3.5.3 PARADIGMA HUMANISTA

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Than ours, a friend to man, to whom thou say‘st,

‗Beauty is truth, truth beauty‘, - that is all Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.

The speaker recognizes the transient nature of human life and contrasts it with that of the urn; and the urn has a message to man, to the effect that beauty and truth are but analogous.

Self-Assessment Exercise

Discuss the themes of permanence and aestheticism in Keats‘ ‗Ode to a Grecian Urn.‘

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The penultimate line of this stanza readily brings to mind Milton‘s ―dark world and wide‖ in ―When I Consider How My Light Is Spent‖.

Essentially, the poem is a philosophical construct, presenting the speaker‘s preoccupations about life, death, love, fame and realization of one‘s dreams. It has been described as a poet‘s poem because it is concerned with the poet‘s contemplations about his literary life in the face of his mortality. The mortality of the poet strips everything of its significance, bringing literary dreams, love and fame to question. The literary dreams are reflected in lines 2 and 3. His pen in line 2 is a symbol of his literary productivity; his teaming brain is his Miltonic talent; high-piled books represent learning; and charactery refers to writing. The first word of the second line underscores the poignancy of the whole situation – that dream may not be realized.

Keats‘ unrequited love for Fanny is graphically brought to bear on this poem. It is paralleled by the phrase ―unreflecting love‖; she is the fair creature of an hour. The poem bemoans the absurdity of human hopes and aspiration and reduces everything to nothing, given that life is but transient.

Reading through the poem carefully, you will discover that its strength is its cosmic relevance. If you look at it as strictly referring to the poet and the poet alone, you may be misreading the poem. Thus, the poem could be seen as a sad commentary on life generally.

The themes of fear, unrequited love, vanity and brevity of human life run the poem. Students are expected to be able to comment on any of these as manifested in the poem.

Self-Assessment Exercise

Discuss the themes of fear, unrequited love, vanity and brevity of human life in Keats‘ ‗When I have Fears‖

4.0 CONCLUSION

The brevity of Keats‘ life notwithstanding, he was able to make much imprint on the Romantic Movement. His is essentially poetry of angst.

He used his works to illuminate the human condition in life on earth,

―where men sit and hear each other groan‖. His poetry searches for the transcendental too; and this is found in works of art and in Nature.

5.0 SUMMARY

Keats‘ ―Ode to a Nightingale‖ and ―Ode to a Grecian Urn‖ are poems that record his feelings about his environment, a type of spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings as is characteristic of Romantic poetry;

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while ‗When I Have my Fears‖ particularly is concerned with the poet‘s contemplations about his literary life in the face of his mortality.

6.0 TUTOR-MARKED ASSIGNMENT

1. Keats‘ poetry is essentially that of feeling of angst. Discuss.

2. Examine the use of contrast in the poetry of Keats.

3. The term ―egotistical sublime‖ defines Keats‘ poetry. Discuss.

4. Write an informed essay on any four themes in the poem of Keats.

7.0 REFERENCES/FURTHER READING

Carstairs, Charlotte (1996). York Notes on Selected Poems: John Keats.

Essex: Longman.

Damrosch, David (2000). The Longman Anthology of British Literature.

New York: Longman.

Garrod, H.W. (1976). Keats: Poetical Works. London: OUP.

Kermode, Frank et al (1973). The Oxford Anthology of English Literature Vol I. New York: OUP.

Kermode, Frank et al (1973). The Oxford Anthology of English Literature Vol II. New York: OUP.

Lawrence, D.H. (1999). Women in Love. Hertfordshire: Wordsworth Edition.

www.sparknotes.com>home>sparknotes>poetry study guide>Keats‘s odes.

Stephen Martin (2000). English Literature: A Student Guide. Essex:

Longman.

Washburn, Katherine and David Rosen (1993). The Great Romantics.

New York: Quality Paperback.

75 UNIT 2

THE WORKS OF PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY CONTENT

1.0. Introduction 2.0. Objectives 3.0. Main Content 4.0. Conclusion 5.0. Summary

6.0. Tutor – Marked Assignment 7.0. References/ Further Reading 1.0. INTRODUCTION

It has been asserted that the Romantic Movement was a revolutionary movement. The poets that wrote during this period were all revolutionary in their outlook. One of the most revolutionary, if not the most revolutionary, of these poets was Percy Bysshe Shelley. A radical, nonconformist, rebel, Shelley was cut out for challenging the status quo;

he believed that the ―society, institutions, and conventional morality destroyed and corrupted mankind‖ and he sought for ways of emancipating man from the inhibitions of the established institutions.

As is seen in his ―A Defence of Poetry‖, Shelley sees poets as legislators. To him, they are ―the institutions of laws, and the founders of civil society, and the inventors of the arts of life‖ (1727)

Born into an aristocratic family (his grandfather was a wealthy landowner; and his father was a parliamentarian) in 1792, Shelley started off as a revolutionary quite early in life. Because of his aristocratic background, he was sent to the best schools available in his day (Eton College and Oxford) with the hope that he would be an aristocrat later in life; but because of his mould of person, he turned out against the very system that nurtured him (like Old Major in George Orwell‘s Animal Farm who sowed the seed of revolution against the tyranny of Mr. Jones and his men, notwithstanding that the system actually favoured him).

Like Blake, Shelley loathed the tyranny of the state and the established religion – this was because these two institutions were very powerful before, during and after the Romantic period in England; they were two sides of a coin – and Shelley in ―Queen Mab‖ notes: ―Power, like a desolating pestilence, pollutes whatever it touches‖. Power has a corrupting influence.

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While at Oxford University, Shelley co-authored ―The Necessity of Atheism‖ with Thomas Jefferson Hogg and sent autographed copies to all heads of Oxford Colleges at the University. The book was a source of shock and embarrassment to the British mind at the time of its publication (1811), and consequently Shelley and his friend were rusticated from Oxford.

Shelley‘s first publication was a Gothic novel, Zastrozzi (1810). Other, some published posthumously, include Original Poetry (1810), Queen Mab (1813), Alastor (1816), Posthumous Poems (1824), Hellas (1822), Prometheus Unbound (1820) and Adonais (1821), an elegy on the death of Keats.

Shelley died before his thirtieth birthday when his schooner was hit by a storm in 1822. We are going to examine some of his poems in this unit.

2.0 OBJECTIVES

At the end of this unit, you should be able to:

1. examine Shelley as a typical Romantic revolutionary;

2. comment on the themes in the poetry of Shelley;

3.0 MAIN CONTENT

The Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley