Class Assignment:
Summary of the Rape of the Lock:
Introduction:
The poem was written by Alexander Pope in the early 18th century (first published in 1712,expanded in 1714).It was based on a real-life incident: A young lord, Lord Petre, secretly cut offa lock of hair from a young lady, Arabella Fermor, without her permission.This small act cause big quarrel between their two wealthy Catholic families in London society.Pope’s friends asked him to write something that might calm the quarrel and make the whole matter seem lessserious.So, the Pope turned this small event into a mock-epic poem.A mock-epic means it use the grand style of classical epics (like Homer’s Iliad or Virgil’s Aeneid) but applies it to a silly or small event.For example, instead of a real war, Pope describes a “battle” between ladies and gentlemen using fans and powder!Through this humorous style, Pope gently made fun of how high society placed too much importance on beauty, fashion, and gossip.In short: The poem was inspired by a real incident where a lock of hair was cut, and Pope wrote it to make peace between two families—by turning a small quarrel into a funny, grand “epic.
Summary:
The poem begins with Belinda, a beautiful and rich young woman, still asleep. Her guardian spirit, Ariel the sylph, sends her a dream. He explains that sylphs exist to protect young women,but also hints that they sometimes control or mislead people. Ariel feels something bad is about to happen to Belinda, though he doesn’t know what. He warns her to “beware of man.”Belinda wakes up and gets ready for the day with the help of her maid Betty and many sylphs.She looks stunning when she leaves for Hampton Court by boat. Everyone admires her,especially her two shiny locks of hair. The Baron wanted to take one of Belinda’s beautiful locks of hair. He made up his mind that he would cut it off. Earlier that morning, he prayed to the god of love to help him succeed. As an offering, he burned things from his past romances—like old love letters, ribbons (garters), and small gifts from women he once loved—hoping this sacrifice would bring him good luck.Ariel, still worried, gathers an army of sylphs to protect Belinda. Hewarns them to guard her hair, her jewelry, her fan, and even her pet dog. His idea of “disaster”seems rather silly—like losing a dress, jewelry, or a pet.At Hampton Court, Belinda joins a game of ombre (a card game). With the help of sylphs, she wins dramatically against the Baron. After the game, coffee is served, and the Baron remember his plan. With scissors secretly provided by Clarissa, he moves to cut Belinda’s lock. The tiny spirit (sylphs) tried to guard Belinda’s hair. But their leader, Ariel, looked into her thoughts and realized that Belinda secretly liked a man. This meant she was not completely “innocent” or“pure” as he thought. Because of this, Ariel gave up protecting her. The Baron then cuts off the lock, and Belinda screams in shock.
Meanwhile, the gnome Umbriel goes to the Cave of Spleen (a place of sadness and badmoods.He collects bags and vials filled with sighs, tears, and anger. Returning to Belinda, he pours them out on her and her friend Thalestris, who becomes furious. Thalestris pushes her lover Sir Plume to demand the lock back from the Baron. The Baron refuses. Belinda laments he lost lock, blaming herself for ignoring Ariel’s warning.At the end, Clarissa gives a sensible speech. She says that beauty will not last forever, so women should not rely only on looks. Instead, they should focus on being good and virtuous. But nobody pays attention to her advice.Instead, the men and women start a mock battle. They don’tfight with real weapons but with playful things like fans, shouting, and clouds of face powder.In the fight, Belinda attacks the Baron. She even throws snuff (powdered tobacco) into his nose to make him sneeze and then threatens him with a hairpin. Belinda demands that he give her lock of hair back. But strangely, the lock has disappeared.At the end of the poem, the stolen lock ofBelinda’s hair is said to have floated up into the sky. There, it becomes a star among the heavens.This means her beauty will be remembered forever, because the lock now shines brightly in the sky and will never grow old or fade away.
Home Assignment:
Characters of the poem:
1). Belinda
Belinda, the main character, is a young, rich lady proud of her beautiful hair. Even though the poem is based on a real event, Belinda is not the real-life Arabella Fermor. She represents atypical flirtatious woman in British high society. She sleeps late, spends a lot of time getting ready, and focuses heavily on her looks, even for simple social gatherings and card games.
Belinda’s actions and moods are controlled by her guardian spirits, the sylphs and gnomes. They take care of her appearance, protect her, and influence her feelings. When the Baron cuts her hair, she gets upset, and the gnome Umbriel even makes her feel worse. This shows that Belinda,like other women in the poem, is guided more by these supernatural forces than by reason logic.
Even though the poem makes fun of Belinda and her society, it also shows her situation is serious. Her hair, which is admired by men, can also harm her reputation if misused. When herlock is cut, Belinda feels unsafe and regrets going to Hampton Court. Her beauty, which gives her status, can also be a source of trouble without her doing anything wrong.
2). The Baron
The Baron, who cuts Belinda’s hair, is not a real person but a typical silly nobleman. The narrator calls him “adventurous,” but he mostly acts foolish. He is driven by his passions anddoesn’t think clearly. When he decides to take Belinda’s hair, he burns all his past love gifts as an offering, which makes him look ridiculous and lovesick rather than serious.
After cutting her hair, he compares himself to a great hero from the Iliad, even though his actionis small and trivial. Because hair was considered a love token at that time, his act has a serious and troubling side, almost like a violation of Belinda. By comparing himself to the heroes of Troy, he also acts as if what he did was destined and unavoidable, showing he has no regret and avoids responsibility for his actions.
3). Ariel
Ariel is the leader of Belinda’s sylphs, who are spirits of flirtatious women. These spirits live inany form they want after death and watch over young single women. Ariel’s name is linked to air because sylphs are air spirits.He takes his job very seriously, warning Belinda about danger and arranging the other sylphs to protect her. In the poem, Ariel and the sylphs actually control Belinda’s beauty, behavior, and her ability to stay pure. They make women flirt but still keep their chastity, which is important for awoman’s social status.
