Percy Bysshe Shelley's Tribute To The West Wind

Shelley uses a wide range of language to describe the weather. To begin with the rain not only falls, but it patters “dismally”. The negative feeling that surrounds this word forebodes that something bad is going to happen; making the reader anxious and alert. It reflects the adverse tone and mood in this section of the extract. Similarly, the night is described with the adjective “dreary”. Together, the cumulative effect of these words creates a semantic field of a sense of danger which only adds further to this already tense (atmosphere) part of the extract.

In the second stanza Shelley describes the frailty of human existence. In lines five through nine humans are describes as "forgotten lyres, whose dissonant strings/ Give various response to each varying blast,/ To whose frail frame no second motion brings/ One mood or modulation like the last.” Shelley uses this as a metaphor that expands on the concept of human morality. In this stanza humans are compared to “forgotten lyres” saying that we will be forgotten when we are dead and gone. The different moods of the stanza are created by the different sounds of the lyre. Humans are being compared to instruments with beautifully melodies have been forgotten. Shelley is saying that once

       The poem gives a wonderful amount of images so a mental picture can be drawn. Just in these six lines Shelley introduces another character, tells all about this sculptor, gives information that is important to the mood of the poem, and lets the image of an upset artist appear in the picture. 

In the second stanza, Shelley describes the ever-changing frailty of human existence. In lines, five through nine humans are described as "forgotten lyres, whose dissonant strings/ Give various response to each varying blast, / To whose frail frame no second motion brings/ One mood or modulation like the last.” This is a metaphor for the human condition and morality. For example, in this stanza humans are compared to “forgotten lyres.” This comparison between humans and the “forgotten lyres” highlights the perpetual human condition of change. It is showing that like the lyres when humans are gone, they will be forgotten. Additionally, the various moods of the stanza are created by the different sounds of the lyre, “whose strings give a various response to various blasts.” Shelley is again pointing out that nothing is constant.

The Romantic period, a time that writers such as Wordsworth and Shelley focused their writing in the centre of life and social importance. An important aspect of 'Romanticism: its emphasis upon the power and terrors of the inner imaginative life ' (Watson, 2012, p. 1). The Prelude celebrates Wordsworth 's life retained through memories and with the act of remembering, depicting emotions and experiences. Whereas, Shelley and the 'Ode to the West Wind ' engaged his audience with inner and outer lives situations, ideas and elements of nature that represent his own position and ideas. This essay will compare and contrast Wordsworth recollections and Shelley dramatizations of the 'powers and terrors of the inner imaginative life '. Also considering, rhyme scheme, stanza forms, the reasons for the use of assonance and alliteration, and other poetic techniques. Finally, how do these effects relate to the main question.

Percy Shelley an ancient poet of the 16th century. He falls under the category of one of the major English poets who are romantic. The recognition of his works developed radically after his death. He was a also a key member who belonged to the closest circle of poets who were very visionary. Such poets included, Leigh hunt, his second wife Mary Shelley who wrote the book Frankenstein, Thomas love peacock and lord Byron. This document therefore seeks to talk about the various works of Percy Shelley and how most of it has been used.

The naturalistic imagery that pervades Mary Shelley’s Mathilda acts as an underlying theme for the incestuous affair between Mathilda and her father and its unruly consequences. Their relationship is a crime against the laws of Nature and causes Mathilda to become ostracized from the very world that she loved as a child. Shelley’s implementation of naturalistic imagery accentuates the unlawful and subsequent ramifications of the relationship between Mathilda and her father and contrasts the ideals and boundaries of the natural and spiritual worlds.

