Tithonus | ISC Class 12 English Notes

This note covers Alfred, Lord Tennyson and the myth behind the poem, its form, the speaker and his situation, a summary by verse paragraph, close reading, poetic devices, imagery and metre, themes, tone, key quotations and vocabulary.

Who wrote "Tithonus", and what kind of poem is it?

About the poet and the myth

Alfred, Lord Tennyson was an English poet who lived from 1809 to 1892 and was Poet Laureate from 1850. "Tithonus" appears among the miscellaneous poems in his volume Enoch Arden, &c.

In Greek myth, Tithonus was a prince of Troy loved by Eos, the goddess of the dawn, whom Latin writers call Aurora. He was given immortality, meaning endless life, but not endless youth, so he went on ageing without being able to die.

The poem never names the goddess; her "halls of morn" (line 10), her horses (lines 39 to 41) and her "silver wheels" (line 76) identify her. In the poem, she grants the gift herself (line 16).

Form: a dramatic monologue in blank verse

A dramatic monologue is a poem spoken by one character to a listener at a particular moment, so that the speech reveals the speaker's situation and feelings. Tithonus speaks throughout; the goddess listens, weeps and leaves without replying.

The poem is in blank verse: unrhymed lines of iambic pentameter, usually ten syllables with the stress on every second syllable. Its 76 lines fall into seven verse paragraphs, blocks of unequal length rather than regular stanzas.

Note: Quotations here spell "vapors" (line 2) and "gray" (line 11). Some editions may print "vapours" and "grey"; the meaning is the same.

Who is the speaker, and what is his situation?

The speaker is Tithonus, named only in the title. He calls himself "once a man" (line 11) and a "white-hair'd shadow" (line 8). He was born on earth, "that dark world where I was born" (line 33), but now lives in the goddess's realm.

He speaks from her arms (line 6), "at the quiet limit of the world" (line 7). The moment is daybreak: as he speaks, a cloud parts, the goddess begins to glow and her horses rise. His wish is to have her "take back" the gift (line 27) and to be restored "to the ground" (line 72): in other words, to die.

Why does the silent listener matter?

The reader knows the goddess only through what Tithonus sees: tearful eyes (line 26), a silent departure "before thine answer given" (line 44) and tears on his cheek (line 45). Every judgement about her, including the meaning of her tears, is the speaker's own interpretation.

What is the summary of the poem, verse paragraph by verse paragraph?

Lines 1 to 10: everything dies except the speaker

Woods decay and fall, mists shed moisture on the ground, a man farms his field and is buried beneath it, and the swan dies after many summers. Only the speaker is consumed by immortality, withering in the goddess's arms and drifting like a dream through the silent East.

Lines 11 to 31: the gift and the plea to return it

He mourns the gray shadow he has become. Once a beautiful man chosen by the goddess, he felt like a god. He asked her for immortality, and she granted it with a smile, as carelessly as rich men give.

Her angry Hours wasted him and, unable to kill him, left him maimed, an immortal old man beside her immortal youth. While the silver star shines in her tearful eyes, he asks whether her love can make amends, begs her to take back the gift, and asks why any man should pass the limit fitting for all.

Lines 32 to 42: the dawn begins

A breeze parts the clouds and he glimpses the earth. Light spreads from the goddess's brows, shoulders and breast; her cheek reddens and her eyes brighten. Her horses rise, shake darkness from their manes and scatter the twilight into sparks.

Lines 43 to 49: silence, tears and an old saying

As ever, she grows beautiful in silence and leaves before answering, her tears on his cheek. Her tears make him fear that an old earthly saying is true: the gods cannot take back their gifts.

Lines 50 to 63: memory of young love

He recalls how differently he once felt, wondering whether he is the same person. He used to glow with her warmth and lie being kissed while she whispered words he could not understand, like a song of Apollo.

Lines 64 to 76: the final request for death

He asks not to be kept in the East, since his nature can no longer mix with hers and her lights feel cold. Looking down on the homes and graves of mortals, he asks to be returned to the earth, to forget her courts while she renews her beauty each morning.

How does the opening set the speaker apart from the natural world?

A world that ends in rest

Line 1 repeats "the woods decay" before adding "and fall". The repetition slows the rhythm, so decay sounds long and steady, and the final word completes it. In line 2 the mists "weep their burthen to the ground": weeping suggests mourning, but also relief as a load is put down.

