write an essay on keats as a writer of odes

Architecture and Design
Asian and Pacific Studies
Business and Economics
Classical and Ancient Near Eastern Studies
Computer Sciences
Cultural Studies
Engineering
General Interest
Geosciences
Industrial Chemistry
Islamic and Middle Eastern Studies
Jewish Studies
Library and Information Science, Book Studies
Life Sciences
Linguistics and Semiotics
Literary Studies
Materials Sciences
Mathematics
Social Sciences
Sports and Recreation
Theology and Religion
Publish your article
The role of authors
Promoting your article
Abstracting & indexing
Publishing Ethics
Why publish with De Gruyter
How to publish with De Gruyter
Our book series
Our subject areas
Your digital product at De Gruyter
Contribute to our reference works
Product information
Tools & resources
Product Information
Promotional Materials
Orders and Inquiries
FAQ for Library Suppliers and Book Sellers
Repository Policy
Free access policy
Open Access agreements
Database portals
For Authors
Customer service
People + Culture
Journal Management
How to join us
Working at De Gruyter
Mission & Vision
De Gruyter Foundation
De Gruyter Ebound
Our Responsibility
Partner publishers

Your purchase has been completed. Your documents are now available to view.

Keats's Odes

A lover's discourse.

Anahid Nersessian
X / Twitter

Please login or register with De Gruyter to order this product.

Language: English
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
Copyright year: 2020
Audience: General/trade;
Main content: 160
Keywords: poetry ; poems ; nightingale ; Grecian ; Urn ; Autumn ; Psyche ; Melancholy ; Indolence ; british ; empire
Published: February 10, 2021
ISBN: 9780226762708

Keats House Hampstead
The Keats Foundation
Keats Conference 2024
Latest News
The Keatsian Newsletter
Poetry Videos

Home » Poetry Videos » Keats Odes

Introductory Essays to Keats’s Odes

November 10, 2022

News , Poetry Videos

Keats’s Odes

A lover’s discourse.

Anahid Nersessian

Literature and Literary Criticism: British and Irish Literature , General Criticism and Critical Theory

Table of contents
Author Events

Related Titles

“ Keats’s Odes is brash, skeptical, and tender by turns, offering a fluctuating re-visioning of Keats which is firm in its convictions. . . . Nersessian’s prose is bold, irreverent, declarative, and feral. Hyperbole and slackness are deceptive: every phrase feels carefully pitched.”

Times Literary Supplement

“Anahid Nersessian offers a radical and unforgettable reading of the British writer’s odes—one that upends our sense of his poetic project.”

"Intense emotion abounds in this literary blend of analysis and autobiography. . . . In six essays that examine each of Keats’s Great Odes, Nersessian tells a 'kind of love story' between herself and the poems."

Publishers Weekly

"Nersessian’s knack for tapping into the emotional center of the odes comes from the third part of her book’s approach: including a personal narrative. She isn’t afraid of bringing her educated, loving, and damaged self (or at least the persona of one) into the discussion.”

Allen Michie | Arts Fuse

"Two-hundred years after his death, Keats’ Great Odes are still among the most-praised poems in the English language. Nersessian taps her lifelong attachment to Keats to illuminate each of the pieces with a personal and meditative essay."

The Bookseller

"Thinking through John Keats’s six 'Great Odes,' Nersessian offers up six critical and autobiographical essays that work, in their own right, like odes. Keats’s Odes's is also a terse, stunning pastiche of Roland Barthes’s 'A Lover’s Discourse.' In imaginative, lucid prose, Nersessian proves that criticism can be loving, literary art."

Boston Globe, Best Books of 2021

"This is a book written in the shadow of the lives, confrontations, and demands that Keats never got to make—a mid-Victorian Keats, say, Keats at a Chartist demonstration, or Keats at the barricades in Paris’s 1848 convulsions. But read it also as a model for what criticism looks like right now; it’s so state-of-the-art that its contemporaneity glows on every page. Urgent, brave, a little elusive at the same time that it is also confrontational, weaving autobiographical vulnerability with critical verve, like a series of letters addressed to an unknown reader who’ll be willing to follow every turn even as they resist, maybe, one or two. Nersessian has, among other things, a gift for lovely figuration. . . . I read it in one big excited gulp."

Public Books, 2021 "Public Picks"

"The best book about John Keats published at the poet’s bicentenary."

“The book’s intimacy, vulnerability and determination to provoke is true to Keats, and Nersessian’s genuine feeling for his work is never in doubt. One can’t help but be pleased that two centuries on, Keats’s odes still inspire engagement and love.”

Washington Post

"Whoda thunk anyone had anything new to say about John Keats? Nersessian demolishes the kitschy gift-shop Keats, giving us in exchange a dangerous political poet whom you have to read Marx to fully grok. This never gets tendentious, because it is leavened with a personal narrative modeled on Barthes's Lover's Discourse."

Michael Robbins | Poetry Society of America

"[ Keats's Odes ] appears freed by the sensuousness of Keats’s own verse, standing on the verge of becoming something more than literary criticism. While not an imitation of Keatsian style, Nersessian shares his willingness for vulnerability and for writing that enfleshes the experience of being subject to the world because you are a subject in it."

Los Angeles Review of Books

“Nersessian weaponizes her searing prose—and Keats’s verse—for a very personal and yet deeply political mission. This short book is highly conscious of the world’s evils, but makes a passionate case for humanity in the face of modern capitalism and the climate emergency. It is all the more powerful a reading of Keats because it rejects the simplistic contortionism that political readings often adopt.”

Camden New Journal

"Keats’s Odes: A Lover’s Discourse by Anahid Nersessian is a deep and accessible delve into the poetry of one of the great Romantic poets. It is the perfect antidote to the way most of us had his poetry foisted on us in school as it's a wonderful combination of reverence for Keats’ sublime writing and reality-based analysis."

Blog Critics

"In previous books, Nersessian has shown herself an excellent scholar of Romanticism. With Keats’s Odes: A Lover’s Discourse , she proves that her criticism can have memoiristic range, too. . . . What most impresses about Keats’s Odes is how deftly Nersessian moves from Keats’s vulnerability to her own."

“This is an intense, often dazzling, original, illuminating, idiosyncratic, but also welcoming and welcome book. Offering trenchant, astute, often polemical and sometimes breathtaking readings of Keats’s Odes—and simultaneously of love, politics, worldmaking, and self—Nersessian has written a propelled, impelled, impassioned work, truly in Keats’s spirit.”

Maureen N. McLane

“This book claims to be ‘about’ Keats’s odes. And it is. But it is also about beauty and sadness and love and revolution and how the odes can help us to better understand these things. It is nothing short of a perfect book, one that understands how poetry can transform one’s life. Nersessian is on track to be the Harold Bloom of her generation, but a Bloom with politics.”

Juliana Spahr

“In a tour-de-force series of revisionary readings, Nersessian makes Keats’s odes new in A Lover’s Discourse ; and by the end of this exhilarating book, a new poet emerges into historical and psychological focus as well, neither aesthete nor insurgent, but someone who discovers the radicalism immanent in literary style. On yet another level, Keats’s Odes is a discourse on love as interpretive practice. Demanding, generous, precise, utopian, and unfailingly brilliant, Nersessian reinvents reading itself as a form of critical intimacy for our broken times. ‘If love is anything not laid waste by this world it is free,’ writes this reader. ‘Mine is.’”

Srikanth Reddy

"Rehearsing the sexual dynamics involved in reading and teaching “Ode on a Grecian Urn,” Nersessian recalls the high school Latin teacher who propositioned her. She then recounts a malign set of encounters with the teacher, with the school administration, and with her friends. In the end, her point is this: that what we think of as the “trigger” in literature is the way that it forces us to remember events, to make us work through pain, and to make us realize that all acts of reading, criticism, and teaching are exercises of power."

Seth Lerer | American Scholar

"Nersessian’s close readings are exquisite: supple, full of wit, and fun to read."

Public Books

"Risky, passionate criticism that—in addition to yielding all sorts of insights into the man and his writing—tests what of her own life the poems might hold (and quicken). This is living in and through and with and against poetry, a brilliant and refreshingly unprofessional book."

Ben Lerner | Paris Review

“This book is a classic of a new genre, a love letter of literary theory, giving a desired political language to the left's long-quivering heart for the lyric and sensuous knowledge of Keats. We always knew he was the activist's Romantic, and now in articulate and radical analysis, we have an understanding of his poetic form that illuminates our unwavering passion for his Odes.”

