“Ode to the West Wind” by PB Shelley as a Romantic Poem

PB Shelley (1792-1822) belonged to the Second generation of the Romantic Age. He became a key member of a close knitted circle of visionary poets and writers that included Lord Byron, John Keats, Leigh Hunt, Thomas Peacock and his second wife, Mary Shelley. He is known for classic poems such as “Ozymandias”, “Ode to the West Wind” , “The Cloud’ and others. He wrote a verse drama “The Cenci” and philosophical poems such as “Queen Mab”, ‘Alastor”, “Adonais” , “Prometheus Unbound” and his final unfinished work “The Triumph of Life”.

Shelley was a revolutionary poet and derives much influences from the French Revolution. The French Revolution destroyed the old setup of order and brought a new order to the society. “Ode to the West Wind” shows the destruction of old ideas to emerge a seed of new ideas. He compares old ideas to “leaves dead” and pleads the West Wind to drive away “like ghosts from an enchanter fleeing”. He talks about the emergence of new ideas where “the winged seeds” are preserved like a “corpse” until “the spring shall blow” resulting of the harbingers of change.
Furthermore, Shelley used these ideas for social reformation and destroy the old setup to bring new setup in the society. The West Wind blows in the air where the clouds represent dead ideas or order and it becomes “loose clouds” when the West Wind blows so the “Black rain, and fire, and rain, and hail will burst” reflecting a social rejuvenation and reform.

He further adds that the West Wind blows through the water where it has the potential to awake the slumbers from “his summer dreams”. The ‘steep old palaces and towers” were covered with old ideas with “azure moss and flowers” but the sound of the West Wind “suddenly grow gray with fear ” over them and they “tremble and despoil themselves”. These lines suggest the revolutionary elements imbue in the organic form of West Wind which is the destroyer and preserver.

Shelley exhibited hellenistic writing in his poem. He highlights a follower of God Dionysus “Maenad” who is a woman who dances wildly in the forest. He draws a parallel comparison to the mythology whose hair seems to scatter in contrast to the West Wind when it blows in the air while shedding the clouds or dead ideas as if it urges the “locks of the approaching storm” to bring forth the rejuvenation process.

“Ode to the West Wind” sprouts a Romantic elements of subjectivity. Shelley was a victim of mob torment and a bully. He addresses his own personal emotions in the statement ” A heavy weight of hours has chained and bowed” him and “I fall upon the thorns of life! I bleed”. These lines suggest the sufferings and pains he went through in his own life and pleads the West Wind to use him as a “lyre” and swept away his old self to a new life.

Lastly, the organic oneness is highlighted in the poem. It seems that Shelley pleads the West Wind to embody in his soul. He urges it as a “Spirit fierce” and pleads it to become one with him as he states ‘Be thou me, impetuous one!”. He adds that the West Wind will be able to revive him from within and “drive my dead thoughts” and “quicken a new birth” and reform him with a fresh setup of ideas and order.

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