The years between 1818 and 1821 mark the final stages of John Keats’ life. Those last few years were tumultuous for Keats. Family deaths, poverty, and a doomed romantic interest were things that contributed to his anxieties. However, those years also proved to be some of Keats most inspirational. It was a combination of these inspirations and anxieties that would lead to some of his greatest works. In that short period of time, he produced masterpiece after masterpiece: “The Eve of Saint Agnes”, “La Belle Dame sans Merci”, and his great odes.
“To Autumn” was one the last poem created within the series of great odes. All together, these poems contain characteristics typical of Romantic poetry. The odes look at external nature, the
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Second, they make the trees with ripe apples and fruit. Third, they work together “to swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells” (line 7) and finally, they bud more flowers until the beehives are overflowing with honey. All these examples show life and energy running through nature as vines run, gourds swell and flowers bud. It has taken all of summer to create this feast, an insurmountable amount of effort from the collaboration between nature and manual labor. The language accentuates this hard work by forcing the mouth to form the words. The effort in producing the “s” sound in words like “fruitfulness”, “conspiring”, “swell” and “cease” mirror the work needed to create the harvest. The soothing sounds of the “O” sound in “close-bosom”, “load”, “moss’d cottage” and “gourd” create a contrast between effort and gentleness. The use of monosyllabic words in phrases like “how to load and bless/ the vines with fruit that round the thatch-eves run” (line 3-4) have a dense, heaviness to them like the harvest and enhances the energy throughout the first stanza.
But this is summer. Keats sees autumn as the climax of summer since the sun has not finished maturing yet. Autumn acts as a promoter who follows the sun as it matures and to make the harvest ripe “to the core”. The season and the sun have done their job as the word “core” is in the middle of the
The similarities between the poems lie in their abilities to utilize imagery as a means to enhance the concept of the fleeting nature that life ultimately has and to also help further elaborate the speaker’s opinion towards their own situation. In Keats’ poem, dark and imaginative images are used to help match with the speaker’s belief that both love and death arise from fate itself. Here, Keats describes the beauty and mystery of love with images of “shadows” and “huge cloudy symbols of a high romance” to illustrate his belief that love comes from fate, and that he is sad to miss out on such an opportunity when it comes time for his own death.
Jeremy Karr Karr 1 Mrs. Overbeck AP Literature & Composition November 29th, 2014 “To Autumn” Explication John Keats’ “To Autumn” uses the beauty, and abundance in the season of autumn in his ode to create a sense of transformation and rebirth. The poem begins with talks of autumn’s abundance and ripeness of fruit along with the beauty of autumn’s ability to begin the process of rebirth for plants, showing autumn’s simplicity and beauty. However, the speaker begins to talk as if autumn is a woman, one that wants to enjoy the harvest she has worked for during her life, finally using the beauties or songs of autumn that come out as the day ends to suggest that the speaker would rather enjoy what autumn has to offer in his final moments.
Keats’ father Benjamin worked as a waiter at a coffee shop in Greenwich Village and was therefore all too familiar with the struggle to make a better life for you and your family. Although he had a great appreciation for Keats’ work, he discouraged him from making it a career for fear that his son would not be able to support himself. On one occasion he went so far ¬¬ to purchase tubes of oil paint and then gave them to Keats under the false pretense that a starving artist had traded them for a bowl of soup. Fortunately for future readers of his works, Jack was not deterred from his passion for art. When Keats graduated from high school he was awarded the senior class medal for excellence in art. In a cruel twist of fate, his father Benjamin died of a heart attack the day before he was set to receive the award. Although his father never saw Jack receive the award, he learned of his support when asked to identify his father’s body. As he checked his father’s wallet after his death he found several preserved article clippings of all of his achievements. His father was proud of Keats and his work and remained a supporter until his last breath.
But, we should first and foremost put this sonnet back in its context. We can easily presume that it is autobiographic, thus that Keats reveals us his own worries. In 1818, he is aware that he has short time left to live due to the fatal illness
The Romantic Period of prose of poetry created a form that promoted the focus on the supernatural, the natural world, and newfound interest in what was once overlooked. Born in different times and with distinct circumstances, both John Keats and Christina Rossetti took to poetry to convey their own ideas, shaped by this revolutionary time. Keats faced the brevity of life much more severely and took on a more grandiose, dramatic form of romantic poetry when compared to Christina Rossetti. However, both had a similar tone in observing the natural world and conveying the emotion that compelled from within. The impact of the Romantic Movement can be felt as one reads through both John Keats and Christina Rossetti. While differences may exist, and their portrayal is a unique experience of one’s own, elements of the great Romantic time permeates through both of these marvelous poets.