Holly Pester

“I've read Anahid Nersessian's Keats's Odes: A Lover's Discourse a half dozen times now, and it just keeps getting better. Nobody's smarter than Nersessian, nobody's more humane, nobody's more searching, fearless, nobody's more provocative, nobody challenges and cherishes their subject this way. It is that thrilling sensation of meeting a new voice on the page you know you'll spend your entire life following.”

Kaveh Akbar

"Nersessian reignites interest in Keats’s odes, justly acclaiming what they achieve without being uncritical."

Minor Creatures

Ivan Kreilkamp

Victorian Sexual Dissidence

Richard Dellamora

The Substance of Shadow

John Hollander

Be the first to know

Get the latest updates on new releases, special offers, and media highlights when you subscribe to our email lists!

Subject List
Take a Tour
For Authors
Subscriber Services
Publications
African American Studies
African Studies
American Literature
Anthropology
Architecture Planning and Preservation
Art History
Atlantic History
Biblical Studies

British and Irish Literature

Childhood Studies
Chinese Studies
Cinema and Media Studies
Communication
Criminology
Environmental Science
Evolutionary Biology
International Law
International Relations
Islamic Studies
Jewish Studies
Latin American Studies
Latino Studies
Linguistics
Literary and Critical Theory
Medieval Studies
Military History
Political Science
Public Health
Renaissance and Reformation
Social Work
Urban Studies
Victorian Literature
Browse All Subjects

How to Subscribe

Free Trials

In This Article Expand or collapse the "in this article" section John Keats

Introduction, general overviews and collected essays.

Poetry and Complete Works
Facsimile Editions
Bibliographies and Reference
Specialist Journals
Early Biographies
Modern Biographies
Specialist Biographies
Contemporary Reception
Posthumous Reception
Influence of Spenser, Shakespeare, and Milton
Influence of Other Earlier Writers
Contemporary Influences and Dialogues
Negative Capability and Chameleon Poet
Egotistical Sublime
Material Sublime
Imagination, Duality, Complexity
The Great Odes
Sonnets and Other Lyric Poems
Narrative Poems
New Criticism
Deconstruction and Psychoanalysis
History and Politics
Medicine and Science
Music and the Visual Arts

Other Subject Areas

Forthcoming articles expand or collapse the "forthcoming articles" section.

Children's Literature and Young Adult Literature in Ireland
Shakespeare in Translation
Find more forthcoming articles...
Export Citations
Share This Facebook LinkedIn Twitter

John Keats by Rachel Falconer , Philip Lindholm LAST REVIEWED: 15 June 2017 LAST MODIFIED: 26 August 2013 DOI: 10.1093/obo/9780199846719-0078

John Keats (b. 1795–d. 1821), a major British Romantic poet, produced his greatest works within an extraordinarily concentrated period of time—just three and a half years, from 1816 to early 1820. One of the most loved and widely read poets in the English language, Keats is particularly known for his six “Great Odes” (including “Ode on a Grecian Urn” and “Ode to a Nightingale”) and sonnets (such as “On First Looking into Chapman’s Homer” and “Bright Star!”). But Keats himself regarded the long narrative genres of romance and epic as more significant, and he greatly admired Spenser’s Faerie Queene and Milton’s Paradise Lost . During his lifetime, Keats published three collections of poetry: Poems (1817), Endymion: A Poetic Romance (1818), and Lamia, Isabella, the Eve of St Agnes, and Other Poems (1820). He was known to his contemporaries as the author of Endymion , while all but one of the Great Odes were published in the third volume, under the insignificant heading of “Other Poems.” To present-day readers, Keats’s tragically short life is almost as well-known as his poetry, and his status as the quintessential Romantic poet has been sealed by Jane Campion’s film Bright Star ( Campion 2009 , cited under Modern Biographies ), a fictional biography that focuses on the poet’s love of Fanny Brawne. Keats’s letters are likewise widely appreciated for the insights they give into the poet’s life as well as his poetics, and, increasingly, scholars are coming to see the letters as major literary works in themselves. If an earlier generation of readers pictured Keats as an aesthete of delicate constitution and sensibility, current criticism emphasizes his vigorous engagement in politics. He was an active participant in the debates of Leigh Hunt’s radical intellectual circle, which included William Hazlitt, Charles Lamb, Mary and Percy Bysshe Shelley, John Hamilton Reynolds, and William Godwin, among others. As Jack Stillinger argues in a chapter of The Cambridge Companion to Keats ( Stillinger 2001 , cited under Contemporary Reception ), Keats’s poetry has the distinctive quality of being meaningful to practically everybody, and to each according to his or her own taste (see Imagination, Duality, Complexity ). For the Rossettis, the Great Odes epitomized purely aesthetic pleasure, while for Matthew Arnold, they were rigorously moral and ethical. Scholars in the 20th century variously interpreted Keats’s “To Autumn” as being about the sensual pleasures of the season, about death, or about the battle of Peterloo. Although he had few readers in his lifetime, Keats predicted that he would be “among the English Poets.” That bold prediction seems conservative now as his readership expands to global dimensions.

Both John Barnard and Kelvin Everest provide engaging, well-balanced introductions to Keats’s life and writing. Barnard 1987 considers issues of class and gender and explores Keats’s views on poetry in the context of nineteenth century intellectual debates. Everest 2002 is more expansive on Keats’s poetic techniques, and on his relation to literary predecessors. While acknowledging that Keats was a writer deeply concerned with history, Everest 2002 argues that Keats nevertheless strove to represent modes of experience outside history and time itself. Mighall 2009 , an entertaining biography of Keats, is included in this section because it interweaves a narrative of Keats’s life with texts and critical commentary. Davey 2009 tells the story of Keats’s passionate love of Fanny Brawne, by using Keats’s poems and letters as primary source material. Wolfson 2001 , an edition of The Cambridge Companion to Keats , makes an excellent introduction to the range of critical approaches to Keats, with a good range of essays by major Keats scholars, and an extensive reading list collated by Wolfson herself. De Almeida 1990 is a collection that emphasizes Keats’s humanism; in some of the essays, this approach is offered as a reaction against the deconstructive readings of Keats that emerged in the 1970s and 1980s. The bicentenary celebrations of Keats’s birth stimulated the publication of two collections of essays, both demonstrating the strength of interest in Keats’s historical and political contexts, as well as ongoing interest in his poetic technique: O’Neill 1997 emphasizes tensions and paradoxes in Keats’s poetry, while Ryan and Sharp 1998 lays greater emphasis on his moral philosophy. Other collected editions, such as Roe 1995 (see Historicist Criticism from 1990 to the Present ), appear elsewhere in this article when they explore a more particular aspect of Keats’s corpus.

Barnard, John. John Keats . British and Irish Authors. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1987.

Considers issues of class and gender, and nineteenth century debates about poetry. An excellent introduction.

Davey, Peter. A Poet in Love . Ilfracombe, UK: Arthur H. Stockwell, 2009.

Narrates Keats’s romance with the enigmatic Isabella Jones and his passionate love of Fanny Brawne, on the basis of Keats’s poems and letters as well as the letters that Fanny Brawne wrote to Keats’s young sister after the poet’s death.

de Almeida, Hermione, ed. Critical Essays on John Keats . Critical Essays on British Literature. Boston: G. K. Hall, 1990.

Consists of seventeen essays, of which some had been previously published elsewhere and others were written specifically for this volume. As a whole, the collection argues for Keats’s humanizing place among the greatest English poets, emphasizing Keats’s adherence to the notions of democracy, love, a Renaissance ideal of character, and philosophical humanism.

Everest, Kelvin. John Keats . Writers and Their Work. Tavistock, UK: Northcote House, 2002.

Keats is introduced both through historical context and through attention to poetic technique. Everest is particularly strong on Keats’s influences and intertexts. The arrangement of the texts covered in his study is chronological, and the maturation of Keats’s style and themes and the developments of his personal life are explored in tandem. While it does consider historical contexts, the study offers a humanist rather than a historicist approach.

Mighall, Robert. Poetic Lives: Keats . London: Hesperus, 2009.

A concise and well-written biographical introduction to Keats and his major poetry, arranged into four seasons: spring, summer, autumn, and winter. Poems are quoted in full but are set off from the critical narrative in italic font.

O’Neill, Michael, ed. Keats: Bicentenary Readings . Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1997.