Line 3 compresses a life into three verbs: man "comes", "tills" and "lies beneath". The field he works becomes his grave, so death is part of an orderly cycle. Line 4 ends on "the swan", which has lived "many a summer" and still dies.

"Me only": the exception

Line 5 begins with "Me", set apart by "only". After four natural endings, the speaker stands alone. Cruel immortality attaches a harsh adjective to something people usually long for, which signals at once that the gift has become a torment.

The verb "Consumes" is held back until line 6, so immortality seems to eat him slowly. "I wither slowly" links him with the decaying woods, but they fall and he goes on withering.

Lines 7 to 10 describe a beautiful, unreal setting: "ever-silent spaces", "Far-folded mists" and "gleaming halls of morn". He moves through it "like a dream", a simile that makes him weightless and aimless, a ghost in a place of light.

How does the speaker tell the story of his gift?

From "him" to "I"

Lines 11 to 14 speak of the speaker in the third person: "this gray shadow, once a man", "his great heart". He looks back on his young self as someone else. Her choice made him seem to himself "none other than a God" (line 14), a feeling that can be read as pride, coming just before his request.

At line 15 the voice shifts to "I", and the request is quoted: "'Give me immortality.'" It names endless life and nothing else, and the rest of the poem shows the cost.

A careless gift and the Hours' revenge

She grants it "with a smile, / Like wealthy men who care not how they give" (lines 16 to 17). The simile suggests that the gift cost her nothing and that she did not weigh its consequences.

The Hours (line 18) are "strong" and "indignant" and "work'd their wills". Time becomes an angry force that seems to take revenge on the man who received the gift. Line 19 piles up injuries, "beat me down and marr'd and wasted me", and line 20 adds the bitter limit of their power: "tho' they could not end me".

"And all I was, in ashes" (line 23) is a metaphor for a burnt-out self. A mid-line full stop then forces a pause.

The plea and the question about human limits

He asks whether her "love" and "beauty" can "make amends", or make up for his loss (lines 23 to 24). Her eyes fill with tears "To hear me" (lines 26 to 27): her tears suggest she is moved, but pity cannot undo his condition. Then come short commands: "Let me go: take back thy gift:". After long sentences, these plain words sound urgent.

Lines 28 to 31 ask why a man should wish "To vary from the kindly race of men" or "pass beyond the goal of ordinance". Kindly suggests both gentle and of one's own kind. He now accepts death as the appointed limit, "most meet", or most fitting, for all.

How is the coming of dawn described in lines 32 to 49?

Daybreak as the goddess's body

"A soft air fans the cloud apart" (line 32), and he glimpses "that dark world where I was born": dark before sunrise, yet the home he longs for.

"Once more" (line 34) shows that this happens daily. Light "steals" from her brows, a verb for quiet, gradual movement. In line 35, "pure brows" and "shoulders pure" place the adjective before and then after the noun, a balanced pattern called chiasmus.

Her body and the sunrise become one image. Her cheek "begins to redden thro' the gloom" (line 37), like the reddening sky, and her heart is "renew'd" (line 36). She is renewed each morning; he never is. Her eyes "brighten slowly close to mine" (line 38), an intimacy that sharpens the contrast with his aged ones.

"Ere yet they blind the stars" (line 39) means before her eyes outshine the stars, as morning does. The "wild team" are her horses, known by their "manes" (line 41). They "beat the twilight into flakes of fire" (line 42), turning half-light into sparks. The verb "beat" recalls the Hours, who "beat me down" (line 19): the action that ruined him makes splendour for her.

Silence, departure and fear

"Lo! ever thus" (line 43) confirms the pattern. Placing "Departest" at the start of line 45 makes her leaving abrupt. In lines 46 to 49 her tears "scare" him and make him "tremble" in case a saying is true: "'The Gods themselves cannot recall their gifts.'" The word "themselves" stresses that even gods are bound.

How does memory change the speaker's sense of himself?

Line 50 opens with "Ay me! ay me!", four heavy single syllables that slow the line. He remembers watching "with what another heart" and "with what other eyes" (lines 50 to 51); the repeated "with what" insists on how changed he is.

The aside "if I be he that watch'd" (line 52) doubts that his young self and his present self are the same person.