The poem, “O Autumn, Autumn!” used many detailed words and phrases. Overall, the poem was written about the season autumn, and the feeling you get during this time. The first stanza talked about the type of atmosphere the season helps you feel. Newsome expands on the mood of the season autumn. Newsome talks about the deep color of the sky. This helps the reader visualize how the autumn sky looks. Furthermore, she goes into detail about the ground, and how it appeals to everyone; moreover, she explains the beautiful color of the leaves, and how they are fluttering everywhere. There are beautiful butterflies and robins flying by in clusters everywhere. Then, she talks about the summer feeling slowly going away, and slowly moving into the autumn season. Throughout her poem, she used meticulous phrases. She describes the sky and the leaves in details that help you picture in your mind. Professor Emerita at Ohio State University talked about how she has a great amount of imagery in her poems. She describes everything in detail, and help the reader imbibe the
As we read through, the reader can begin to see a change in the tones of the poems. In A November Landscape, the tone is very dark and sad until it hits the third stanza. The speaker talks very sad then, the author adds the word “yet” to show the reader it is not all what it seems. He then finishes the last stanza by saying “April lured the crocus through snow” which shows signs of spring. The tone in Winter brightens up and talks about how “spring must take its place” but then is quickly switch around and the speaker says “I tell you no” and ends the poem with absolutely no hope and says “who watch each other with the winter’s look, touch with his hand, speak with his bitter breath”.
During the romnatic period, poets would mainly send out the message to admire nature and see the beauty in it. We should fine joy in nature and nature should be our teacher. In the poem “composed upon Westminster Bridge”
Misty dew covers the entire surface of the field. The yellowing corn stalks stand erect and proud until my grandpas tractor comes to end their growth. Autumn slowly weaves its way in and leaves a stain of brilliant color in its wake. Not everyone enjoys such colors, but when you take a second to step outside your doorstep, and look at all the wonders that surround you, you’d be surprised at how marvelous the world can truly be. To me, Autumn is a time for relishing in the colors. Soaking in the oranges and reds while sitting by a warm fire. It’s a time for remembering that everything does end, but it does not have to end in the dreadful way we think it will. Autumn is a time for the closeness of others to keep out the chill of the morning and the starry-eyed darkness of the night.
Alexander Pushkin and Robert Frost both have written poems about autumn. There is a correlation between these two poems since they share many romantic features. “Autumn” and “After Apple-Picking” are both alike and different in many ways.
This poem that I am going to be focusing on is titled "Ode to Autumn",
The twenty-four old romantic poet John Keats, “Ode on a Grecian Urn” written in the spring of 1819 was one of his last of six odes. That he ever wrote for he died of tuberculosis a year later. Although, his time as a poet was short he was an essential part of The Romantic period (1789-1832). His groundbreaking poetry created a paradigm shift in the way poetry was composed and comprehended. Indeed, the Romantic period provided a shift from reason to belief in the senses and intuition. “Keats’s poem is able to address some of the most common assumptions and valorizations in the study of Romantic poetry, such as the opposition between “organic culture” and the alienation of modernity”. (O’Rourke, 53) The irony of Keats’s Urn is he likens
In “To Autumn”, the season autumn is depicted as death, or as the Grim Reaper. Autumn is, however, an unusual reaper figure, in that they are not merciless, but patient and calm. Interestingly enough, the point of view Keats offers about death, is non-violent, not corporeal, and only implicit in the poem, through metaphors. Almost all human components are removed from the poem, and death is symbolized by nature only. It is put into a context where it occurs in the course of nature, and pictured as a consequence of riches, abundance, and fulfilment.
At one time or another, every person has experienced the beauty of summer. In this time of the year, nature is full of life, the weather is at its finest, and the paramount joys of life can be experienced to their fullest. Then the fall comes, the trees turn lovely shades of red and yellow, and the wind offers a nice chill breeze for relief. Unfortunately, seasons change and the beauty that people once experienced vanishes. People focusing only on the material and petty aspects of life, rather than the beauty around them, will let life pass them, missing out on the true wonders of the world. In his poem “To Autumn,” John Keats utilizes imagery to express the importance of indulging in the beauties of nature, while alive, because humans are mortal beings bound by the limits of time.