A balanced collection of essays, which consider Keats’s poetic techniques, his political and historical contexts, and tensions and conflicts in his ideas about poetry. Includes essays by Michael O’Neill, Nicholas Roe, Fiona Robertson, David B. Pirie, J. R. Watson, Gareth Reeves, Martin Aske, and Timothy Webb.

Ryan, Robert M., and Ronald A. Sharp, eds. The Persistence of Poetry: Bicentennial Essays on Keats . Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 1998.

An important bicentenary collection, with a focus on historical contexts, poetic technique, and Keats’s moral philosophy. Contains essays by Jack Stillinger, M. H. Abrams, Walter J. Bate, Aileen Ward, Ronald Sharp, Eavan Boland, Susan Wolfson, Donald H. Reiman, Elizabeth Jones, Debbie Lee, Terence Hoagwood, Hermione de Almeida, David Bromwich, George Steiner, and Philip Levine.

Wolfson, Susan J., ed. The Cambridge Companion to Keats . Cambridge Companions to Literature. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2001.

DOI: 10.1017/CCOL0521651263

One of the best collections of essays on Keats, to date, with a focus on poetic form, gender, history, and politics. The volume is available online to those students whose institutions subscribe to the Cambridge Online series. Contains essays by John Kandl, Karen Swann, Duncan Wu, Jeffrey N. Cox, Vincent Newey, Paul D. Sheats, Susan J. Wolfson, John Barnard, Garrett Stewart, Christopher Ricks, Theresa M. Kelley, Greg Kucich, William C. Keach, Anne K. Mellor, Alan Richardson, and Jack Stillinger.

Users without a subscription are not able to see the full content on this page. Please subscribe or login .

Oxford Bibliographies Online is available by subscription and perpetual access to institutions. For more information or to contact an Oxford Sales Representative click here .

About British and Irish Literature »
Meet the Editorial Board »
Abbey Theatre
Adapting Shakespeare
Alfred (King)
Alliterative Verse
Ancrene Wisse, and the Katherine and Wooing Groups
Anglo-Irish Poetry, 1500–1800
Anglo-Saxon Hagiography
Arthurian Literature
Austen, Jane
Ballard, J. G.
Barnes, Julian
Beckett, Samuel
Behn, Aphra
Biblical Literature
Biography and Autobiography
Blake, William
Bloomsbury Group
Bowen, Elizabeth
Brontë, Anne
Brooke-Rose, Christine
Browne, Thomas
Burgess, Anthony
Burney, Frances
Burns, Robert
Butler, Hubert
Byron, Lord
Carroll, Lewis
Carter, Angela
Catholic Literature
Celtic and Irish Revival
Chatterton, Thomas
Chaucer, Geoffrey
Chorographical and Landscape Writing
Coffeehouse
Congreve, William
Conrad, Joseph
Crime Fiction
Defoe, Daniel
Dickens, Charles
Donne, John
Drama, Northern Irish
Drayton, Michael
Early Modern Prose, 1500-1650
Eighteenth-Century Novel
Eliot, George
English Bible and Literature, The
English Civil War / War of the Three Kingdoms
English Reformation Literature
Epistolatory Novel, The
Erotic, Obscene, and Pornographic Writing, 1660-1900
Ferrier, Susan
Fielding, Henry
Ford, Ford Madox
French Revolution, 1789–1799
Friel, Brian
Gascoigne, George
Globe Theatre
Golding, William
Goldsmith, Oliver
Gosse, Edmund
Gower, John
Gray, Thomas
Gunpowder Plot (1605), The
Hardy, Thomas
Heaney, Seamus
Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey
Herbert, George
Highlands, The
Hogg, James
Holmes, Sherlock
Hopkins, Gerard Manley
Hurd, Richard
Ireland and Memory Studies
Irish Crime Fiction
Irish Famine, Writing of the
Irish Gothic Tradition
Irish Life Writing
Irish Literature and the Union with Britain, 1801-1921
Irish Modernism
Irish Poetry of the First World War
Irish Short Story, The
Irish Travel Writing
Johnson, B. S.
Johnson, Samuel
Jones, David
Jonson, Ben
Joyce, James
Keats, John
Kelman, James
Kempe, Margery
Lamb, Charles and Mary
Larkin, Philip
Law, Medieval
Lawrence, D. H.
Literature, Neo-Latin
Literature of the Bardic Revival
Literature of the Irish Civil War
Literature of the 'Thirties
MacDiarmid, Hugh
MacPherson, James
Malory, Thomas
Marlowe, Christopher
Marvell, Andrew
Mary Shelley's Frankenstein
McEwan, Ian
McGuckian, Medbh
Medieval Lyrics
Medieval Manuscripts
Medieval Scottish Poetry
Medieval Sermons
Middleton, Thomas
Milton, John
Miéville, China
Morality Plays
Morris, William
Muir, Edwin
Muldoon, Paul
Ní Chuilleanáin, Eiléan
Nonsense Literature
Novel, Contemporary British
Novel, The Contemporary Irish
O’Casey, Sean
O'Connor, Frank
O’Faoláin, Seán
Old English Literature
Percy, Thomas
Piers Plowman
Pope, Alexander
Postmodernism
Post-War Irish Drama
Post-war Irish Writing
Pre-Raphaelites
Prosody and Meter: Early Modern to 19th Century
Prosody and Meter: Twentieth Century
Quincey, Thomas De
Ralegh (Raleigh), Sir Walter
Ramsay, Allan and Robert Fergusson
Revenge Tragedy
Richardson, Samuel
Rise of the Novel in Britain, 1660–1780, The
Robin Hood Literature
Romance, Medieval English
Romanticism
Ruskin, John
Science Fiction
Scott, Walter
Shakespeare, William
Shaw, George Bernard
Shelley, Percy Bysshe
Sidney, Mary, Countess of Pembroke
Sinclair, Iain
Sir Gawain and the Green Knight
Smollett, Tobias
Sonnet and Sonnet Sequence
Spenser, Edmund
Sterne, Laurence
Swift, Jonathan
Synge, John Millington
Thomas, Dylan
Thomas, R. S.
Tóibín, Colm
Travel Writing
Trollope, Anthony
Tudor Literature
Twenty-First-Century Irish Prose
Urban Literature
Utopian and Dystopian Literature to 1800
Vampire Fiction
Verse Satire from the Renaissance to the Romantic Period
Webster, John
Welsh, Irvine
Welsh Poetry, Medieval
Welsh Writing Before 1500
Wilmot, John, Second Earl of Rochester
Wollstonecraft, Mary
Wollstonecraft Shelley, Mary
Wordsworth, William
Writing and Evolutionary Theory
Wulfstan, Archbishop of York
Wyatt, Thomas
Yeats, W. B.
Privacy Policy
Cookie Policy
Legal Notice
Accessibility

[66.249.64.20|195.190.12.77]
195.190.12.77

Dawson English Journal

Publishing dawson student writing since 2010.

Mental Sensations: An Analysis of Keats’s Odes

An essay by Michael D’Itri

For Prof. Hanford Woods’ Literary Genres class

The senses can be the most wonderful catalyst for our notions of art, nature and mythology. In 1819, six odes were written by the English Romantic poet John Keats, using rich imagery to evoke these ideas within the mind of the reader. The intoxication of Poetry comes to Keats through the world of the senses. This poetry, however, remains trapped within the confines of the artist’s mind. This thesis will be developed through a series of excerpts and analyses of five of his renowned odes: “Ode on Indolence” and “Ode on Melancholy” reveal and illustrate the curse of the poet; “To Autumn” more clearly demonstrates the poet’s movement from the senses to the mind, delving into the poet’s personification of the natural world as an eternal goddess; and “Ode to a Nightingale” and “Ode to Psyche” expose and detail the essential characteristic of poetic inspiration for Keats: that it is a cerebral event.

Although the course of this essay may not follow the chronological order of the odes, which is often disputed amongst literary scholars, it serves a thematic narrative to view the odes in the order that follows. Keats’s intoxication of Poetry can be illuminated if we begin by observing his “Ode on Indolence”. Poetry, personified as Poesy, is described as she “whom [Keats] love[s] more, the more of blame / is heap’d upon her, maiden most unmeek” (28-29). This reveals his admiration and respect for Poetry, as opposed to the other two figures in “Indolence”, who are described less adoringly. Love is, rather simply, a fair woman, while Ambition is pale and weary. The fact that Keats later refers to Poesy as his “demon” also demonstrates his bittersweet notions of poetry as a guiding force in life as well as a fatal attraction (30). It is a ‘curse’ that he seems unable to rid himself of.

