Remembering the past: do you find it sad or satisfying to look backward? You’re probably thinking, “Obviously, that depends on what’s being remembered -happy or sad times”. But is that the only view? Is there a way in which memory itself -the very FACT of the past- always shadows life in the present?

Read Tears, Idle Tears, by Lord Tennyson

After reading this poem, answer this: How caqn tears be “idle” -can you cry without knowing why?

What do you think the “divine despair” is in line 2? Could you relate it to Adam and Eve’s fall in Genesis -would that story explain the speaker’s existential sadness?

Does the contradiction in the phrase “Death in Life” (line 20) make sense to you? Explain. What is your response to this line? Have you ever felt this way?

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