In Percy Shelley’s poem, “Ode to the West Wind,” the speaker, being separated from his home and familiar surroundings, laments the loss of his voice and worldly influence. Searching for direction and guidance, the speaker addresses his grievances to the West Wind, a powerful westerly force that arrives to sweep away the dying remnants of autumn. However, while he acknowledges its destructive capabilities, the speaker nonetheless reveres and respects the West Wind, illuminating its crucial contribution to Earth’s natural cycle and renewal of spring. Classified as both destroyer and restorer, the West Wind ultimately becomes a vehicle for the speaker’s desire for a revived significance. Furthermore, as the speaker’s desperation for renewal escalates,
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While the poem’s rhyming pattern closely adheres to terza rima’s traditional form, the poem’s five cantos each contain fourteen lines, and thus establish the sonnet’s foundation. Furthermore, although the rhyme scheme forces the stanzas into four tercets rather than three quatrains, each cantos nonetheless ends with the sonnet’s quintessential rhyming couplet. Shelley’s adaptation of these two structures creates a striking opposition, as it forces two very distinct literary forms to compete– the older, ancestral terza rima and the more contemporary English sonnet. This contrast between the traditional and the new is highly representative of the West Wind, “from whose unseen presence the leaves dead / are driven” (“Ode to the West Wind” 2-3) to make way for new life in spring. In addition, the poem also contrasts Italy and England’s separate literary traditions, two countries that inevitably possess great significance in the poem. While the speaker pleads with the West Wind, “Oh, lift me as a wave, a leaf, a cloud” (53), he fails to specify where he would like the West Wind to take him. That said, the speaker does establish a geographical frame, as he makes a very specific reference to “a pumice isle in Baiae’s Bay” (32), a harbour outside of Naples, Italy. …show more content…
In this subtle conceit that runs throughout the poem, the speaker compares the West Wind’s binary nature with the other elements’ corresponding dualities. For example, having “waken from his summer dreams / The blue Mediterranean, where he lay” (29-30), the West Wind unleashes the destructive capabilities of the Ocean, who, despite creating a habitable Earth, is nonetheless able to rip apart what lives beneath it and engulf whatever tries to cross it. Similarly, the speaker also showcases fire’s destructive and restorative capabilities. As he implores the West Wind to “Scatter, as from an unextinguished hearth / Ashes and sparks, my words among mankind” (66-67), he alludes to the fact that, while it can decimate and ravage, fire is also necessary for the regeneration of forests and plant life. These comparisons ultimately validate the speaker’s faith, as water, earth, and fire possess similar dualities that complement the West Wind’s paradoxical character. However, while the speaker highlights the elements’ similarities, he simultaneously establishes the West Wind’s superiority over them; while all four forces possess destructive and restorative natures, water, earth, and fire’s conservational qualities are nonetheless achieved through the West Wind’s agency. Although the ocean’s churning and movement is powerful and destructive,
While the poem’s rhyming pattern closely adheres to terza rima’s traditional form, the poem’s five cantos each contain fourteen lines, and thus establish the sonnet’s foundation. Furthermore, although the rhyme scheme forces the stanzas into four tercets rather than three quatrains, each cantos nonetheless ends with the sonnet’s quintessential rhyming couplet. Shelley’s adaptation of these two structures creates a striking opposition, as it forces two very distinct literary forms to compete– the older, ancestral terza rima and the more contemporary English sonnet. This contrast between the traditional and the new is highly representative of the West Wind, “from whose unseen presence the leaves dead / are driven” (“Ode to the West Wind” 2-3) to make way for new life in spring. In addition, the poem also contrasts Italy and England’s separate literary traditions, two countries that inevitably possess great significance in the poem. While the speaker pleads with the West Wind, “Oh, lift me as a wave, a leaf, a cloud” (53), he fails to specify where he would like the West Wind to take him. That said, the speaker does establish a geographical frame, as he makes a very specific reference to “a pumice isle in Baiae’s Bay” (32), a harbour outside of Naples, Italy. …show more content…
In this subtle conceit that runs throughout the poem, the speaker compares the West Wind’s binary nature with the other elements’ corresponding dualities. For example, having “waken from his summer dreams / The blue Mediterranean, where he lay” (29-30), the West Wind unleashes the destructive capabilities of the Ocean, who, despite creating a habitable Earth, is nonetheless able to rip apart what lives beneath it and engulf whatever tries to cross it. Similarly, the speaker also showcases fire’s destructive and restorative capabilities. As he implores the West Wind to “Scatter, as from an unextinguished hearth / Ashes and sparks, my words among mankind” (66-67), he alludes to the fact that, while it can decimate and ravage, fire is also necessary for the regeneration of forests and plant life. These comparisons ultimately validate the speaker’s faith, as water, earth, and fire possess similar dualities that complement the West Wind’s paradoxical character. However, while the speaker highlights the elements’ similarities, he simultaneously establishes the West Wind’s superiority over them; while all four forces possess destructive and restorative natures, water, earth, and fire’s conservational qualities are nonetheless achieved through the West Wind’s agency. Although the ocean’s churning and movement is powerful and destructive,