In “Ode on Melancholy”, this curse is illustrated using Roman mythology, which Keats often alludes to throughout the odes. The speaker warns one suffering from melancholy to not “be kissed / by nightshade, ruby grape of Proserpine” (3-4). Proserpine, or Persephone in Greek mythology, was the goddess of spring and daughter of Ceres, the Olympian goddess of the harvest and fertility (“Persephone”). According to Ovid’s Metamorphoses , Proserpine was kidnapped by Pluto, god of the Underworld, who saw her in a grove and grew mad with lust (V. 386-400). Ceres killed off all the crops of humanity and spread famine until her daughter would return (V. 464-483). Jupiter, king of the gods, promised she could return if she had not eaten anything while in the Underworld. Seeing as she had been tempted to eat some pomegranate seeds, Proserpine was cursed to remain in the Underworld for four months every year, during which Ceres would prevent the growing of crops (V. 535-551). It can be argued that this curse or “intoxication” is reminiscent of the affliction Keats feels from poetry. Just as she must remain in the Underworld, Keats must continue in his poetry. The fact that Proserpine experienced and tasted the cause of her curse also emphasizes the notions that poetry originates from the senses for Keats. The speaker in “Melancholy ” warns those who are suffering from melancholy not to poison themselves, as Proserpine and Keats have, but to enjoy the emotions and experiences of the mind which has been gained through the senses.

The image of ingesting and experiencing reoccurs in “To Autumn ” , in which the season of Autumn is personified as a goddess that fills up the objects of nature with a sort of ripeness or fulfillment. She is described as having her “hair soft-lifted by the winnowing wind, / or on a half-reap’d furrow sound asleep, / drowsed with the fume of poppies…” (15-17). Here, Nature is intoxicated by the scent of poppies, which is an obvious allusion to opium. Britain was introduced to the opium trade in the 18 th century and soon became one of the leaders in opium cultivation (“Opium Trade”). Opium was also popular amongst literary circles (Berridge), and so Keats may have consumed opium at some point in his life. Autumn, like Proserpine, takes part in pleasures of the world of the senses; however the former is also the source of Keats’s poetry. By extension, Keats’s poetry can thus be seen as deriving from the senses on many levels; his muse is Nature, who herself indulges in the pleasures of Nature.

In “Ode to a Nightingale ” , the world of the senses is somewhat rejected; the speaker wishes to leave behind sight, taste, smell and touch for the sound of the nightingale’s melody (31-33). The song of the nightingale is an immortal and inspirational tune (61-62), which can be a metaphor for how Keats thinks about art; it is both eternal and able to make things eternal, however this is seen more clearly in “Ode on a Grecian Urn ” . In the second stanza of “Nightingale ” , the speaker wishes to taste wine “with beaded bubbles winking at the brim, / and purple-stained mouth; / that [he] might dink, and leave the world unseen” (17-19). Alcohol, here, is the inspiration for his poetry and brings him closer to the song of the nightingale (20). The use of the word “stained” to describe his mouth also holds connotations of pleasure and gluttony (18). This description of sensual pleasures as a “staining” experience foreshadows the dismissal of the senses in the fourth stanza, in which the speaker wishes to reach the nightingale’s song, “not charioted by Bacchus and his pards, but on the viewless wings of Poesy” (32-33). Although the senses are undoubtedly linked to Keats’s poetry, his art ultimately lies in the abstract dimensions of his own mind.

This abstraction is most evident in “Ode to Psyche ”, in which Keats literally transforms his own mind into a temple for the contents of his poetry’s narrative. “Psyche ” imagines the goddess lying in a bed of grass next to her lover Cupid, who is referred to as Love (20-21). In the third stanza, the speaker observes and laments the fact that Psyche seems to have no shrine or altar to worship her, no choir to sing for her, no incense burnt in her name and no oracles to prophesy through her (28-34). In the final stanza, the speaker takes it upon himself to be her “priest, and build a fane / in some untrodden region of [his] mind, / where branched thoughts . . . shall murmur in the wind” (50-52). The poet acknowledges that the prime seat of poetry should be in the mind; the imagination is, after all, what poetry fundamentally requires. This “rosy sanctuary [will be dressed] / with the wreath’d trellis of a working brain … / and a bright torch…to let the warm Love in” (59-67). Here, the poet himself is submitted into the narrative of Cupid and Psyche; Cupid will enter the mind of the poet, attracted by Psyche. In simpler terms, Psyche, or Keats’s poetry in general, literally and metaphorically rest in his own brain, housed by the ‘temple’ that he has created in order to enter and become Poetry itself.

“ Ode to Psyche ” provides an example of the way in which poetry is ultimately a mental event for Keats. This mentality can be first observed in “Ode to a Nightingale ” , which initially demonstrates how the senses are linked to poetry, but concludes with focus being placed on the mind. “To Autumn ” makes the senses explicit as the starting point of Keats’s poetry and the intoxication of the poet as necessarily having to write poetry is illustrated through images from Roman mythology in “Ode on Melancholy ”. The “Ode on Indolence ”, however, personifies poetry into a goddess, Poesy, in order to speak directly to the figure that, fortunately for us, plagued Keats all throughout his life.

Works Cited

Berridge, Virginia. Opium and the People: Opiate Use and Drug Control Policy in Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Century England. New York: Free Association, 1999. Drug Library . Web. 11 July 2013.

“Persephone.” Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia. 6th ed. MasterFILE Premier . Web. 11 July 2013.

Keats, John. “Ode on Indolence.” Poetry Foundation . Web. 11 July 2013.

—. “Ode on Melancholy.” Poetry Foundation . Web. 11 July 2013.

—. “Ode to a Nightingale.” Poetry Foundation . Web. 11 July 2013.

—. “Ode to Psyche.” Poetry Foundation . Web. 11 July 2013.

—. “To Autumn.” Poetry Foundation . Web. 11 July 2013.

“Opium Trade.” Encyclopædia Britannica. Encyclopædia Britannica Online. Encyclopædia Britannica Inc., 2013. Web. 27 Apr. 2013.

Ovid. “Book the Fifth.” The Metamorphoses . Trans. Henry Thomas Riley. Project Gutenburg. Web. 11 July 2013.

You must be logged in to post a comment.

Keats as a Writer of Odes

Contents in the Article

What is an Ode?

An ode is a rhymed lyric, often in form of an address, generally dignified or exalted in subject, feeling and style. It is a strain of enthusiastic and exalted lyrical verse directed to a fixed purpose, and dealing progressively with one dignified theme. It is more elaborate than a lyric both in form and language.

Keats’ Odes

Keats is one of the greatest masters of this form of poetry. In fact, his Odes are decidedly the best of his poetry. It is in his odes that Keats achieves that maturity, that ripeness, that sureness of touch, that mastery of form, which has made many a critic see in him the promise of another Shakespeare. His odes show him to be a consultimate artist and a great craftsman. It is in them that he achieves his ideal and touches the highest point of his career. Into them he put his most consummate work, and they stand out, “not more by poignancy of feeling than by the fixedness of their meditative texture.” The poet Bridges said of them. “Had Keats left us only the odes, his rank among the Poets would not be lower than it is.

A brief review of his Odes-

To a Nightingale and To a Grecian Urn-have a common starting point-a mood of deep despondency. The poet is oppressed by the fact that beauty perishes and passion cloys. The transient nature of life, its flux, haunts him. In the first of these poems he finds a refuge in the magic of Romance, while in the second (Urn) he seeks consolation in the permanence that art gives to life. Ode to Melancholy, too, is oppressed with the feeling that is short-lived. In ode to Psyche the poet returns to freedom of the pagan world in a half playful mood. In To Autumn we, find a rich, mellow contentment. The poet sees beauty in Autumn-its sights and sounds. There is no regret for spring no foreboding of winter.

The common characteristics of his odes-

In all these odes there is a note of sadness, of melancholy, if regret, of wistful contemplation, so that Carrod calls them odec elegies. They have in them the joy of life, the love for beauty. But they also have, along with this love of life, the feeling, that life is fleeting and joy short lived. This feeling of the fugitiveness of life beauty, love and joy haunts Keats’ poetry, and especially his odes. The mutuability of life and the transience of pleasure weight upon the poet’s mind in the odes as they do in his beautiful sonnet “when I how fears…” All of these beautiful poems are reflective in spirit- there is in them no rhetoric. The poet broods in them-softly and gently.

