Research Paper On John Keats

John Keats, born October 31, 1795, is one of the most celebrated poets of the English Romantic Age. Although he was only twenty-five when he died of tuberculosis, Keats remains one of the best-known poets of his generation. He wrote many famous poems and sonnets, so it is very unfortunate that he died before producing additional impressive works. Although he used innovative and non-traditional styles for many of his sonnets, much of his work revolves around themes associated with the Romantic Age of literature. However, Keats’s personal life did affect the way he wrote and the themes that he chose to explore in his poems and sonnets. Because of his connection with nature and his fear of dying young, Keats often wrote about themes of beauty …show more content…
Keats says “glut thy sorrow on a morning rose,” explaining to his readers that surrounding oneself with beauty and nature is the best way to find relief from sadness and sorrow (15). “Ode on Melancholy” differs from many other Romantic poems because it focuses on the relief that nature and beauty can provide when intertwined with one another, as they often are. Keats explains that people should not turn towards anything except beauty and nature. In his eyes, becoming full of beauty can push sorrow to the side, even if only for the time being. However, Keats also explains that this cannot last forever, and eventually the sorrow and sadness will strike again. He says that it is a cycle that all people have to deal with, but in order for one to be happy, one must have something else that is sad. It works both ways, and according to John Keats, beauty in nature is the best way to create happiness in times of sorrow. In “Ode on Melancholy,” Keats uses the theme of beauty in nature not only as a writing point, but also as a lesson of how the wonder and beauty of nature play into the joy and sadness in one’s …show more content…
He looks at death from different perspectives, including a very negative perspective of it and a quite positive one as well. In “When I Have Fears That I May Cease to Be” John Keats explains his horrible fear of dying young before he can accomplish the things he wishes to achieve in his life. Keats is terribly afraid of losing his life before he has reached his full potential as a writer, as shown when he writes, “When I have fears that I may cease to be/ before my pen has gleaned my teeming brain” (Keats, “When I have Fears…” 1-2). Keats is obviously very intrigued by death, in a good way and in a bad way, and this is evident in many of his poems. John Keats was part of a family with a poor medical history, and because of this, “Keats was aware of his impending death, and as a result of that awareness, many of his works reflect a desire to reconcile his own mortality with his desire to achieve immortality through his poetry” (Garvey). John Keats visits the complexities of death in “When I Have Fears That I May Cease to Be” and is clearly very disturbed by the idea of a young death, which shows in much of his