• Home Page
  • Lyric Moment Of Beautiful Sadness In Keats Ode To Melancholy

Lyric Moment Of Beautiful Sadness In Keats Ode To Melancholy

Improved Essays
Show More
Keats' Ode to Melancholy focuses on the lyric moment of beautiful sadness. Keats describes finding beauty in the sad and temporary. Keats understands that in order to enjoy positive feelings one must also experience the beauty in the negative as well. Through the poem, Keats balances surrendering to depression with embracing the human range of feeling as a combination of fleeting emotions.
In the first stanza, Keats describes multiple poisons to stay away from. He is both reflecting on their danger and the resurrection myth hidden in them. He describes the river Lethe, a mythic river of forgetfulness also associated with the ancient Greek path to reincarnation. The death-moth is named for the skull like coloring on the back of its head. …show more content…
He starts describing moments of melancholy. Keats describes a "weeping cloud,/ that fosters the droop-headed flowers all, / And hides the green hill in an April shroud;" (12-14). These lines evoke the memory of a cloudy day in a beautiful place. The droop-headed flowers only bloom in the rain and fade quickly in the sun. Keats is encouraging us to experience the sad moments, rather than only focusing on getting to the joyful moments. He continues his point with the next three examples; "Then glut thy sorrow on a morning rose, /Or on the rainbow of the salt sand-wave, /Or on the wealth of globed peonies" (15-17). Each of these images holds a piece of Keats' lyric style. Morning roses and globed peonies, like the flowers mentioned earlier, fade very quickly. The rainbows made of spray on the beach also fade when the light changes even the slightest. Keats wants us to focus on fading beauty. It is the next image that is the most surprising; "Or if thy mistress some rich anger shows,/ Emprison her soft hand, and let her rave, / And feed deep, deep upon her peerless eyes" (18-20). Keats is encouraging his audience to let their lover become frustrated with them. He wants us to find the beauty in that anger as a well, hopefully for its temporary …show more content…
"Ay, in the very temple of Delight / Veil'd Melancholy has her sovran shrine," (25-26). Even in a joyful moment can a person experience depression. Even though melancholy is veiled, or hidden from view, sadness can find its way to make even the most joyful taste sour, not only literally but to their soul (28-29). Keats seems to be describing clinic depression. He highly stresses the importance of not surrendering to the gloomy appearance of the world. He focuses on the sadness of the lyric moments of beauty as the growth of character and food for the

Related Documents

  • Improved Essays

    Analysis Of Mezzo Cammin By Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
    • 757 Words
    • 4 Pages

    Analysis Of Mezzo Cammin By Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

    John Keats’ “When I have fears that I may cease to be” is a English sonnet that forms three quatrains and a closing couplet. It’s main theme is death with it expressing the…

    • 757 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
    Read More
  • Improved Essays

    Alexander Crum Smell Poem Analysis
    • 1615 Words
    • 7 Pages

    Alexander Crum Smell Poem Analysis

    This fragment acknowledges that his brain is ripe with imagination, however, it is doubt that seems to limit him from constructing such visionary works and before he can materialize his desired creations he will die. This mental state of doubting one’s ability to exploit the abundant and limitless nature of their inventiveness can be relatable to any artist and human being who is dissatisfied with his or her current state. Subsequent to this first section, Keats’s writes about beholding upon “the night’s starr’d face” and the “huge cloudy symbols of a high romance” and as he looks upon these celestial entities he fears that he “may never live to trace their shadows, with the magic hand of chance.” In lines 5-8, Keats uses terms that can be interpreted in a multitude of ways. Wording such as “high romance” can be addressing many things; a romantic chivalrous love, a celestial and romantic idea of nature, or even the essence of man’s soul. One interpretation the reader can extract from this quatrain is Keats’s establishment of…

    • 1615 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Improved Essays
    Read More
  • Improved Essays

    Humanistic Response To Nostalgi
    • 413 Words
    • 2 Pages

    Humanistic Response To Nostalgi

    There is something in the poetry of melancholy that has driven us forwards through art and through history, the humanistic response to loss which is at once motivating and demotivating, both binding and…

    • 413 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Improved Essays
    Read More
  • Superior Essays

    Hollen Use Of Personification
    • 1302 Words
    • 6 Pages

    Hollen Use Of Personification

    Throughout the poem she slowly becomes stuck in her head. Another one of the attitudes in the poem is the attitude of her peers. I think the attitude of the other people judging her is harsh. I think it’s harsh because they can tell that what they're saying is hurting her, but they never stop. The people criticizing her never think that maybe what their saying to her will end up making her depressed or suicidal. I also think the tone of this poem is mostly solemn. I think this poem is solemn because it’s a serious issue that repetitively occurs throughout the poem. The girl who slowly loses self-esteem because of others represents the serious and sad tone. This tone is especially represented well in this poem when the girl commits suicide because of others. It causes for the tone to be even more solemn because of the amount of sadness it quickly accumulates. This poem has important attitudes and…