A dawn remembered in warmth

He saw "The dim curls kindle into sunny rings" (line 54). The verb "kindle" is a fire image: her hair catches light as if set alight. He "Changed with thy mystic change" (line 55), his feelings once moving in step with hers, and his blood would "Glow with the glow" (line 56). Repeating "glow" spreads the warmth from her to him.

"Mouth, forehead, eyelids, growing dewy-warm" (line 58) lists the places kissed without linking words, as if kisses fall on each in turn. Kisses "balmier than half-opening buds / Of April" (lines 59 to 60) suggest spring and beginnings, the opposite of the decaying woods of line 1.

Apollo's song and the rising city

Her whispers were like the song he heard Apollo, a Greek god linked with music, sing "While Ilion like a mist rose into towers" (line 63). Ilion is another name for Troy. After the exclamation, the paragraph runs as one sentence to line 63, as if he cannot bear to leave the memory.

Why does the ending present death as a release?

Two natures that no longer mix

"Yet" (line 64) turns from memory back to his request: "hold me not for ever in thine East". He asks, "How can my nature longer mix with thine?" (line 65). Nature marks the deepest difference: he is mortal by birth, she is divine.

The warmth of memory has gone: "Coldly" opens line 66, "cold" follows twice, and even "rosy shadows" chill him. His "wrinkled feet" rest on her "glimmering thresholds" (lines 67 to 68): standing on a doorstep, he is at the edge of her world, unable to belong to it.

The happiness of the dead

Steam rises from fields about "the homes / Of happy men that have the power to die, / And grassy barrows of the happier dead" (lines 69 to 71). Death becomes a power: the living are "happy" because they can die, the dead "happier" because they have. The adjective "grassy" gives the graves a peaceful surface, recalling the man who "lies beneath" his field (line 3).

"Release me, and restore me to the ground" (line 72) is his most direct request. She "wilt see my grave" (line 73) and "renew thy beauty morn by morn" (line 74). "I earth in earth" (line 75) imagines his body becoming soil. The poem closes on her image, "returning on thy silver wheels", so his rest and her endless return stand side by side.

Which poetic devices, imagery and metre does the poem use?

Blank verse and the rhythm of speech

Line 1 scans as regular iambic pentameter: the WOODS de-CAY, the WOODS de-CAY and FALL. With no end rhyme, the lines sound like a speaking voice, which suits a dramatic monologue.

Enjambment, a sentence running on past a line ending, occurs at lines 5 to 6, 59 to 60 and 66 to 67. A caesura, a strong pause inside a line, falls after "ashes" in line 23 and after "hear me" in line 27. Together they make the verse follow the movement of thought.

Patterns of imagery

Imagery is language that appeals to the senses. Each pattern below separates the speaker's world from the goddess's.

Figures of speech

Sound patterns

Alliteration, the repetition of opening consonant sounds, appears in "silver star" (line 25), "curls kindle" (line 54) and "Release me, and restore me" (line 72), where the r sound binds his two requests.

What themes and message emerge from the poem?

Death as natural and right

The opening shows death as the proper end of woods, men and swans (lines 1 to 4), and the ending calls mortals "happy" because they can die (line 70). The poem's message is that mortality belongs to human life and gives it a fitting shape.

The danger of an unconsidered wish

Tithonus asked only for immortality (line 15), and it was granted lightly (line 17). The result is "Immortal age" (line 22). A wish granted without thought for its consequences becomes a curse that, he fears, cannot be withdrawn (line 49).

Pride and human limits

Feeling "none other than a God" (line 14) comes just before his wish to pass beyond the human lot. His later question about why a man should "vary from the kindly race of men" (line 29) shows that he now sees this as a mistake. Accepting limits is presented as wisdom.

Time, ageing and renewal

The Hours "wasted" him (line 19) and he withers "slowly" (line 6), while the goddess renews her beauty "morn by morn" (line 74). Endless decline is set against endless renewal, and the first is unbearable.

Love between unequal natures

Their love was once shared and warm (lines 55 to 58), but he asks how his nature can "longer mix" with hers (line 65). Love cannot bridge the gap once a mortal body and a divine one follow different laws.

Memory and identity

The doubt "if I be he that watch'd" (line 52) asks whether a person stays the same across vast change. Memory keeps his youth vivid, yet shows him how much he has lost.

How do the tone and the speaker's attitude change?