The Structure of Keats’ Odes-

Keats experimented with both the Petrarchan Miltonic and Shakespearian forms of sonnets and structurally his odes are the result of these experiments. They are a variation on the Shakespearean sonnet.

Keats, odes combine in them the peculiar excellences of the form with absolute freedom from its characteristic draw backs which disfigure the odes of Dryden, Gray, Collins, Wordsworth , Coleridge, even of Shelley. They are, as they should be, always inform of an invocation. The language is singularly exalted and dignified in tone, and they are long enough to be distinguished from lyric proper. The evolution of though in them is always measured, distinct and logical. They are distinguished by their poignancy of feeling, their richly meditative texture, their solemn splendor of imagery, and their flawless workmanship. They are remarkable for their Hellenic clarity, their chiseled beauty. They surprise us with their brooding sweetness, their long drawn out melody and their glorious independence. No wonder that Prof. Selin-court goes in raptures and says, ‘In the odes he has no master; and their indeniable beauty is so direct and so distinctive an effluence of his soul that he can have no disciple.”

All the Odes of Keats are modern; one or two are irregular and intricate, but the rest and the best of them are regular and comparatively simple. He has attempted no classical variety of the ode, Pindaric or Horatian. His odes are not choric but purely personal and subjective. They are the most harmonious and the riches expression of the full current of his soul, his keen sense of beauty of nature and the significance of art and mythology, his impassioned recognition of the fundamental mystery of beauty, fleeting yet permanent, his love of permanence, his all-embracing sensuousness, his profound sense of the mutability of life and his almost Shakespearean receptivity of openness of mind.

The note of sadness sound through all his odes and the vivid joy, the ideal permanence of art, the glamour of romance are contrasted with the mutability of life and the transience of pleasure-

Joy whose hand is ever at his lips,

Bidding adieu

‘She cannot die, though thou hast not thy bliss

For ever wilt thou love and she be fair’

“Where beauty cannot keep her lustrous eyes

Or new love pine at them beyond tomorrow”

are thrilled with the aching hopelessness of Keats’ love for Fanny Browne . As Murry remarks “The hopelessness of Keats’ love for Fanny is the heart-knowledge that inspires and colours his odes.”

His odes are not merely decorative and descriptive poems as parts of them appear to be; nor yet poems of luxurious self-abandonment, not yet mere manipulation of feelings. The deep conflict from which they spring is both emotional and intellectual; yet they proceed solely by the methods peculiar to poetry, not by the aid of speculative intelligence. They are in fact, the perfect examples of Negative Capability, ‘when a man is capable of being in uncertainties, mysteries, doubts without any irritable reaching after fact and reason.’ According to Brooke, ‘they are above criticism, pure gold of poetry, virgin gold.’

English Literature — Important links

“Ode To a Nightingale” By John Keats- Stanza wise Summary
Ode to a Nightingale- Stanza-wise Explanation & Analysis
Critical appreciation of the “Ode To a Nightingale”
John Keats as Poet of Sensuousness | English Literature
William Wordsworth as a Poet of Nature | Notes / Essay
“Ode to the West Wind”- Introduction & Complete Explanation
Main Characteristics of P. B. Shelley’s Poetry
Shelley as a Lyrical Poet & Poet of Nature
Tintern Abbey- Line by Line Explanation (1 to 10 Context Stanza-wise)
Tintern Abbey Stanza-wise Explanation (11 to 16 Context)
The World is Too Much With Us- Summary & Stanza-wise Explanation

Disclaimer: wandofknowledge.com is created only for the purpose of education and knowledge. For any queries, disclaimer is requested to kindly contact us. We assure you we will do our best. We do not support piracy. If in any way it violates the law or there is any problem, please mail us on [email protected]

About the author

Wand of Knowledge Team

A Short Biography of John Keats

John Keats was born in Morefield. He was the son of a hostler and stable keeper, thus born in the stable of the swan and Hoop Inn, London. His father, Thomas Keats, died when he was just eight years old. Adding to the misfortune of John Keats, his mother, Frances Jennings Keats, was also diagnosed with tuberculosis when he was fourteen years old. His life and metal health was greatly influenced by these tragic events and brought him closer to his siblings. He has two brothers Tom and George, and one sister, Fanny.

Keats tried to find ease and escape in art and literature when his parents died. He was an insatiable reader at the Enfield Academy. Keats was closely associated with the headmaster, John Clark, of the academy as he proved to be a fatherly figure to Keats. Clark encouraged him to develop his interest in the young orphan in literature and art.

In 1810, John Keats withdrew from the Enfield Academy and started pursuing the career of a surgeon. In 1816, he completed his medical education and was appointed as the certified apothecary in the hospital in London. Despite pursuing the medical career, Keats’ devotion to literature and art never ended. In the meantime, through a close friend Cowden Clarke, he became familiar with the editor Leigh Hunt of The Examiner. In 1817, he shifted back to London. However, his friendship with Hunt still continued.

The year 1819 is marked with the ups and downs for John Keats. He received very harsh criticism from the critics on his long poem “Endymion,” which discouraged him a lot. When he moved to Hampstead, he met with the Brawne family. Fanny Brawne, the daughter of the Browne family, was a beautiful girl. Though she was five years younger than Keats, he fell in deep love with her. Soon after, Keats and Fanny Brawne got engaged. It was during this period that Keats wrote his famous poem “Ode to a Nightingale” and Ode to Grecian Urn.”

In 1820, Keats was diagnosed with tuberculosis. He was very well nursed by Fanny Brawne. Though he was severely ill, he tried his best to finish the last poem, and ultimately it received the admiration of a lot of people. However, he gave up writing poetry due to his ailing condition and shifted to Italy for treatment with friend Joseph Severn. He could not survive the disease and died. He was buried in Rome.

John Keats’ Writing style

The writing style of John Keats is overwhelmed by poetic devices such as personification, alliteration, metaphors, assonance, and consonance. These devices are put together, which creates the music and rhythm in the poems. For example, his poem “Ode to the Nightingale” is full of literary devices. Similarly, his poetry is also characterized by sensual imagery . His poems “Lamia,” “Hyperion,” “Ode to the Nightingale,” and “Endymion” are the best examples of sensual imagery.

Moreover, the diction used by Keats is also connotative. For example, in the poem, “Ode to the Grecian Urn,” Keats implied formal diction:

“Heard melodies are sweet, but those unheard

Are sweeter: therefore, ye soft pipes, play on …”

The uses of formal diction “ye” in the above lines.

The odes written by Keats are a unique achievement in poetry. Keats’s odes are usually a lyrical reflection on something that stimulates the poet to encounter his own inner desires, to think about his own longings and their relationship with the harsh reality of the outer world.

Being the last romantic poet, he shows the typical aspects of Romanticism in his poetry. Though Keats wrote for only three years, the poems he wrote in these three years become the hallmark of the literary canon and make him one of the greatest and most celebrated poets in English Literature. Though the themes of his poems are not concerned with nature, he implied the poetic devices to make his poetry gentle and romantic. Misery, death, love, and nature are the main aspects of Romantic poetry, and the readers also find these aspects in the poetry of Keats’ as well.

Similarly, in Romanticism, we also find the appreciation of past writers, mythology, and Latin. We observe that Keats’s poetry also observes these rules.

Though Keats’ style of writing poetry is unique, his manner of poetry is immensely suggestive of Edmund Spenser. Keats and other traditional Romantics would likely focus on the remote past, ancient myth, and fairy tales to escape from the harsh realities of life and the unwelcoming modern 19 th century. The material of Keats’ poem “Endymion” is found in remote antiquity instead of the Middle Ages. In essence, he used the manner of Middle Ages poetry in his poems “Eve of St. Agnes” and “La Belle Dame sans Merci.”

Keats writes his poetry in rhymed iambic pentameter; however, it is not exactly like the simple heroic couplet used by the poet of the previous century. We seldom find end-stops at the end of the poetry. He uses enjambment normally as his verses flow into one another, particularly in a narrative poem. For example, in the poem “Ode to the Nightingale” has the poetic device enjambment as follows:

“My sense, as though of hemlock I had drunk,

Or emptied some dull opiate to the drains.”

