Write an essay on John Keats as a poet.

What are the prominent characteristics of John Keats as a poet?

Write an essay on Keats as a Romantic poet.

Ans.

Introduction

Keats was neither a reformer nor a revolutionary idealist. He was an artist pure and simple and kept himself studiously aloof from the cross currents and sweeping waves of revolutionary idealism. Keats is the only romantic poet in whose works even the faint rumblings of revolutionary thunder is not heard. Keats’ only object as a poet was to create aesthetic delight for the readers and to provide them means of escape from the hurly-burly of hectic life. He loved beauty, nature and all these received the utmost consideration in his poetry. He was a conscious artist.

The Chief Characteristics of His Poetry

His Love for Beauty: Keats was considerably influenced by Spenser and he was a passionate lover of beauty in all its forms and manifestations. Beauty, indeed was his pole-star, beauty in Nature, in woman, and in art. “A thing of beauty is a joy forever”, he writes and he identifies beauty with truth. He was the most passionate lover of the world as the career of beautiful images and of the many imaginative associations of an object or word with whatever might give it a heightened emotional appeal. According to Keats, poetry should be the incarnation of beauty, not a medium for the expression of religious or social philosophy. Keats dedicated his brief life to the expression of beauty. He said, “I have loved the principle of beauty in all things.” The world of beauty was for him an escape from the dreary and painful effects of ordinary experience. He grasped the essential oneness of beauty and truth.

The Greek Note in His Poetry: Keats was unmistakably a representative of Greek thought. The Greek spirit came to Keats through literature, through sculpture, and through an innate tendency. Towards the creations of Greek mythology Keats was attracted by an overmastering delight in their beauty. He possesses the Greek instinct for personifying the powers of Nature in clearly defined imaginary shapes endowed with human beauty and half-human faculties. He derived his knowledge of Greek classics from translations and books of reference like Chapman’s translation of Homer, and Lempriere’s Classical Dictionary. His sonnet On Seeing the Elgin reveals the important influence exerted on him by Greek sculpture. The Greek lore, the Greek sculptures and through them, the Greek gods and goddesses, entered the world of imagination of John Keats.

His Attitude to Nature: Keats was one of the greatest lovers and admirers of Nature. His love for nature was purely sensuous and he loved the beautiful sights and scenes of nature for their own sake and less for the sake of sympathy. He was tremulous with delight at the feast of nature and its music delighted his ears. He viewed nature like an objective observer and painted its beauties in a picturesque and pictorial manner. He cared only for the beauty of earth that was never dead. Sometimes Keats’ note of happiness towards nature is coloured by sorrow and despair. He wishes to die into Nature.

His Medievalism: Keats was a great lover of the Middle Ages. He responded more than any other poet to the spell of medieval romance. He was not interested in the political or social conditions of his age nor did he dream of the Golden age of man. He was more or less a poet of escape, an idealist. Keats, who was chiefly a poet of pure imagination without much contact with reality, was naturally fascinated by the charm of the Middle Ages. Keats pays his tribute in The Eve of St. Agnes. It is a medieval poem in background, motive and atmosphere. Its story is based upon a medieval superstition. La Belle Dame Sans Merci deals with the love of a knight-at arms for a fairy. The knight suggests the chivalry and the spirit of adventure of the Middle Ages. The supernaturalism of this poem is also a medieval quality. The Eve of St. Mark again deals with a medieval superstition.

His Sensuousness: Keats’ believed in sensations. Sensations come direct from the perceptions of objects. So, he exclaimed “O, for a life of sensations rather than of thought!” Sensations are more important for him than thoughtful or intellectual considerations. Sensuousness is the permanent quality of Keats’ poetical genius. No one has catered to and gratified the five human senses (touch, taste, smell, sight and hearing) to the same extent as Keats. He is a great lover of beauty in the concrete. His religion is the adoration of the beautiful. In this respect he is a follower of Spenser: “I have loved the principle of Beauty in all things”, he said. In the volume of 1817, we have an abundance of sensuous imagery. In The Eve of St. Agnes, the description of the Gothic window is famous for its rich sensuous appeal. The short masterpiece, La Belle Dame Sans Merci, has its own sensuous appeal. The lady is described as ‘full beautiful, a fairy’s child’, with long hair, light foot, and wide eyes. The knight makes “a garland for her head, and bracelets too, and fragrant zone.” She finds him roots of sweet relish, wild honey, and manna dew. The Ode to Psyche contains a lovely picture of Cupid and Psyche lying in an embrace in the deep grass, in the midst of flowers of varied colours. Keats always selects the objects of his description and imagery with a keen eye on their sensual appeal. This sensuousness is the principal charm of his poetry.

His Pessimistic Attitude : Keats’ personal life was one of despair and suffering, and echoes of that despair and gloom are found all over his works. Keats’ vision of human life of human life had a touch of melancholy and in the Ode to a Nightingale, he expressed what he considered human life to be-a tale of misery and suffering where beauty cannot keep its lustrous eyes and new love pine at them beyond tomorrow.

Poetic Diction and Musical Quality of Verse Form

He uses a variety of verse-forms and adds a lot of music to every form. He uses heroic couplet, four-line stanza, blank verse as well as Spenserian stanza. He adds a distinct beauty to every form. There is nothing rigid or harsh about his presentation. Then he writes odes, sonnets, and poems in ballad forms also. He uses blank verse very effectively in long narrative poems.