    • 1302 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Superior Essays
    Read More
  • Improved Essays

    When The Sidewalk Ends By Shel Silverstein Essay
    • 796 Words
    • 4 Pages

    When The Sidewalk Ends By Shel Silverstein Essay

    Starting off, this imagery of this poem displays a transition from a happy tone to a more solemn one. This book was declined by most publishing companies due to it’s darker and realistic nature of humanity. This is shown his such lines like…

    • 796 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
    Read More
  • Superior Essays

    Diction In The Raven
    • 1575 Words
    • 7 Pages

    Diction In The Raven

    The poem illustrates its theme of pain through its diction and depressive language in all of its stanzas. Specifically, the first stanza sets itself apart, establishing a depressive…

    • 1575 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Superior Essays
    Read More
  • Improved Essays

    Climbing The Herndon
    • 670 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Climbing The Herndon

    The poem describes a scene on an urn that takes place in the spring. Keats states, “Ah, Happy, happy boughs! that cannot shed / Your leaves, nor ever bid the Spring adieu.” The leaves will never say goodbye to spring because the perfect world on the urn doesn’t change. Keats is trying to make the point that in real life, the seasons change and it is not always beautiful spring time. There is a similarity between the poem and the Herndon monument. In a perfect world, both situations last forever. Plebes would always get to enjoy the feeling of accomplishment with their classmates and spring would never end. In reality, plebes move on to being youngsters (sophomores) and spring turns into summer. Perfection is only temporary in human…

    • 670 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
    Read More
  • Improved Essays

    The Eve Of St Agnes Analysis
    • 819 Words
    • 4 Pages

    The Eve Of St Agnes Analysis

    John Collick, in his article “Desire on the ‘The Eve of St Agnes’”, explores the idea of language and symbolism of desire in the poem ‘The Eve of St Agnes’ by John Keats. Collick holds the notion that Keats was a Romantic Era poet who viewed life as a pessimist and vicariously exemplified that in his works. Throughout his article, Collick critiques Keats’ ambiguity. Keats is known as ‘a poet concerned with dreams, visions, and images…’ (Collick) however in ‘The Eve of St Agnes’ it 's quite odd that Keats uses very distinct visual and sensual imagery for the reader. Collick argues that this diversion from his typical ambiguity ‘destroys the transcendent atmosphere’. Collick also brings to light the political undertone the linguistics of the…

    • 819 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
    Read More
  • Improved Essays

    Ode To A Nightingale Diction
    • 645 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Ode To A Nightingale Diction

    John Keate's "Ode to a Nightingale" is a well-known writing in which the speaker relates his emotions and his happiness to that of a Nightingale. This poem is one where the speaker is sharing his experience with the reader, rather than just recalling his experience, creating more of a personal feel. Through the author's constant use of diction, imagery, and tone, we get a clear representation of what the speaker is going through and how he feels.…

    • 645 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
    Read More
  • Great Essays

    Ode To The Nightingale And The Raven
    • 1694 Words
    • 7 Pages

    Ode To The Nightingale And The Raven

    This was a common practice of writers throughout the Romantic era. For example, in “Ode to a Nightingale,” Keats makes reference to “Lethe” (Keats 4). A mythological river in the Greek underworld (Hades) and when souls would drink from the river Lethe it would cause them to lose their memory. Keats mentions Greek mythology in the fourth Stanza of his poem, “Not charioted by Bacchus and his pards” (Bacchus). Bacchus is the God of wine and the grape harvest he was worshiped widely from 1500-1100 B.C.E. What Keats is saying here is that he will not be with the nightingale through drinking. He goes on to say “But on the viewless wings of Poesy,” meaning he will be with the Nightingale through his poetry (Keats 33). Poe too makes use of alluding to Greek mythology as well. In the first line of the third stanza just as the speaker sits down to read an old book in order to keep his mind off of his late lover Lenore, the stately raven shutters in to his home and the ominous creature quickly perches itself upon a bust of Pallas, the goddess of wisdom in Greek mythology. This is a deliberate choice by Poe to contrast the robotic mindless, nature of the raven who has only one line available to it “Nevermore” with the Goddess of wisdom (Poe). There is also an extended simile in lines 3-4. Opium leads the speaker to lose his memory his latter mention of the river lethe is the extension of the…