To present the individual characters in the poem, Keats never coupled the narrative and the dramatic power. He would display the characters with expressive moods as he had mastered the lyrical powers. The moods were often romantic, pensive, lethargic, sadness, or ecstatic delight. These moods can greatly be observed in his odes.

The following are the characteristics of Keats’ poetry.

Quest for Beauty

Like other Romantic poets, Keats also focused on understanding and exploring the beauty of nature in his poems. According to Keats, there is beauty in every object of the universe, and as a poet, it is his job to look for it and incarcerate it in his poetry. According to Keats, a person becomes aware of the truth when he identifies and understands the concept of beauty. In his poem “Ode to Grecian Urn,” he writes in the final lines that

“Beauty is truth, truth beauty — that is all

Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.”

Emphasis on Ordinary Things

Keats, unlike the Romantic poets, emphasizes on the ordinary and common things in his poetry, particularly in efforts to understand beauty. Though famous Romantic poet, P.B. Shelley wrote about imperceptible things in his poetry, Keats emphasizes the identifiable and close object such as the dew of the season in autumn. Once Keats wrote, in his letter that “If a sparrow comes before my window, I take part in its existence and pick about the gravel.” This proposes that Keats always look for beauty in the ordinary things like sunset, sunrise, mountain, and valleys, etc.

Exclusion of Self

While exploring and identifying the beauty of ordinary things in his poetry, Keats disposed of his personality that would dictate his exploration. In doing so, he aligned himself to the father of English Drama, William Shakespeare. Keats found Shakespeare to be able to write about ordinary things as he refrained from expressing fondness to anything.

The six odes that Keats wrote to the physical objects is one of the most famous sets of Keats poetry. These odes are to the urn, autumn, a nightingale, indolence, psyche, and melancholy. These odes are lyrical and are devoted to praising something, thus fall in the Literary and poetic tradition of English odes. The odes are the representatives of the obsession of Keats with exploration and understating the notion of beauty in ordinary things. These odes are the extended imageries, blended with illusory tales about the thing on which they are focusing on. Keats divulges each object and the notion of beauty through the interchange of narration and description.

Works Of John Keats

Keats as a writer of odes / Dramatic quality of Keats’ Odes

अनुक्रम (Contents)

Keats as a writer of odes

Write a short note on Keats as a writer of odes .

1. introduction :.

Keats as a writer of odes – Keats has left behind a number of beautiful odes. The most prominent of them are – “The ode to a Nightingale”, “Ode to Autumn”, “Ode on Melancholy”, “Ode on a Grecian urn”, Ode on Indolence”, and “Ode to Psyche”. These odes represent the best of Keats’s poetry. Critics have greatly admired these Odes which are charged with a peculiar intensity. The Odes of Keats constitute a class apart in English literature in form and manner. A.C. Swinburne rightly remarks.

“Greater lyrical poetry the world may have seen than any that is in these Odes, lovelier it surely has never seen nor even can it possibly see”.

Keats’s odes are no doubt the best specimens of his poetry. His genius found its perfect expression in the odes. His odes really represent his artistic perfection at the best.

2. Salient features of Keats’s Odes :

Though this is not certainly the rule, the ode is usually an address. The poet in his personal voice addresses some abstraction or Quality of person. An ode is loaded with lyric enthusiasm. It is written on an exalted theme and in a metrical form which is always complex and elaborate.

All the prominent odes of Keats have all these qualities in abundance. Most of Keat’s odes are serious and contemplative lyrics in which the poet addresses something or some person. The theme of these odes is exalted, dignified and serious. The style is elevated. The metrical structure is highly complex, and the entire poem reflects a logical development. The odes also show the great imaginative power of Keats. The splendid phrascology reveals the great artistic achievement of the poet. Keats’s odes do not suffer from the defects of artificiality or rhetorical effusions. In these odes, Keats has found a form of lyrics utterance which gives utmost expression to his genius. selincourt has remarked.

“He stands without a rival, as the poet of the richly meditative ode”.

3. A Perfection of artistic Beauty :

The odes very artistically express Keats’s sensuous enjoyment of beauty. Through these odes, the poet describes the beauty of nature, changing human moods, Grecian art, Melodious song of the nightingale, the mellow fruitfulness of Autumn and the romance of psyche. Thus the poet proclaims that

“Beauty is truth, Truth beauty, That is all,

Ye know on earth and all ye need to know”.

4. A deep sense of Melancholy:

Along with his sensuous enjoyment, the odes also present the deepest melancholy. The poet expresses his personal anguish and grief through these odes. The sad death of his brother Tom, The Poet’s own illness and poor health, adverse criticism of his literary achievement, and above all anguish of unfulfilled love for Fanny Brawne all find an echo in these beautiful odes. In ‘Ode to a Nightingale’, Keats says-

“The weariness, the fever and the fret Here, Where men sit and here each other groan Where palsy shakes a few, sad last grey hairs, Where youth grows pale, and spectre-thin and dies.”

These lines also reflect deep human emotion and a universal feeling profound melancholy at the sufferings and afflictions of mankind. The Key-note of his odes is thus the spirit of sadness which predominated during the closing years of the poet’s life.

5. All Illustration of Negative Capability –

However, the poet faced the slings of fortune calmly, and consequently the odes reflect a mode of complete self-effacement. The ‘Ode to Autumn’ can be stated as a perfect example of that calm and poise which is born of the Negative Capability.

6. Immortality of art –

Keats also contemplates on the translent nature of human joy while art is permanent. This is well illustrated in his famous “Ode on Grecian urn” where the bold lover engraved on the Grecian urn can not kiss his beloved but is advised by the poet not to grieve because ‘She can not fade, though thou hast not thy bliss”. Even in ‘Ode to Nightingale’, the poet confirms the permanent value of art when he states no hungry generations can treated the art of the Nightingale.

“Thou wast not born for death, immortal Bird! No hungry generations tread the down”.

7. Lyric flow and predominating seriousness

Thus the ode contains the most intimate feelings and emotions of the poet. It is composed in a lyric form in which the poet speaks in his personal voice. It is built upon a serious and dignified theme and is subjective in nature. It comprises a succession of elaborate stanzas in stately and dignified style. Alogwith lyrical flow, we also observe ideas of deep solemnity and impressiveness. Thus the personal ideas are transformed into universal and philosophical ideas, Keat’s odes are all personal and subjective not inspired by occasions of public importance. However, he is objective and not interested in his own feelings while composing the ‘Ode to Autumn’. In this ode the poet describes the season in humanised way and mostly remains detached to his own sorrow. However, in all the odes of Keats the element of basic seriousness predominates. Keat’s odes are all of the regular variety and form a class by themselves. Keats deals with the problems of life in general and asserts the fact that art is permanent and eternal.

8. Conclusion :

Keats’s odes are no doubt supreme in their class. They are unsurpassed in their dignity and melodic beauty. Each ode is remarkable for its pictorial art, rich imagery, sensuousness and suggestion. Each ode originates from a definite mood of the poet and by its regular movement and rhythmic expression gives us a lot of delight. Keats’s odes are great examples of high excellence and poetic art. In their technique and structure, the odes are peerless. in symbolic depth. The language of the odes is colourful and vibrant.

La Belle Dame sans Merci Poem Summary

John Keats as Romantic Poet

Important Links

John Keats Biography
Percy Bysshe Shelley Biography
William Wordsworth as a Romantic Poet
William Wordsworth as a poet of Nature
William Wordsworth Biography
William Collins Biography
John Dryden Biography
Alexander Pope Biography
Metaphysical Poetry: Definition, Characteristics and John Donne as a Metaphysical Poet
John Donne as a Metaphysical Poet
Shakespeare’s Sonnet 116: (explained in hindi)
What is poetry? What are its main characteristics?
Debate- Meaning, Advantage & Limitations of Debate
Sarojini Naidu (1879-1949) Biography, Quotes, & Poem Indian Weavers
Charles Mackay: Poems Sympathy, summary & Quotes – Biography
William Shakespeare – Quotes, Plays & Wife – Biography
Ralph Waldo Emerson – Poems, Quotes & Books- Biography
What is a lyric and what are its main forms?

Going Places Summary Written by A.R. Barton in Hindi...

The Road to Happiness Summary in Hindi by Bertrand...

The Road to Happiness Summary by Bertrand Russell

Indigo summary written by Louis Fischer in Hindi and...

The Art of The Essayist Summary by A.C. Benson

The Art of The Essayist Summary | Summary of The art...

The Rattrap Summary written by Selma Lagerlof in Hindi...