On of the most influential romantic English poets of the 19th century was Percy Bysshe Shelley. He was born August 4th 1792 to Sir Timothy and Elizabeth Pilford Shelley in Field Place, Horsham, Sussex, England. (Crook) Shelley was the oldest of six children. He had one brother, John and four sisters, Mary, Elizabeth, Hellen, and Margaret. His family lived a very comfortable lifestyle, especially his dad’s father, Bysshe Shelley whom owned quite a few estates. Shelley’s father was also a member of parliament.

becoming any worse in the future since “a thing of beauty is a joy for

As he enjoyed the works of William Wordsworth when he was younger, the more conservative Wordsworth caused much of Shelley’s dissatisfaction, which he eventually showed in a later work. Shelley showed his interest in the natural world in his, “Ode to the West Wind”, which he explained that the world has its ways and means for advancement and rebirth, “The trumpet of a prophecy! O wind, If winter comes, can spring be far behind”(Shelley, 64-70). This was the conclusion when he described how the winds change with the season and what their involvement is with the natural world. How the winds take down trees and spread seeds in its very own balance of destroyer and creator. Shelley finishes his ode with the statement quoted to create a comparison of the winds and its duties to the laws of nature, birth, death, and rebirth of the natural world, for the cycle of winter and spring tell a larger story of the

Percy Bysshe Shelley and John Keats were both unconventional men during their era. They were both part of the romantics, poets who sought nature as a way of expressing their most bare and intimate feelings. Their greatest aspiration was to resemble great poets like Wordsworth and Coleridge, who they admired profoundly. However, Keats and Shelley were completely different both in their outlook of life and even in the way that they expressed their feelings. John Keats was a poet who followed his passion for poetry and left his medical career to become a poet. He was a passive man who believed in the beauty of nature and held a respect and fear for it as well. Shelley was a man beyond his years, he was an adventurous man who held a deep love for nature and uniqueness, as we can see in many of his sonnets and poems. Both believed greatly that the power of art held and radiated once it was acknowledged. Through their sonnets they expressed their respect for artists and their work, exalting them for the passion and

The poet, Percy Bysshe Shelley refers to the wind 4 times in the first section of the poem, although we do not know until the very end of the first section why and what he wants from the wind. In order to gain the Winds trust and confidence, the speaker comes up with a couple examples of what the wind did in the past and is capable of. Like driving away the autumn leaves, placing seeds in the earth, bringing thunderstorms and the "death" of the natural world, and stirring up the seas and oceans. The end of the first and third line always rhyme with each other.

In "Ode on the West Wind," the `melody ' delivered to Shelley is unconsciously expressed in the poem 's epic metaphor, and the chords that his mind generates in response are, first, the repetitions and variations of that melody -- for example, the variation of the "leaves" metaphor -- and secondly, the formal order: the sonnet sequence imposed on terza rima, as if the tradition of Western sonneteering were imposed on Dante 's transcendental vision. That Shelley echoes the metaphor-melody 's points of comparison throughout "The Defence of Poetry" shows how deeply ingrained it was in his mind. To Shelley, metaphors like this, comparing a human being and the universe, characterize the prophetic powers of all poets. Their conscious, rational mind, in routine

It has a maintained stanza form throughout and is as, if not more, archaic shown by quotations such as, ‘hail to thee’ and ‘thou’. In the second stanza, although there is no reference to a bird, the language used suggests an immense scale similar to that used in Wordsworth’s presentation of the lark’s ‘flood’ of harmony or song. Quotations such as, ’Higher still and higher’ and ‘springest’, show this similarity. Similar to Wordsworth’s poem, Shelley begins with exclamation with, ‘Hail to thee, blithe spirit!’. Again although much more subtle and less

He uses a good amount of figurative language within his poem from imagery describing his thoughts and expressions to similes comparing past experiences with things that happen to him while he goes through his transformation of becoming a spirit. An example of the imagery used is when he is describing what he used to feel like as a human “[w]ith [a] beating heart and streaming eyes” (line 71) before he chased after the life to become a spirit. The reason why he might of used this imagery would be to describe what it used to feel like to have a feeling about something he missed or something that might have happened to him during his life. The example Shelley uses for a simile is when he seems to compare his life “[l]ike the darkness to a dying flame” (line 50) as if his life is going to end like a flame losing its energy to continue to burn. He uses this comparison to show what it must of felt like ending his mortal life to being his life as a immortal being. Also the way that his poem is, structured is in seven stanzas that almost seem to resemble his stages from being a real human being to going into the life as a spirit that he has always wanted to