The tone, the attitude conveyed by the voice, begins as a weary lament, a poem of grief, set by the slow repetitions of lines 1 to 4 and "cruel immortality" (line 5). In lines 11 to 27 it becomes regretful and pleading, from "Alas!" (line 11) to the urgent commands of line 27, then reflective in lines 28 to 31.

Lines 32 to 42 carry wonder at her beauty; lines 46 to 49 shift to fear, as her tears make him "tremble". Lines 50 to 63 are tender and nostalgic. The ending is calm and firm: "Release me, and restore me" (line 72). His attitude to death has moved from his youthful wish to escape it to a present longing for it.

Towards the goddess he stays affectionate even when he complains of the careless gift (line 17) and her cold lights (line 67).

Which key quotations help in exam answers?

A strong answer places a short quotation in context, names the feature it shows and explains its effect. Each quotation below supports a different theme or stage.

"Me only cruel immortality / Consumes:"

Tithonus, lines 5 to 6: he alone cannot die.

Shows his isolation and the central paradox.

"I ask'd thee, 'Give me immortality.'"

Tithonus, line 15: his original request.

Supports the theme of the unconsidered wish.

"Immortal age beside immortal youth,"

Tithonus, line 22: his age beside the goddess.

States the contrast between the lovers; an example of antithesis.

"Let me go: take back thy gift:"

Tithonus, line 27: his first plea.

Marks the turn from lament to urgent request.

"And beat the twilight into flakes of fire."

Tithonus, line 42: her horses at dawn.

Shows the splendour of her world.

"'The Gods themselves cannot recall their gifts.'"

Tithonus, line 49: the saying he fears.

Supports the theme of irreversible consequences.

"if I be he that watch'd"

Tithonus, line 52: doubting his identity.

Supports the theme of memory and identity.

"Of happy men that have the power to die,"

Tithonus, line 70: mortals seen from the East.

Shows the reversal of values in which death becomes a power.

Glossary

• Burthen: An older spelling of burden, a load carried; here the moisture the mists let fall to the ground (line 2).
• Hours: The passing hours of time, personified with a capital letter; "thy strong Hours" belong to the goddess, yet they work their own angry wills on him (line 18).
• Marr'd: Marred, meaning damaged or spoiled in appearance; one of the injuries the Hours inflict (line 19).
• Maim'd: Maimed, meaning crippled or permanently injured in body; the state in which the Hours leave him (line 20).
• Tremulous: Trembling or quivering, often from strong feeling; it describes the goddess's eyes filling with tears (line 26).
• Kindly: Here both gentle and belonging to one's own kind; the kindly race of men are his fellow mortals (line 29).
• Ordinance: Something ordained or decreed; the goal of ordinance is the limit appointed for every human life (line 30).
• Meet: An older word for fitting or proper; that limit is described as most meet for all (line 31).
• Ere: An older word for before; her eyes brighten before they blind the stars (line 39).
• Yoke: A wooden frame fastened over the necks of animals pulling a load; here the harness of her horses (line 40).
• Lucid: Clear, bright and shining; it describes the outline of light forming round the goddess (line 53).
• Portals: Grand gates or doorways; the remembered glow spreads over her presence and her portals (line 57).
• Barrows: Mounds of earth raised over graves; the grassy barrows of the dead lie in the fields below (line 71).

Common errors and misconceptions

• Misconception: Tennyson is describing his own old age. Correct: The speaker is Tithonus, named in the title, in a dramatic monologue addressed to the goddess of the dawn.
• Misconception: The goddess replies and refuses him. Correct: She never speaks; she brightens, weeps and departs before answering (lines 43 to 45).
• Misconception: He asked for immortality and youth together. Correct: The request in line 15 names only immortality, leaving "Immortal age beside immortal youth" (line 22).
• Misconception: The poem is written in rhyming stanzas. Correct: It is unrhymed blank verse in seven verse paragraphs of unequal length.
• Misconception: The opening is simply gloomy about death. Correct: It presents death as the natural completion of life, which the speaker envies because he is denied it.
• Misconception: He has stopped loving the goddess. Correct: He remembers their love tenderly (lines 55 to 61); his complaint is against the gift and the gap between their natures.
• Misconception: The phrase "the power to die" is a slip for weakness. Correct: It is a deliberate paradox: to him, the ability to die is a privilege mortals have and he lacks.