    • 1694 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Great Essays
    Read More
  • Improved Essays

    Critical Analysis Of Echo By Walter De La Mare
    • 793 Words
    • 4 Pages

    Critical Analysis Of Echo By Walter De La Mare

    The second stanza is proof that nature has a main part in describing the character and maybe even the meaning the poem. “The leafy boughs on high”, means the “main” part of the branch, resaying nature is the main branch of the poem. The second stanza also has the evidence that the character is depressed. “Hissed in the sun” Hissed mean a sharp note but can also mean displeasure. Figuring out that hissed could mean displeasure, resaying it would be” displeasure of the sun” The sun signals warm, light and hope, but saying there’s a displeasure to that could mean the opposite. “The dark air carried my cry” The author uses words of negativity, nature is also darken here, evidence that nature connects with the character. We for sure know that the character is depressed.…

    • 793 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
    Read More
  • Great Essays

    The Theme Of Death In Ode To A Nightingale
    • 1455 Words
    • 6 Pages
    • 8 Works Cited

    The Theme Of Death In Ode To A Nightingale

    The lines passionately describe the misfortunes and sorrows attached to human life. Indeed, the world is filled with sickness, weariness, lost hope and human suffering in general. Ode to a Nightingale is a touching expression of death because Keats wrote it when he was struggling with an overwhelming sense of life’s tragedy. He also appeared to be pessimistic, expressing his own impending death, noting that everyone around him that he loves was dying. The personal yet human character expressed by the speaker outlines the poet’s sense of tragedy attached to human life as well as his sense of personal weariness and suffering. The theme of death acts as a groundwork for the introduction of nightingale’s immortality. Though the speaker attains this by referring to the bird as being immortal, he realizes that as a human he cannot attain such and that is when he comes back to…

    • 1455 Words
    • 6 Pages
    • 8 Works Cited
    Great Essays
    Read More
  • Improved Essays

    Duality And Personification In John Keats's To Autumn
    • 1142 Words
    • 5 Pages

    Duality And Personification In John Keats's To Autumn

    In the incredible ode, “To Autumn”, John Keats uses the literary devices duality and personification to capture the audience’s attention. He talks about the differences in autumn and it becomes clear that no matter the scale of revolt, or whatever happens, the cycle of life will continue endlessly. This is obvious when one looks at the phrases in each stanza, which makes the slight contrasts Keats’ uses purposeful. By looking at duality and personification, we can see the major differences in the phrases and the stanzas; this is important because John Keats magnificently exemplifies that all good things must eventually end as it’s a common cycle to all living on earth.…

    • 1142 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
    Read More
  • Improved Essays

    Analysis Of Ode On Melancholy By John Keats
    • 958 Words
    • 4 Pages

    Analysis Of Ode On Melancholy By John Keats

    It is easy to lose yourself in grief, however, when afflicted with “the melancholy fit” (11), Keats urges us instead to embrace it. He points out that our emotions build up, unnoticed, and comes “Sudden from heaven like a weeping cloud,” (12). This forms a natural metaphor for Keats’ assertion that we should not ignore the nature within ourselves, and melancholy is certainly a vital part of that nature. The natural analogy of a cloud which in spite of its dark and foreboding nature, provides the earth with essential rain is a suggestion to seek comfort in the beauty of the world around us. The black clouds therefore, are a necessary nutrient to plants, flowers and all nature. It is much like the paradox of joy and pain. We cannot increase our measure of joy by turning a blind eye to our pain, or the pain of others. Essentially, he suggests that as self-aware beings, melancholy provides us with an opportunity to indulge in intense perception that we do not experience under normal circumstances. It is in our experience of melancholy that we can grasp the beauty of the “morning rose,” “the rainbow of the salt sand-wave,” or even the beauty in the eyes of angry mistress…

    • 958 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
    Read More
  • Improved Essays

    Reflection Of Death And John Keats Philosophy Of Life And Death
    • 1057 Words
    • 5 Pages

    Reflection Of Death And John Keats Philosophy Of Life And Death

    Even more commendable is that when the poet learned that he has contracted lung disease, in the face of the test of life and death, through feeling, deeply. Fully experience the eternal nature and powerless beauty. Keats is not afraid of misery and death, suffering is the soul of poetry, death is an indispensable experience in life, but he fears he has nothing in a limited life, so he overcome inner fear, the courage to face the reality. This is also the best way for him to cherish and praise…

    • 1057 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
    Read More

Related Topics

Ready To Get Started?
Discover
Company
Follow
©2023 Cram.com
Privacy Policy |  About Ads |  Site Map |  Advertise  | 
  • Cookie Settings