About the author.

Sarkari Guider Team

Ode to a Grecian Urn by John Keats Essay

Ode to a Grecian Urn is a portrayal of pure creativity and imagination. In this poem, John Keats goes outside the realms of the physical world by addressing the surreal. Given the fact that Keats belongs to the Romanticist era that ushered in the enlightenment period, it is not surprising that most of his poetry tends to cross the borders of physical reality. It can be argued that Keats goes into the very extreme of poetic liberty, by violating the norms of ordinary language. But then, as Plato once said in his tirade against the poet’s lofty imaginations, poetry is ‘thrice removed from reality.’ By getting inspiration from nature, Keats transforms his experiences to represent what his fantasies inspire him to envision (Colvin 166).

This coinage by Plato implies that the poet does not appeal to the ordinary, but rather to the extraordinary. As Keats suggests in Ode to a Nightingale, the poet is actually a lonely adventurer exploring what the ordinary spirit could not grasp. In Nightingale, he sees the bird “as a creature that has already escaped the confines of the tangible world” (Anderson 2010). This is because in poetry, the familiar is defamiliarized and the ordinary mystified. In this regard, Ode to a Grecian Urn is Keats’ attempt to overcome the limits of reality. His wandering spirit captures fleeting images of love and grief or frozen in the curving of the urn. But within this paradoxical juxtaposition of romance and sorrow, Keats portrays the romanticist’s ability to create an ideal world out of a chaotic one. This essay examines the theme of joy and grief in Ode to a Grecian Urn, as a portrayal of the dilemmas of life.

In the first stanzas, Keats seems to directly address the urn. He addresses it that “Thou still unravish’d bride of quietness…..Thou foster-child of silence and slow time” (Keats 32 1-2). This indicates his attempts to engage himself with things that are removed from reality. By finding a way to ‘talk’ to the urn, Keats portrays the power of poetry to overcome inspire one into the idealized and fantasized world. The first notions of love are indicated by the mention of the bride, suggesting a desire for intimate connection. The paradox of the sought happiness and the unfulfilling nature of reality is portrayed by calling it a foster child, meaning that what the urn represents, i.e. the joy, love and happiness of a bride, could not be achieved in the real world, since for being a foster child, it lacks nurturance. This is a strong indication that Keats believed true joy to exist in the surreal world, and that the physical one is not well suited for personal fulfillment (Tacia, 154).

At the same time, he suggests that the pursuit of happiness is like chasing shadows, that it cannot be experienced to one’s satisfaction. In his imagination, he sees visions of men and gods, all in mad pursuit of their fantasies and struggles to escape from the entrapments of reality (line 8-9). But his Lack to distinguish between images of mortals and gods implies the thin line of distinction between the real and the surreal since gods and morals do not inhabit the same worlds.

Keats’ detachment from the real world is further portrayed when he says that:

“Heard melodies are sweet, but those unheard Are sweeter: therefore, ye soft pipes, play on Not to the sensual ear, but, more endear’d” Pipe to the spirit ditties of no time (Keats 32)

In these lines, Keats glorifies the satisfaction gained in the silence of the surreal world (symbolized by the urn). The element of fantasy is indicated by the imaginary music, which he finds sweeter than what real words and ordinary sound could manage. Rather than sound, it is the visions of his fantasies as he gazes on the urn which present his beauty, and inspires him to dream of the silent and unheard melodies (11).

The irony of life is further portrayed by the element of time, which could affect the urn, but not the images carved on its surface. This is indicated by the characters of the urn, who are forever seeking what they could not achieve but are nonetheless invincible to the effects of time. Keats says that:

“Bold lover, never, never canst thou kiss, Though winning near the goal yet, do not grieve; She cannot fade, though thou hast not thy bliss, Forever wilt though love, and she be fair!” (Keats 32, 17-20).

The irony is in the sense that although the fantasized world is full of promise, it presents opportunities that cannot be achieved by mortals. The real world is harsh, but it offers what can be actually experienced, unlike the metaphysical one where even the bold lover could not get a kiss. It is an eternal pursuit of life, represented by the immortality of the images (Jarod, 143). However, Keats believes that although what the characters on the urn seek could not e experienced as in real life, it is the paradox of life to give something to get another, in this case subjecting oneself to unattainable fantasies so as to avoid the temporality of the physical life. This aspect of the surreal world’s immortality is repeatedly mentioned in the poem when Keats says that:

“When old age shall this generation waste, Thou shalt remain, in midst of other woe Than ours, a friend to man” (Keats 32 46-48).

But the reality of life, within which the poet gets his experiences and inspiration, makes it impossible to imagine and at the same time live in the envisioned world. However, Keats’ desires to “capture a moment similar to the one pictured on the vase and live there forever, in one moment of pure joy and delight” (Lee 2010).

Works Cited

Colvin, Sidney. John Keats: His Life and Poetry, His Friends, Critics and After-Fame. New York: Adegi Graphics LLC, 2006.

Jarod, Anderson. Literary Analysis: John Keat’s Poetry. Helium, 2010. Web.

Keats, John. Ode on a Grecian Urn and Other Poems. New York: Kessinger Publishing & Adegi Graphics LLC, 2006.

Tacia, Lee. Literary Analysis. Literary Analysis: John Keats Poetry. Helium, 2010. Web.

Chicago (A-D)
Chicago (N-B)

IvyPanda. (2021, December 18). Ode to a Grecian Urn by John Keats. https://ivypanda.com/essays/ode-to-a-grecian-urn-by-john-keats/

"Ode to a Grecian Urn by John Keats." IvyPanda , 18 Dec. 2021, ivypanda.com/essays/ode-to-a-grecian-urn-by-john-keats/.

IvyPanda . (2021) 'Ode to a Grecian Urn by John Keats'. 18 December.

IvyPanda . 2021. "Ode to a Grecian Urn by John Keats." December 18, 2021. https://ivypanda.com/essays/ode-to-a-grecian-urn-by-john-keats/.

1. IvyPanda . "Ode to a Grecian Urn by John Keats." December 18, 2021. https://ivypanda.com/essays/ode-to-a-grecian-urn-by-john-keats/.

Bibliography

IvyPanda . "Ode to a Grecian Urn by John Keats." December 18, 2021. https://ivypanda.com/essays/ode-to-a-grecian-urn-by-john-keats/.

How Does Keats Explore the Theme of Life and Art in Ode on a Grecian Urn?
John Keat's Ode on a Grecian Urn vs. Ofterdingen's Novalis
“Of Silence and Slow Time”: The Metaphor of Art as the Silent Witness in John Keats’ Ode on a Grecian Urn
Keats' "Ode to a Grecian Urn" vs. Hughes' "The Weary Blues"
John Keats’ Comparison of Odes
The Role of Poetry According to Keats and Shelley
Compare and contrast Wordsworth and Keats
Individual and Society in Romanticist Texts
Poems by Iconic Authors: Keats, Shakespeare, Hughes
Ode to a Nightingale by Keats and Ode to the Cheese Fries by Olivarez
“Nothing in That Drawer” by Ron Padgett
“Everybody Knows” by John Legend and “Homage to My Hips” by Lucille Clifton
War in Poems by Dickinson, Hardy, and Jarrell
War in Poems by Hardy, Jarrell, and Levertov
Man vs. Nature in The Fish Poem by Elizabeth Bishop

Craft and Criticism
Fiction and Poetry
News and Culture
Lit Hub Radio
Reading Lists

Literary Criticism
Craft and Advice
In Conversation
On Translation
Short Story
From the Novel
Bookstores and Libraries
Film and TV
Art and Photography
Freeman’s
The Virtual Book Channel
Behind the Mic
Beyond the Page
The Cosmic Library
The Critic and Her Publics
Emergence Magazine
Fiction/Non/Fiction

First Draft: A Dialogue on Writing

Future Fables
The History of Literature
I’m a Writer But
Just the Right Book
Lit Century
The Literary Life with Mitchell Kaplan
New Books Network
Tor Presents: Voyage Into Genre
Windham-Campbell Prizes Podcast
Write-minded
The Best of the Decade
Best Reviewed Books
BookMarks Daily Giveaway
The Daily Thrill
CrimeReads Daily Giveaway

Anahid Nersessian’s Close Reading of Keats’s “Ode on a Grecian Urn”

In conversation with mitzi rapkin on the first draft podcast.