Exam-style questions with model answers

Q1. Read the extract: "The woods decay, the woods decay and fall, / The vapors weep their burthen to the ground, / Man comes and tills the field and lies beneath, / And after many a summer dies the swan." (lines 1 to 4). The next lines say that only the speaker is consumed by "cruel immortality". (i) What do the four lines describe? [1] (ii) Identify the device in line 1 and give its effect. [1] (iii) Give two ways in which the extract prepares for the contrast that follows. [2] [4 marks]

1. (i) They describe a natural cycle: woods fall, mists shed their load, and man and the swan die.
2. (ii) Line 1 repeats "the woods decay", which slows the rhythm and makes decay sound long and steady.
3. (iii) Every example ends in death or rest, so the speaker, consumed by immortality, stands out as the single exception.
4. (iii) Death is shown calmly, as man lying beneath the field he tilled, so immortality seems cruel by comparison rather than a blessing.

Q2. Of the goddess, the speaker says: "Then didst thou grant mine asking with a smile, / Like wealthy men who care not how they give." (lines 16 to 17). The next lines describe the Hours beating him down and leaving him maimed. Identify the figure of speech and explain what it suggests about the gift. [2 marks]

1. It is a simile comparing the goddess with wealthy men who give without caring how they give.
2. It suggests that she granted immortality lightly, without weighing its effects; her smile contrasts with the suffering the Hours then cause.

Q3. The immortal speaker lives with the goddess of the dawn: "To dwell in presence of immortal youth, / Immortal age beside immortal youth," (lines 21 to 22). Explain three ways in which the repetition and contrast present his situation. [3 marks]

1. Both lines end with "immortal youth", so the goddess's youth surrounds him and is repeated as the thing he lacks.
2. "Immortal age" is set against "immortal youth": both share endless life and differ only in age, which makes his loss exact and painful.
3. "Immortal age" is a paradox, since age normally leads to death; his ageing will go on for ever, turning the gift into a punishment.

Q4. The speaker asks: "Why should a man desire in any way / To vary from the kindly race of men, / Or pass beyond the goal of ordinance / Where all should pause, as is most meet for all?" (lines 28 to 31). Here "kindly" suggests gentle and of one's own kind; "meet" means fitting. Explain the device and what it shows about his view. [3 marks]

1. It is a rhetorical question, expecting no answer because he believes the answer is obvious: no man should wish this.
2. It shows that he now values belonging to the "kindly race of men", his fellow mortals, instead of being raised above them.
3. It presents death as the "goal of ordinance", the appointed limit "most meet for all", so he now accepts mortality as right for every human being.

Q5. Read the extract, which follows the goddess's eyes brightening: "Ere yet they blind the stars, and the wild team / Which love thee, yearning for thy yoke, arise, / And shake the darkness from their loosen'd manes, / And beat the twilight into flakes of fire." (lines 39 to 42). Earlier he says, "I wither slowly". (i) What is "the wild team", and which word shows it? [1] (ii) Explain "Ere yet they blind the stars". [1] (iii) Explain the image in the last line and how it contrasts with the speaker. [2] [4 marks]

1. (i) The phrase "the wild team" means the goddess's team of horses, identified by "manes"; they long for her "yoke" so that they can draw her.
2. (ii) It means before her eyes grow so bright that the stars can no longer be seen, as happens when morning comes.
3. (iii) The metaphor shows the horses scattering the dim half-light into sparks, so the dawn bursts out as fire with great energy.
4. (iii) This vigorous energy contrasts with the speaker, who only withers "slowly" and has no such strength.

Q6. The aged speaker recalls: "Ay me! ay me! with what another heart / In days far-off, and with what other eyes" (lines 50 to 51), adding "if I be he that watch'd". He remembers her "dim curls kindle into sunny rings", his blood that would "Glow with the glow", kisses "balmier than half-opening buds / Of April", and whispers like Apollo's song as Ilion rose into towers. Later her lights are "cold" and her courts "empty". Explain, in five points, how the memory contrasts with his present. [5 marks]

1. The repeated "with what" and the doubt "if I be he that watch'd" show that he feels so changed that he questions whether he is the same person.
2. The memory is full of warmth, his blood glowing with her glow, which contrasts with the "cold" lights he feels now.
3. The cry "Ay me! ay me!" opens the memory in grief, so the happiness he recalls is felt as a loss in the present.
4. April buds and kindling curls suggest spring, youth and beginnings, which oppose the coldness of his present old age.
5. Apollo's song and the rising towers of Ilion are images of music and creation, contrasting with the "empty" courts of his present life.

