" I ain't nothing without my man!"- Social Commentary and Women's Rights in ALT Mariana

      Alfred Lord Tennyson's poem “Mariana” is yet another Victorian poem about an embowered woman.While we are never told of the exact circumstances through the poem itself, we know of the sad occurrences due to the origins of the poem; Shakespeare’s “Measure by Measure.” With her family being lost at sea, Mariana is abandoned by her betrothed because she has no dowry. She is left to rot like the building around her, weeping day in and day out over her dreary circumstances The poem continues to tell of her loneliness while she awaits each day for her love to appear. However, as we see through the repeated refrain, he never comes. Over the passing of time, again and again we hear the cries of Mariana:

       She only said, ‘The day is dreary, 
           He cometh not,’ she said; 
       She said, ‘I am aweary, aweary, 
           I would that I were dead!’

      But why is it that Mariana is trapped and left to rot? Why does she only sit a lament? The answer is simple. The poem is meant to warn every lady in the Victorian era of the extent of their worth, that without a man to define them, they are nothing.

      Now, dear reader, you may be thinking that there are many unmarried, unspoken for ladies getting by much better than Mariana herself. Why, even the many fallen woman we have been introduced to have fared far better than our poor embowered lass. But the situation is that even fallen women are defined by men, and what they do for the men they serve.

      All in all, Mariana proves to be a pivotal look into the social cometary of the Victorian Era, Women's rights, and the place in the anti-feminist world of the 19^th century. Unless a woman was serving a man, be it as dutiful daughter, humble wife, or secret lover, she had no place in the world.