Ode on Melancholy

Lyric Poetry
Short poem with one speaker, who expresses thoughs/state of mind, feelings and perceptions. The mood is musical and emotional, and it makes its impact in a very brief space.

Melancholy
Melancholy is beyond sad: as a noun or an adjective, it's a word for the gloomiest of spirits.
Being melancholy means that you're overcome in sorrow, wrapped up in sorrowful thoughts. The word started off as a noun for deep sadness, from a rather disgusting source. Back in medieval times, people thought that secretions of the body called "humors" determined their feelings, so a depressed person was thought to have too much of the humor known as melancholy — literally "black bile" secreted from the spleen. Fortunately, we no longer think we're ruled by our spleens, and that black bile has been replaced by another color of sorrow: the "blues."

http://www.vocabulary.com/dictionary/melancholy

Notes on the poem

•  "And feed deep, deep upon her peerless eyes." Repetition + Assonance (Repetition of vocal sounds) + Sibilance (Repetition of 's' sound): Draws attention to the poem so the reader feels "deep" about what we're reading.

•  "And joy, whose hands is ever at his lip", whenever we experience joy/pleasure you know its not going to last, its going to fade.

• "aching Pleasure" Oxymoron

• Ancient greek myths = Connected to nature (Proserpine)                                                                    
•  First stanza = Mentions to nature ("ruby grape" "beetle" "yew-berries" "downy owl")

•  "Sudden from heaven like a weeping cloud" = How melancholy appears suddenly, unexpected, as rain (Weeping cloud). Mention to nature.

Task 4

"No, no, go not to Lethe, neither twist

       Wolf's-bane, tight-rooted, for its poisonous wine"

We chose this picture as firstly, it shows the physical appearance of the Wolf's-bane, and it also highlights its poisonous aspect, portraying deadliness (In contrast to the actual beauty of the flower). The image also highlights certain places playing with the shadows and light, leaving the flower dark (Relating to the darkness=evil, death).

"Make not your rosary of yew-berries,"

 

   The image on the right presents a rosary that is red just like the yew-berries. The shape of the balls in the rosary have the same shape as the ones of the berry. Also the fact that it talks about a rosary relates to religion and god.  This is one more allusion to nature that is present in the first stanza. It portrays the idea that everything is connected.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                        "Sudden from heaven like a weeping cloud"

The image on the right shows a landscape in which there is a storm and it is raining. This highlights the metaphor in the poem about the rain and sky. Melancholy is unexpected, just like rain and is presente through nature. 

          

 "And feed deep, deep upon her peerless eyes."

This image is a direct portrayal of the "peerless eyes". Keats' makes use of repetition of the word 'deep' to highligh this idea, and the eyes on the picture give an impression of deepness. The use of  assonance and sibilance help to draw the attention to the reader, the same way these eyes capture our attention.

"She dwells with Beauty—Beauty that must die;

       And Joy, whose hand is ever at his lips

Bidding adieu; and aching Pleasure nigh,"

This picture represents the "aching pleasure", as the woman is 'throwing up' love. It is a portrayal of the oxymoron as two opposite terms are joined. In this case, the oxymoron expresses that even though you are happy, you will eventually be sad as melancholy makes it's way to us, and joy is only temporary.

                                                                            

 "Turning to poison while the bee-mouth sips:" 

 The image on the right shows a bee sipping the pollem of a flower. The bees make honey which is really sweet but they can also sting which can ache. In some way this can show how the speaker enjoys melancholy. 

Ode on a Grecian Urn

The making of the urn:

PART ONE
Task 1 (Critical Friend: Isa Atucha)
a) What elements of my poem do you think you understand more after completing the urn task? (This could be aspects of language, images, metaphors, similes, development of ideas, sounds, whatever...). Explain.
 The making of the urns helped on the understanding of the poem. In the first place, it directly expressed through drawings the images Keats' included in each stanza (Including his own synaesthetic images), bringing to reality the images we had build with our own imagination. Secondly, through these drawings, language was also explored and analyzed in a deeper way, depicting every aspect of the ode. In the third place, metaphors were portrayed with the help of these representation of the images, helping on the understanding of them in a more dynamic way. For example: "What men or gods are these? What maidens loth? What mad pursuit? What struggle to escape? What pipes and timbrels? What wild ecstasy?", this quote was illustrated as woman running (Escaping), and in this way the metaphor was explored and worked for it to be understood better.
b) Has the urn task raised any questions or doubts about my poem that you would want answered? What are they?
 Is Keats' reflecting on his own coming of death? (He was already infected with Tuberculosis)
    Is he allucinating? What is real and what is not?
c) What skills were important for you to use in order to complete the task successfully (which you all did, by the way. The way you worked was very impressive…)?
     - Group Work
     - Patience
     - Efficent Communication (Listening to others)
     - Creativity
     - Division of tasks
     - Correct use of time
   
Task 2

STANZA 1

"Thou still unravish'd bride of quietness,

       Thou foster-child of silence and slow time,

Sylvan historian, who canst thus express

       A flowery tale more sweetly than our rhyme:

What leaf-fring'd legend haunts about thy shape

       Of deities or mortals, or of both,

               In Tempe or the dales of Arcady?

       What men or gods are these? What maidens loth?

What mad pursuit? What struggle to escape?

               What pipes and timbrels? What wild ecstasy?"

- Why is the urn compared to a " still unravish'd bride"?

"still" has two meanings - "motionless" or "remaining in time". Time and motion are two concepts that the poem explores throughout.

"unravish'd" means unspoiled - a bride yet to lose her virginity; similarly, the urn and the scenes it represents are "unspoiled" by the passage of time.

- Explain the term "sylvan historian"(l.3)

The urn is a "Sylvan historian" because it records scenes from a culture lived long ago (ancient greeks); and because it is bordered with leaves, as well as having scenes of the countryside within.

- Is it paradoxical that the urn, a "bride of quietness", can tell its stories "more sweetly than our rhyme" (meaning the poem itself)?

The gentleness of the term "sylvan historian" and his "flowery tale" told "sweetly" do not prepare us for the wild sexuality of lines 8-10. (Another contrast!)

- What change in viewpoint occurs in lines 8-10?

The short questions and frequent repetitions inject pace into the poem. Notice how the speaker moves from contemplative observer to emotionally-involved participant with these breathless questions. (We have another contrast - that of the participant vs the observer). You may want to think about how I develop this idea throughout, and what it might suggest about the audience's relationship with "Art" in general...

STANZA 2

"Heard melodies are sweet, but those unheard

       Are sweeter; therefore, ye soft pipes, play on;

Not to the sensual ear, but, more endear'd,

       Pipe to the spirit ditties of no tone:

Fair youth, beneath the trees, thou canst not leave

       Thy song, nor ever can those trees be bare;

               Bold Lover, never, never canst thou kiss,

Though winning near the goal yet, do not grieve;

       She cannot fade, though thou hast not thy bliss,

               For ever wilt thou love, and she be fair!"

- In lines 1-4 I contrast the ideal (in art, love, and nature) and the real - the "heard melodies"; which does my speaker seem to prefer at this point? How can you tell?

In lines 1 to 4, Keats seems to compare and contrast the ideal vs the real, and he shows a preference for the ideal (Which can also be called unreal), as the expresses in the phrase "Heard melodies are sweet, but those unheard are sweeter". Imagination seems to be a way to escape reality and this goes beyond actual thought. This ambivalence is a characteristic of the romanticism.

It is also a paradox as the people drawn on the urn appear real and living, but the only way to break their stillness is through imagination, as they are just representations, still and motionless.

- Is the idea of unheard pipes an oxymoron?

"unheard pipes" is an oxymoron as it is a contrasts reality vs imagination. Keats' praises the silent music (from the pipes) as it is more pleasing than "real life" music, as the urn's music is for the spirit.

- In lines 5-10 we begin to sense a negative undercurrent to the ideal, to frozen time. How do I use language to help convey this negativity?

Keats' describes on this stanza a young man playing the pipe besides a tree ("Fair youth, beneath the trees, thou canst not leave Thy song"), who he describes will always remain on the urn, fixed in time like the leaves on the tree. "She cannot fade, though thou hast not thy bliss" This quote presents the impossibility of aging and eventually death. Keats' uses words that express the impossibility of actions, such as the young man was not able to grow old. The highlighted words express these negativity.