Q7. Outline: woods fall, mists shed their load, and man and the swan die (lines 1 to 4); only the speaker is consumed by "cruel immortality" (line 5); his request for immortality was granted carelessly; he asks why a man should pass "the goal of ordinance" (line 30); mortals are "happy men that have the power to die" and the dead "happier" (lines 70 to 71); he imagines "I earth in earth" (line 75). Discuss how the poem presents mortality, in six points. [6 marks]

1. The opening presents death as the natural end of every living thing, from woods to men to swans, so mortality belongs to an orderly cycle.
2. The speaker is the single exception, and calling immortality "cruel" reverses the usual view that endless life is a blessing.
3. His request, granted carelessly, shows that escaping mortality brought suffering he did not foresee rather than reward.
4. The question about "the goal of ordinance" presents death as an appointed limit, fitting for all humans, that should not be passed.
5. Calling death a "power" and the dead "happier" is a paradox that turns death into a privilege he envies and lacks.
6. "I earth in earth" completes the cycle of the opening, where man too dies, so his longed-for death becomes a peaceful return to the ground.

Q8. Features: one speaker addresses the goddess of the dawn throughout; she departs "before thine answer given" (line 44); he calls himself "this gray shadow, once a man" (line 11), then speaks as "I"; he describes the dawn as it happens (lines 32 to 42); he recalls their past love (lines 50 to 63); the poem is unrhymed, in seven verse paragraphs of unequal length. Appreciate "Tithonus" as a dramatic monologue, in six points. [6 marks]

1. A single speaker addresses a listener throughout, so the reader learns his situation, history and longing only through his own words.
2. The goddess's silent departure keeps the poem inside his mind and leaves the meaning of her behaviour to his interpretation.
3. The shift from "this gray shadow, once a man" to "I" reveals a divided sense of self that the form lets the reader overhear.
4. The dawn unfolding as he speaks fixes the monologue at a precise moment and shows her brightening beside the "gray shadow" he has become.
5. The memory of past love carries the speech back through time, so the monologue holds his history as well as his present.
6. Unrhymed blank verse in unequal paragraphs sounds like a speaking voice, each paragraph marking a new stage of feeling, from lament to plea to acceptance.

Key takeaways

• "Tithonus" by Alfred, Lord Tennyson is a dramatic monologue in which an immortal but ageing man pleads with the goddess of the dawn.
• The poem is in unrhymed blank verse, 76 lines divided into seven verse paragraphs of unequal length.
• The opening shows woods falling, mists shedding their load, and man and the swan dying, and sets the speaker apart as the one being who cannot die.
• He asked only for immortality, and the careless gift left him with "Immortal age beside immortal youth" (line 22).
• The dawn appears as the goddess's brightening body and her eager horses, whose energy contrasts with his slow withering.
• Her silent tears make him fear that the gods cannot take back their gifts, so his suffering may never end.
• Warm memories of youthful love make him doubt that he is the same person; the present feels cold and empty.
• The ending calls death a power and imagines his return to the earth as peace, while the goddess goes on renewing her beauty.

Test yourself

Who is the speaker, and whom does he address?

The speaker is Tithonus, named in the title. He addresses the goddess of the dawn, who listens but never replies.

What does the repetition in line 1 suggest?

Repeating "the woods decay" slows the rhythm, so decay sounds like a long, steady process that ends in falling.

Why does the speaker call immortality cruel?

He has endless life without youth, so he keeps ageing beside the goddess without ever being able to die.

What do the Hours do to the speaker?

The strong, indignant Hours beat him down, marred and wasted him, and, though they could not end him, left him maimed.

What is the saying he fears in line 49?

That the gods themselves cannot recall, or take back, their gifts, so his immortality could never be removed.

What does "if I be he that watch'd" reveal?

He has changed so much that he doubts whether he is the same person who once watched the dawn with love.

Why are mortals called "happy men that have the power to die"?

To Tithonus, the ability to die is a privilege he lacks, so the paradox presents death as a power and a source of happiness.