John Keats – GetSetNotes

John Keats was one of the most well known poets of the Second generation Romantic Age. He was the first Romantic to die at a young age and the last Romantic to contribute to English Literature. He is widely famous for his six great Odes written in 1819 and wrote many other poems including “The Eve of St.Agnes” and the unfinished masterpiece “The fall of Hyperion”. He even wrote a tragedy “Otho ,the Great” in collaboration with Charles Brown.

“Ode to Autumn” is one of the beautiful odes written by Keats. The poem serves as a melodious tune for the old ages and paints a beautiful life of the autumn season. The autumn season is always a symbol of old age for the Romantics and hence the poem can be assumed to describe the poet’s own personal emotions and his impending death. Keats was diagnosed with Tuberculosis at an early age and this poem soothes the aching pain of old age as autumn has its own color to represent and enjoy.

Keats has used negative capability to ensure his subjective emotions in the poem. The images in the poem intrigues Keats own personal feelings who is waiting for his death yet enjoying the color of the season. The image of “maturing sun” indicates Keats own life as he has already reached the life of an old age due to his sickness. The image of fruits including “apples”,”gourd” , “hazel’ , “Kernel” shows its ripeness in the autumn season and it could indicate Keats career at its peak which is ripen when he got sick.

Keats describes the lifestyle of the autumn season implying that the autumn is the season for resting and less activity. He personifies “Autumn” to a human being and draws image of the “Autumn” himself “sitting careless on a granary floor” indicating rests and less activity in the season. He further adds the farmers who is ready to take rest and “Spares the next swath” around him and a “laden” who patiently look at the “cyder-press” extract from apples and the “Autumn” himself watches the “last oozings hours by hours”. These statement highlights the color and lifestyle of the season which shows a carefree life without bothering for the productivity.

Lastly, Keats was a sensuous poet and the sensual elements in the poem helps the poet to ease the pain within. The poem encapsulates the poet’s ability to sense the calmness in the nature and he states that season has the color to offer the “barred clouds” of the sunset while touching the “stubble-plains”. He goes on to suggest that one can hear the singing of “wailful choir ” of the “small gnats” and the bleating of the “full-grown lambs” from hilly areas as well the “crickets” singing and “swallows gathering ” while twittering signifying the process of making a funeral for old age.

Keats Ode on Indolence as a Romantic Poem–https://getsetnotes.com/keats-ode-on-indolence-as-a-romantic-poem/

Critical Note on Keats Negative Capability– https://getsetnotes.com/critical-note-on-negative-capability/

Click Here to Know about Ode on a Grecian Urn as a Romantic Poem– https://getsetnotes.com/ode-on-a-grecian-urn-as-a-romantic-poem/

John Keats(1795-1821) belonged to the second generation of the Romantic Age. He is famous for his odes which are written in 1819. His influences as a poet emerge from his famous odes beacuse of his unique writing skills. His writings embody the Romantic essence of negative capability, hellinism, sensuousness, imagination , interconnection between man and nature, beauty, medievalism and others.

The important essence of Keat’s poem is the spirit of medievalism. “The Eve of St.Agnes”(1820) shows the influences of Spenser as it is written in Spenserian Stanza and set in a medieval castle and medieval beliefs. Madeline’s assurance of her ritual rites and fasting to enable a vision of her lover is a clear reflection of the medieval cultural beliefs and the sensuous touch is dived in the poem when Porphyro makes her dream come true.

The faculty of Keatsian imagination in the poem of “The Eve of St.Agnes” is the connection between conscious and unconscious creative mind through the representation of conflict between thought and feeling. It is the thought of Madeline’s belief to see a vision of her lover in her dream and the feelings of Porphyro for her which enabled her dream to come true shows the imaginative faculty that connects the realm of unconscious to conscious mind. Keats stated in his letter to his friend Benjamin Bailey “The imagination may be compared to Adam’s Dream- he awake and found it truth”.

The application of hellenism is important with Keats and are usually drawn from Greek images and objects. “Ode on a Grecian Urn” is a classic example weaved with Greek imageries and hellenistic writings where the sequential images on the urn are frozen in time. The depiction of “Sylvan” , “Tempe” and the “dales of Arcady” reflects the the Greek natural landscape and beauty of the Urn which are objectified to represent the timeless existence of Greek culture.

“Ode on a Grecian Urn” shows the Romantic maturity of the concept of beauty. Romantics believed that the beauty is the ultimate truth to perceive the world and to comprehend the world of nature. The concept of beauty is interconnected with life as a pictorial sets of images that provides some cognitive insights into culture and life of the Ancient Greece. Thus, the beauty remains immortal in the form of an image and the concept of such immortal beauty evokes the truth of life which the urn provides as he suggests “Beauty is truth, truth beauty, -that is all/ Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know”.

Keat’s coined the term negative capability which is the ability to negate oneself and objectify oneself in a particular object. It is about substracting one’s self and objectifying in the other objects to portray objectively. “Ode to a Nightingale” is a beautiful poem where Keats is able to negate himself and objectify himself in the melodious voices of a nightingale that eases his pain. He further highlights the desire to taste the “draught of vintage” which is of “flora and the country green ” to aid him to leave the world and fade away to the wrold of a nightingale.

Keats was considered as a sensuous poet. The sensuousness comes from his use of senses that he applies in his poems to soothe his subjective emotions and sprouts the pleasure from it. “Ode to a Nightingale” exemplifies the ideal world in the realm of nightingale where he feels the immense pleasure as he states “the flowers are at my feet” neither intoxicate the fumes of “what soft incense hangs upon the boughs”. Furthermore , he highlights the elevation of the senses which connects to the past the voice of the nightingale had been heard “In ancient days by emperor and clown” and diminishes the pain of “the sad heart of Ruth” as it had a “charm’d magic ceasements” on the listeners.

Romantic poems are subjective in its essence and expresses poet’s own personal emotions and personality. “ode to Autumn” is the finest ode that expresses Keats own personal emotions. The images in the poem imbues the objectified personal emotions of Keats. The image of “maturing sun” shows the poet’s own personal emotion delineating his life to an old age as he was diagnosed with tuberculosis and an impending death. Keats own personality is also evoked when he highlights that the flowers that will bloom later will be feed upon by the bees and shall think of unending “warm days”. The image shows a clear picture of Keats greatest works will bloom after the autumn season as “summer has o’er- brimm’d their clammy cells”.

Hence, in conclusion John Keats was the finest Romantic poet. His classicism shows very much influenced from Homer and Edmund Spenser. He had placed himself as a great Romantic poet in the English literature. His writings are shows much insights into the essence of Romantic poems and he was original in his aspect of writing with his own development of negative capability which he induced in his six great odes.

Tag: John Keats

Critical analysis of Keats “Ode to Autumn “.

John Keats as a Romantic Poet.

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