Helen: Innocent or Guilty?

In her poem “Helen,” Hilda Doolittle uses the images of whiteness to convey Helen’s innocence; however, Doolittle uses variance in the strength of the initial verbs in each stanza to portray the Greek’s dissenting sentiments towards Helen.
There are three stanzas in this poem, and each stanza includes a visual description of Helen. Each stanza repeats the color white to describe Helen’s flawless physical appearance; furthermore, Doolittle uses the color white to convey her belief that Helen should not be held responsible for the Trojan War.
There are varying views about whether or not Helen was really abducted or if she went with Prince Paris willingly to Troy; however, the footnote in the Heath Anthology suggests that Helen was kidnapped. In light of this translation, it is reasonable to assume that Helen did not go with Paris on her own accord; thus, we must assume that Doolittle wishes us to relieve Helen of the blame for the Trojan War or at least say that Helen did not intentionally cause the war. With this footnote in mind, we can further guess that Doolittle held the view that Helen was abducted which verifies Helen’s innocence.
Doolittle also uses variance in the strength of the verbs to convey the feelings of Greeks towards Helen and to also continue to reveal Helen’s innocence. The first stanza’s opening line is “All Greece hates.” The rest of the stanza describes Helen and her beauty. The second stanza’s opening line is “All Greece reviles,” and like the first stanza, the second stanza continues to describe Helen’s beauty. The two verbs in the opening lines of each of the first two stanzas are strongly negative towards Helen. It is obvious that through the eyes of the Greeks up to this point, Helen is definitely at fault and to blame for the countless Greek soldiers who have fought and died in Greece. Should the poem end after this point, one could make the claim that Doolittle was blaming Helen for the Trojan War and the deaths of the Greek soldiers. The meaning of the whiteness in the poem would also change should the poem end here, and Helen’s whiteness would not be representative of her purity but rather her coldness which would lead the Greek nation to war and death. However, the third stanza’s opening line contains a neutral verb, “Greece sees unmoved.” The verb sees is much less harsh than hate or reviles. This change in verb intensity represents the realization among the Greek people that Helen is indeed “white” and innocent; however, in the eyes of these Greeks, her innocence does not excuse her from the responsibility which she must claim by being the reason for the war. The only available option for Helen at this point is death, “could love indeed the maid, only if she were laid, white ash amid funereal cypresses.”