"Fair youth, beneath the trees, thou canst not leave

       Thy song, nor ever can those trees be bare;

               Bold Lover, never, never canst thou kiss,

Though winning near the goal yet, do not grieve;

       She cannot fade, though thou hast not thy bliss,

               For ever wilt thou love, and she be fair!"

"La Belle Dame Sans Merci"

Our Placemat:

John William Waterhouse (1849 - 1917) was a painter of classical, historical and literary subjects (Eg. Greek Mythology, Femme Fatale's, etc) . He studied in the Royal Academy Schools in 1870, after assisting his father at his studio. 

The poem "La Belle Dame Sans Merci" is full of synaesthetic images related to nature, which Waterhouse made honor to in this painting through the background and development of nature. For example in the expression "sweet moan", which can also have a sexual connotation, where all senses intertwine.

 It seems that nature is connected with the human figures in the painting, which highlights the importance of nature and the link between human life and the natural world. "She found me roots of relish sweet" shows this sustainability that plants create on humans.

We can also clearly notice an atmosphere of love and admiration between the man and the woman present, and an engaging connection between them. The woman seems to be dragging the man towards her, through an intense gaze. It can be analyzed that the woman mentioned in the poem is actually Fanny Brawne, and that Keats is reffering to how his illness will cut short their relationship (he knows his time lefth is short), as this poem was written the year he contracted turberculosis. 

"La Belle Dame sans Merci" Henry Meynell Rheam, 1901

In my opinion, the painting that better represents the poem by Keats is Waterhouse's, as it shows in a more effective way the connection between human and the nature world, while in the painting by Maynell Rheam nature is not as present and there is no link with the human world. Also, in Waterhouse's painting, the light helps highlight the presence of the woman, placing her in a higher level of importance.

RYTHM AND METER IN "LA BELLE DAME SANS MERCI"

Keats' "La Belle Dame Sans Merci" subverts the traditional ballad form. Traditional ballads have verses of four or six lines which follow two basic meters: 4-4-4-4 or 4-3-4-3. In this case, Keats' does not follow the traditional scheme used; he uses only three stressed syllables int eh fourth line of each quatrain. That is to say, each of these lines are shorter and end before expected, creating a slower pace. The poem follows an iambic tetrameter in quatrains, as shown in:

"O what / can ail / thee, knight / at arms,"

Sources

http://www.np.ac.rs/yu/preuzimanjasve/nastavni-materijal/filoloske-nauke/engleska-knjizevnost-4/753-introduction-to-romanticism/download

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/08/books/08book.html?scp=1&sq=stanley%20plumly&st=cse

http://www.poemhunter.com/john-keats/biography/

http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/5784

Poetic Ballads

A poetic ballad is a poem that has a song-like style, they could be related to children since poems for them are written in that style. Also it has some characteristics that define them; like simple language so that it can be understood by anybody. Also they have repetition, usually they have refrain that is repeated along the poem, and it is story-like since it tells a story and it is narrative, it includes multiple characters.

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vdfiCPx7sewc

Synaesthetic Images

The synaesthetic images are when the different senses are combined. It is when the visual, tactile, auditory, etc. senses are merged to form one image.  It was repeatedly used by John Keats to portray the unity of the world, to show that everything is linked together in some way and to create a sensual effect.

"Isabella; or, The Pot of Gold" And TASTE the MUSIC of that VISION pale. (stanza XLIX)

In this line, the three sensory images that are combined are sight, (vision pale), sound (music) and taste (taste). Therefore the synaesthtic image created is composed of a visual image, a sound image and a taste image.  

Keats' Themes

- Death: “When I have fears that I may cease to be.” (1818) – Ode to a Nightingale “When youtb grows pale, and spectre-thin, and dies” (1819)

- The Contemplation of Beauty: “Bright star, would I were stedfast as thou art” (1819) – Ode on a Grecian Urn “Beauty is truth, true beauty” (1819).

