Victorian Visual Culture

Jane Francesca Elgee, Lady Wilde’s, “The Famine Year” demonstrates visual culture in quite a macabre way. The poem’s language forces the audience to envision the scenes of agony and anguish brought on by famine, instead of turning a blind eye or erasing the gruesome realities.

“And some of us grow cold and white—we know not what it means;
But, as they lie beside us, we tremble in our dreams.
There’s a gaunt crowd on the highway—are ye come to pray to man,
With hollow eyes that cannot weep, and for words your faces wan?” (Elgee, 13-16)

The above lines from the poem’s second stanza are a great example of just one of these instances in which her language creates a ghastly image. There is no way around imagining the horrid conditions and painful deaths of those affected by the famine- the only way to ignore it would be to stop reading. She ties in religious imagery numerous times alongside her portrayal of famine, which then forces the audience to consider the moral implications of ignoring- or even actively harming- those affected by famine. The poem’s last stanza directly begs the audience to reflect on those implications and asserts that those who idly stood by and those responsible for the conditions will be punished by God.

“We are wretches, famished, scorned, human tools to build your pride,
But God will yet take vengeance for the souls for whom Christ died.
Now is your hour of pleasure—bask ye in the world’s caress;
But our whitening bones against ye will rise as witnesses,
From the cabins and the ditches, in their charred, uncoffin’d masses,
For the Angel of the Trumpet will know them as he passes.
A ghastly, spectral army, before the great God we’ll stand,
And arraign ye as our murderers, the spoilers of our land” (41-48)

The very last line asserts that those responsible for the famine are murderers. While they may not have directly taken someone’s life, they indirectly caused many, many, deaths. That line ends the poem in an extremely powerful way, tying together the entire message into one line. There is no way to misunderstand her meaning- there are people to blame for all this suffering, and they will get their punishment.

Elgee, Jane Francesca. “The Famine Year.” 1847.