 The poem 's seventy lines of blank verse are presented as a dramatic monologue . Scholars disagree on how Ulysses ' speech functions in this format ; it is not necessarily clear to whom Ulysses is speaking , if anyone , and from what location . Some see the verse turning from a <unk> to a public address , as Ulysses seems to speak to himself in the first movement , then to turn to an audience as he introduces his son , and then to relocate to the <unk> where he addresses his mariners . In this interpretation , the comparatively direct and honest language of the first movement is set against the more politically minded tone of the last two movements . For example , the second paragraph ( 33 – 43 ) about Telemachus , in which Ulysses muses again about domestic life , is a " revised version [ of lines 1 – 5 ] for public consumption " : a " savage race " is revised to a " rugged people " . 
