Help me find this quote from Tennyson.

May 12, 2004 7:54 AM

Hunting down the source of a Tennyson quotation. [more inside]

I'm doing a paper on Arthurian literature, and in one of the books I've got on Tennyson (A Tennyson Companion, by F.B. Pinion), the author quotes Tennyson as writing that Camelot is "symbolic of the gradual growth of human beliefs and institutions, and of the spiritual development of man." I'd love to use this in my paper, but the author does not provide a citation, he just states that Tennyson wrote it. It is in a chapter about Idylls of the King, but I've searched a digital copy and its not from there. So my question is, where is this quotation from? Secondary question, can/should I use this in my paper and cite Pinion's book as the source? Tertiary question, why the hell don't authors of published books have to cite quotations, yet us students get in trouble if we don't follow MLA conventions perfectly?

posted by rorycberger to Writing & Language (10 answers total)

Response by poster: Oh, i've also googled and found several webpages that use the quotation, but none provide a good source. Some claim that it's from Idylls of the King, but as I said earlier, it's not.
posted by rorycberger at 7:57 AM on May 12, 2004

Have you shortened the quote to "gradual growth of human" or the like to make sure the quote aren't slightly different?
posted by Kwantsar at 8:09 AM on May 12, 2004

Response by poster: yeah, i've searched through two different digital copies of Idylls for just "gradual" and its not in there.
posted by rorycberger at 8:36 AM on May 12, 2004

Response by poster: also searched some of the other words, just to be safe - no luck there either.
posted by rorycberger at 8:40 AM on May 12, 2004

The phrase appears to be quoted in this anthology and in Alfred Lord Tennyson: A Memoir by His Son by Hallam Tennyson. That's as much as I could determine using Amazon's "search inside this book" feature.
posted by cbrody at 9:45 AM on May 12, 2004

Best answer: It may be a different Tennyson. Amazon "Search in the Book" thinks it comes from Alfred Lord Tennyson: A Memoir by His Son, by Hallam Tennyson.

I searched for "Symbolic of the gradual growth" and got this citation:

Memoir, ii. 127
posted by Hildago at 9:45 AM on May 12, 2004

Response by poster: My school library has the Memoir by his son, so I'll check that out...still might have been Tennyson who said it, as quoted by his son. I'll let you know how it turns out when I make it up to the library later this afternoon.
posted by rorycberger at 11:22 AM on May 12, 2004

Response by poster: oh yeah, thanks for the info. I can't believe I didn't think to try amazon.
posted by rorycberger at 11:28 AM on May 12, 2004

Response by poster: Yep, there it is in the Memoir, Hallam is quoting his father, as if in conversation. It doesn't look like Alfred ever actually wrote it anywhere. It still pisses me off that I had to hunt down a citation for this and the author of the book that I got it from didn't.
posted by rorycberger at 3:45 PM on May 12, 2004

Good luck with the paper. Mohaha.
posted by Hildago at 6:25 PM on May 12, 2004