Ariel loses his power the moment he sees that Belinda likes a real man, because then he cannot fully protect her anymore.
4). Umbriel
Umbriel is a gnome, similar to Ariel but linked to earth instead of air. In the poem, women who avoid men all their lives become gnomes. Umbriel’s name comes from “umbra,” meaning shadow, because his job is to make Belinda feel sad and gloomy.He goes to the Cave of Spleen (a place of sadness) and asks the goddess there for help. She gives him a bag of sobs and a vial of tears, which he uses to make Belinda regret coming to the court and wish she had stayed home.
Like Ariel, Umbriel is part of the poem’s “machinery”—he explains why Belinda acts more upset than the situation really deserves.
Essay:
Themes:
1). The Triviality of Court life
In The Rape of the Lock, Alexander Pope criticizes the shallow and unimportant lifestyle of the 18th-century royal court by telling a humorous story in a very serious, epic style. The poem center on Belinda, a beautiful young lady, whose lock of hair is secretly cut off by the Baron.This small act of vanity is treated as if it were a major event, leading to quarrels and mock battles among the courtiers. Pope uses heroic couplets, a form usually connected with grand epic poems like Homer’s Iliad and Virgil’s Aeneid, which describe wars, gods, and great struggles. By using this lofty style to describe something as minor as a stolen curl, Pope creates a comic contrast that makes the concerns of court life look ridiculous. He even compares Belinda’s sorrow over her hair to Queen Dido’s tragic grief in Virgil’s Aeneid and imitates lines from Homer’s Iliad—but instead of warriors fighting with shields and spears, the fashionable men at court compete with wigs, ribbons, and carriages. Through these playful exaggerations, Pope shows how the aristocrats waste their energy on vanity, fashion, and gossip, rather than on anything meaningful.In this way, he mocks the superficiality of court society, proving that their values and worries are trivial when compared to the noble struggles of classical heroes.
2). Gender
In The Rape of the Lock, Alexander Pope talks about how men and women were treated differently in the 18th century, often in unfair ways. The story is about Belinda, a beautiful young woman whose lock of hair is cut off by the Baron. At first, Pope makes fun of Belinda for being too focused on her looks, but he also shows sympathy for her because society judges women mainly by their beauty, not by their intelligence or goodness. For example, the poem says that even if Belinda makes mistakes, people forget them as soon as they see her pretty face.Unlike most poems of that time, which made men the heroes, Pope puts Belinda at the center of the story and makes her the main character, almost like an epic hero. The men, on the other hand,are shown as vain and silly. Pope also explains why Belinda cares so much about her beauty—because in her world, unattractive women are mocked and ignored. So, beauty was here only way to survive in society.Toward the end, Clarissa gives an important speech, saying the beauty will fade with age, but goodness and moral worth last much longer. This shows that women can also be wise and thoughtful, not just beautiful. At the same time, the Pope criticizes the men. The Baron’s act of stealing Belinda’s hair is called a “rape” (meaning theft), showing it was wrong and unfair. Other men, like “Sir Fopling” and “Dapper wit,” are mocked as foolish and shallow because they only care about their looks.
In the end, the Pope shows both sides—he makes fun of women’s vanity but also feels sympathy for them, since society gave them little choice but to depend on beauty. He also points out that man, who were supposed to be superior, are often just as vain and far less wise than women.
3). Beauty vs Poetry
In The Rape of the Lock, Alexander Pope shows how 18th-century society gave too much importance to beauty and appearance, especially among women. The poem tells the story Belinda, a beautiful young lady, whose lock of hair is cut off by the Baron. This small act leads to an exaggerated quarrel at court. Pope humorously mocks Belinda’s obsession with her beauty by comparing her morning routine of getting dressed and doing makeup to an epic hero preparing for battle. While epic heroes fight for noble causes like honor, duty, or the safety of their people, Belinda’s “battle” is only to look attractive, which shows how shallow her concernsare.Through the character Clarissa, Pope adds a moral voice in Canto V. Clarissa reminds everyone that beauty fades with time—hair will turn gray, youth will disappear, and even the most attractive faces will change with age or illness. She says that instead of chasing beauty, women should focus on building inner worth and morality because “charms strike the sight, but meri twins the soul.” This means beauty may attract people’s eyes for a short while, but true character and virtue win lasting respect.
In the end, the Pope seems to say that everyday vanity and obsession with looks are foolish, butbeauty itself still has value when it becomes the source of great poetry. Beauty alone is temporary, but when poetry preserves it, it becomes eternal.
4). Religious and Morality
In The Rape of the Lock, Pope shows that people in his time often cared more about beauty and fashion than about true religion or morality. For example, Belinda keeps her Bible on the same table as her makeup and love letters, which makes religion seem less important. Pope even joke that her dressing table is like an altar where she worships beauty instead of God. He also introduces the magical sylphs, who secretly guide people’s actions. Sometimes they protect women, sometimes they mislead them, which makes it unclear whether people are really in control of their choices. Because of this, the Pope suggests that it is difficult to judge someone surely good or bad. In the end, the poem points out the hypocrisy of society, where people pretend to be moral and religious but are actually more focused on vanity and material things
Conclusion:
The poem ends by turning Belinda’s loss of the lock into a kind of victory. Though the lock is stolen and lost forever, it is transformed into a shining star in the heavens, making Belinda immortal in fame. Thus, what began as a trivial quarrel over vanity is elevated into a mock-epic conclusion, where beauty, wit, and satire all combine to show how small social conflicts can be exaggerated yet remembered forever.