First Draft: A Dialogue of Writing is a weekly show featuring in-depth interviews with fiction, nonfiction, essay writers, and poets, highlighting the voices of writers as they discuss their work, their craft, and the literary arts. Hosted by Mitzi Rapkin, First Draft celebrates creative writing and the individuals who are dedicated to bringing their carefully chosen words to print as well as the impact writers have on the world we live in.

In this episode, Mitzi talks to Anahid Nersessian about her latest book, Keats’s Odes: A Lover’s Discourse .

Subscribe and download the episode , wherever you get your podcasts!

From the episode:

Mitzi Rapkin: In your essay about “Ode on a Grecian Urn,” I learned the most about that poem that I wasn’t really aware of— what it was really about, and the origin of the Romantic period, and where that term came from. Can you talk about “Ode to a Grecian Urn,” what’s on the surface, what it might appear to be, and then what you’ve learned through your studies?

Anahid Nersessian: “Ode on a Grecian Urn” is probably Keats’s most famous poem. It ends with a very, very famous line: “Beauty is truth, truth, beauty.” What it describes is an urn, and more specifically, a scene that’s painted on this urn of a bunch of people—presumably in ancient Greece, somewhere in the ancient world—going to a sacrifice. So, it’s some kind of religious festival. Some people are going to a sacrifice, and they’re leading a cow through their village. And the other thing that you see on the urn, and it’s probably part of the same festivities, is women being chased by men, and the women are described specifically as “maidens loth.” The word loth means unwilling, but it’s even stronger than that—it means full of hatred for whatever it is that is chasing you, or trying to make you do something you don’t want.

So, Keats scholars have always understood that what is depicted on the urn is, at least in part, a scene of sexual violence. These women are being chased by the men. There’s also a woman who is frozen and described as frozen in time as she runs from the male youth who is trying to catch her. People have always understood that what was on the urn is a scene of sexual violence. And so, the question is, how do you get from that to the lines that conclude the poem:

“Beauty is truth, truth beauty,”—that is all Ye know on earth, an all ye need to know.

There are thousands of interpretations of these lines. One really straightforward interpretation of them and of the poem would be, you know, lots of bad stuff happens, women get raped, cows get killed, lots of bad stuff happens in life. But human beings make art out of that bad stuff. And the art that they make is beautiful. And that’s the truth of human experience. The truth of human experience is not all the bad stuff that goes down, but the redemption of that bad stuff through its representation, through its elevation into art. That is the straightforward back-of-the-textbook answer about the poem.

My reading of the poem is pretty different. I actually think that the poem is spoken not by a voice that ultimately belongs to Keats. I think that the speaker of the poem is a character of sorts; I think it’s a character who we’re not supposed to trust and we’re not supposed to listen to. And I think that that message that is delivered at the end of the poem is actually supposed to fall flat, even if it sounds good, and it does sound good. I mean, those are beautiful, beautiful lines. It almost sounds like a slogan; this is very pat, it’s very accessible. It is something that you can remember easily. And that’s part of the trick of the poem, because actually, I think we’re not meant to believe that at all. We’re actually not meant to believe that the bad stuff that happens in life or has happened through the course of human history is in any way redeemed or made better by being turned into art.

And in fact, what we have to understand when we encounter art, particularly art that represents human suffering, in this case art that represents sexual violence, we have to understand that there is no way to say “it turned out okay because now we have this beautiful urn.” We actually have to dwell in the very, very, very difficult and uncomfortable position of knowing that one of the things art does is aestheticize or beautify or prettify incredible pain. And that’s a very, very hard thing to recognize. If you’re somebody that loves art, if you’re somebody that makes art, it’s a very hard thing to recognize.

And so that’s my reading of the poem. I actually think that the moral at the end of the poem is not pat. I actually think it’s a kind of a trap, and that if you read it and you think, “Oh, yeah, that’s true,” then you’re as bad as the speaker of the poem. You’re as bad as someone who looks at art and forgets the pain that it has come out of it.

Anahid Nersessian is an associate professor of English at University of California at Los Angeles. She is the author of The Calamity Form: On Poetry and Social Life; Utopia, Limited: Romanticism and Adjustment ; and Keats’s Odes: A Lover’s Discourse.

Share on Facebook (Opens in new window)
Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)
Click to share on Google+ (Opens in new window)
Click to share on LinkedIn (Opens in new window)
Click to share on Reddit (Opens in new window)
Click to share on Tumblr (Opens in new window)
Click to share on Pinterest (Opens in new window)
Click to share on Pocket (Opens in new window)

Next article, support lit hub..

Join our community of readers.

to the Lithub Daily

Follow us on Twitter

“The Bittersweet Joys.” Five Books That Center Asian Voices in Adoption Narratives

RSS - Posts

Literary Hub

Created by Grove Atlantic and Electric Literature

How to Pitch Lit Hub

Advertisers: Contact Us

Support Lit Hub - Become A Member

Become a Lit Hub Supporting Member : Because Books Matter

For the past decade, Literary Hub has brought you the best of the book world for free—no paywall. But our future relies on you. In return for a donation, you’ll get an ad-free reading experience , exclusive editors’ picks, book giveaways, and our coveted Joan Didion Lit Hub tote bag . Most importantly, you’ll keep independent book coverage alive and thriving on the internet.

Become a member for as low as $5/month

Home / Essay Samples / Literature / Ode / Literary Analysis Of John Keats’ Odes

Literary Analysis Of John Keats’ Odes

Category: Literature

Pages: 2 (1089 words)

Downloads: -->

--> ⚠️ Remember: This essay was written and uploaded by an--> click here.

Found a great essay sample but want a unique one?

are ready to help you with your essay

You won’t be charged yet!

Things Fall Apart Essays

The Story of An Hour Essays

Into The Wild Essays

Fahrenheit 451 Essays

Catcher in The Rye Essays

Related Essays

We are glad that you like it, but you cannot copy from our website. Just insert your email and this sample will be sent to you.

By clicking “Send”, you agree to our Terms of service and Privacy statement . We will occasionally send you account related emails.

Your essay sample has been sent.

In fact, there is a way to get an original essay! Turn to our writers and order a plagiarism-free paper.

samplius.com uses cookies to offer you the best service possible.By continuing we’ll assume you board with our cookie policy .--> -->

Keats's Odes

Introductory Essays to Keats’s Odes

Keats’s Odes

Related Titles

Table of Contents

Minor Creatures

Victorian Sexual Dissidence

The Substance of Shadow

Be the first to know

British and Irish Literature

How to Subscribe

In This Article Expand or collapse the "in this article" section John Keats

Related Articles Expand or collapse the "related articles" section about

Other Subject Areas

John Keats by Rachel Falconer , Philip Lindholm LAST REVIEWED: 15 June 2017 LAST MODIFIED: 26 August 2013 DOI: 10.1093/obo/9780199846719-0078

Dawson English Journal

Leave a Reply

What is an Ode?

Keats’ Odes

A brief review of his Odes-

The common characteristics of his odes-

The Structure of Keats’ Odes-

English Literature — Important links

About the author

Wand of Knowledge Team

A Short Biography of John Keats

John Keats’ Writing style

Quest for Beauty

Emphasis on Ordinary Things

Exclusion of Self

Works Of John Keats

Keats as a writer of odes / Dramatic quality of Keats’ Odes

Write a short note on Keats as a writer of odes .

2. Salient features of Keats’s Odes :

3. A Perfection of artistic Beauty :

4. A deep sense of Melancholy:

5. All Illustration of Negative Capability –

6. Immortality of art –

7. Lyric flow and predominating seriousness

8. Conclusion :

Important Links

You may also like

Going Places Summary Written by A.R. Barton in Hindi...

The Road to Happiness Summary in Hindi by Bertrand...

The Road to Happiness Summary by Bertrand Russell

Indigo summary written by Louis Fischer in Hindi and...

The Art of The Essayist Summary | Summary of The art...

The Rattrap Summary written by Selma Lagerlof in Hindi...

Sarkari Guider Team

Ode to a Grecian Urn by John Keats Essay

Works Cited

First Draft: A Dialogue on Writing

Anahid Nersessian’s Close Reading of Keats’s “Ode on a Grecian Urn”

Previous Article

to the Lithub Daily

Follow us on Twitter

“The Bittersweet Joys.” Five Books That Center Asian Voices in Adoption Narratives

Literary Hub

Become a Lit Hub Supporting Member : Because Books Matter

Literary Analysis Of John Keats’ Odes

Related Essays