
She often rejects, but never offends.”
The poem refers to the latest fashions in clothing and decoration of that society, for example, lacquered tables, china collection, Irish lapdog, diamond earrings, etc. and drinks of the rich like cider water, chocolate, tea, coffee.
As we find in the poem:
As Citron-Waters Matron’s cheeks swell,
Or change Complexions in a losing Game;
Here we find a strong analogy between Belinda and Madame Eglantine, the nun in Geoffrey Chaucer’s Prologue to the Canterbury Tales. She was a very shy and elegant lady like Belinda and she wore an expensive dress with a gold brooch, but as a nun she should have been very simple in her behavior. We can compare Belinda to the newborn Eve, as seen in part IV, line 46, of John Milton’s Paradise Lost, while Eve admires herself as a mirror in the pool of Eden. We, in this case, may also be reminded of The Lilliputian Queen, an unnecessarily fashionable and petite-looking lady, as seen in Jonathan Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels.
The competition between the young lords for the attention of the beautiful ladies is represented by the activities of the baron, bewitched by Belinda’s glamorous charm. But Belinda didn’t pay any attention to him, so he got angry with her and wanted to cut the captivating lock of her hair.
As the poet says:
“Th’ Adventrous Baron the brilliant Locks admired,
He saw, desired and aspired to the Prize:
Determined to win, meditate the way,
By force to violate, or by fraud to betray;”
Toward the beginning of canto iii we have an excellent account of the society in the description of Hampton Court, a place where British statesmen often assembled to predict the overthrow of despotic foreign kings and the fair ladies of England.
“…British statesmen of autumn doom
Of foreign tyrants, and nymphs at home;”
At Hampton Court, Anne, who ruled over three kingdoms, held her council and sometimes just tea.
As we find in the poem:
“Here You, great Anna! whom three Kingdoms obey,
Sometimes he takes advice, and sometimes tea.
The sylphs become an allegory for mannered conventions that govern female social behavior. Principles like honor and chastity have become nothing more than a part of conventional dealings. Pope makes it clear that these women do not conduct themselves on the basis of abstract moral principles, but are governed by an elaborate social mechanism, of which the Sylphs cut a fitting caricature. Society as a whole is just as guilty as she is.
In the end, we will say that The Rape of the Lock is a mirror of the aristocratic life of the 18th century. In the poem, the poet successfully captures and forever fixes the atmosphere of his time and tracks down fools and follies to rectify them. As Lowell says: “It was a living room mirror, but it returns a faithful image of society”