- Separation Vs. Connection: Ode on a Grecian Urn “Fair youth, beneath the trees, thou canst not leave” (1819)

-Dreams or visions (Imagination): Ode on a Grecian Urn “Heard melodies are sweet, but those unheard” (1819)

Odes

An ode is a lyric poem typically of elaborate or irregular metrical form and expressive of exalted or enthusiastic emotion.  Ode comes from the Greek work “aeidein” which means to sing or chant, although this did not occur in the Romanticism.

Keats Odes:

- Ode on Indolence (1819): “One morn before me were three figures seen,”

- Ode on a Grecian Urn (1819): “Thou still unravish'd bride of quietness,”

- Ode on Melancholy (1819): “No, no, go not to Lethe, neither twist”

- Ode to a Nightingale (1819): “My heart aches, and a drowsy numbness pains”

- Ode to Psyche (1819): “O Goddess! hear these tuneless numbers, wrung”

- Ode to Apollo (1815): “In thy western halls of gold”

- Robin Hood – To a Friend (1818): “No! Those days are gone away,”

- Lines on the Mermaid Tavern (1818): “Souls of Poets dead and gone,”

-To Autumn (1819): “Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness,”

- Ode to Fancy (1820): “Ever let the Fancy roam,”

Rivalry: Lord Byron

                                                    Lord Byron, British poet born in 1788.

The rivalry between Byron and Keats was mainly because of jealousy. Byron belonged to an upper class aristocratic family, therefore was accepted in society and had great success. On the other hand, Keats struggled as a middle class poet, being critized for his work as soon as published. Byron stated that he disliked Keats’ work on an aesthetic level while Keats described Byron’s work as overrated and unoriginal.

Women of Algiers in their Apartment. Delacroix. 1834

Romantic Period: Characteristics

- Imagination and emotion are more important than reason and formal rules

- Interest in nature and rural life, nature = divine revelation

- Interest in medieval past, the supernatural, the exotic and mystical

- Individualism: Elevation of the achievements of the misunderstood

- Subjective poetry

- Allure of rebellion and revolution

The French Revolution

Liberty leading the people – Eugene Delacroix (1830)

The historical event that had a major impact in the romantic era was the French revolution

In England initial support for the Revolution was primarily utopian and idealist, and when the French failed to live up to expectations, most English intellectuals renounced the Revolution.

Romantic Period

This picture is of the typical countryside in England, one of the places where the Romantic period was the most powerful. One of the aspects the romantics highlighted was the common aspect of the rural world. It shows the nature in the landscape, with the fog in the back which portrays the exotic and marvellous. These are characteristics of this period. 

His Letters

Letter to Fanny Brawne

Letter to Charles Brown

Charles Brown was Keats’ closest friend. He was the neighbour to Fanny Brawne.

“Write to George as soon as you receive this, and tell him how I am, as far as you can guess; and also a note to my sister—who walks about my imagination like a ghost—she is so like Tom. I can scarcely bid you goodbye, even in a letter. I always make an awkward bow.”

Fanny Brawne: His True Love

Frances (Fanny) Brawne was a really important person in John Keats, it could be said that she was the love of his life and he would have done anything for her. He thought he couldn’t live without her, he believed he was selfish by saying this.  Every aspect of his life was concentrated on her as he loved her so much, and he was inspired by her.

John Keats: His Life

-1795: Born in London, England, on October 31

-1803: His dad died (Had a profound effect on his life)

-1810: After her mother left him in the care of her mother because of her second marriage failure, she got sick with turberculosis and died.  Keats left the school for studies to become a surgeon. He studied medicine at a London hospital.

-1813:  Hunt's radicalism and biting pen landed him in prison for libeling Prince Regent.

-1816: He became a licensed apothecary, never ceasing his devotion for literature.

-1817: Leveraged his new friendships to publish his first volume of poetry, Poems by John Keats. 

-1818: He published his first Shakespearean sonnet “When I have fears that I may cease to be”. He fell in love with Fanny Brawne.

-1819: He contracted turberculosis, and his health started to deteriorate quickly.

-1820: Publishes his last final volume of poetry Lamia, Isabella, The Eve of St. Agnes, and Other Poems. He left a letter to Fanny saying “If I had had time, I would have made myself remember’d”.

-1821: Died on the 23 of February, clutching the hand of his friend Joseph Severn.