Finding Hope in Mutability through Percy Bysshe Shelley and John Keats Poems

809 Words2 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: French revolution causes and effects

The Romantic period happened in and around the years of 1789 to 1832. During these years, all around the world terrible things were happening. In France, the French Revolution was devastating and were the after affects. Almost all of Europe was affected, and this loss and suffering permeated the writings of Romantic poets. Percy Bysshe Shelley and John Keats poems are two authors that write about mutability but also write in a way that comes off as a search for something hopeful and happy in human existence. Both poets try to see the beauty inside the ugliness of the world.
The first example of poetry is Shelley’s “Mutability” poem. Throughout the poem, he makes many parallels between humans and nature. “We are as clouds that veil midnight moon,” (1) and “Or like the forgotten lyres” (5) are two of the most notable ones. The purpose of the two comparisons is to emphasize the eternal human condition of change, in other words, to be mutable. However, Shelley consistently takes the sadness and gloom of these ideas and creates a beautiful image. “How restlessly they speed, and gleam, and quiver, / Streaking the darkness and radiantly!-yet soon / Night closes round, and they are lost forever” (2-4). Here, Shelley is comparing the time it takes for a cloud to pass along the moon to the time a human’s life is. It goes quickly. But with the words Shelley uses, like “gleam” and “radiantly”, he creates a beautiful image out of the tragic truth of human existence.
Shelley’s third stanza of this poem is almost the turning point. “We rest.-A dream has power to poison sleep; / We rise-One wandering though pollutes the day; (9-10). Simply put, one thing can simply ruin your outlook on the day, or even life. The mind cannot control the unc...

... middle of paper ...

...at are native to nature. He is able to see the beauty and the hope of life even though death is close.
Both Shelley and Keats, through their poems, are able to see the beauty and hope in tragedy and death. Shelley is able to see that change is, in fact alright, because it is inevitable. The fact that life is so short and that your feelings and thoughts are uncontrollable shows that change will happen and you will not feel that way forever. If you sit and wallow in your sadness, life will pass you by. Shelley is able to illustrate these themes by using beautiful imagery and comparisons. Keats s is able to look at the fruitfulness and beauty of Autumn even though death is around the corner. He is able to not take life for granted just because death is guaranteed. Both poets gorgeously emphasis the point that even beauty and hope can be found in the darkest of times.

Show More
Related

  • The Fire Side Poets from the Romantic Period of Literature Appreciate Nature

    585 Words  | 2 Pages

    The Romantic period in American Literature dates from 1800-1860. It was a time where people were trying to find a distinctive voice. The Romantic period included letters, poems, essays, books, and art. Most of the authors focused on feelings, which is why it's called the “Romantic” period. The authors can be put into four different groups, The fire side poets, The Transcendentalist, American Gothic, and The Early Romantics.

    Read More

  • The Mutability Of Nature In Mary Shelley's Frankenstein

    1547 Words  | 4 Pages

    All Shelley might be doing both here and in the ‘Mutability’ lines (as also perhaps in ‘Ozymandias’) is describing the imperfection and impermanence of worldly circumstances. Mary Shelley’s purpose in using her husband’s lines might be no more than a device to engender feelings of pathos in the reader’s heart at the series of losses suffered by the protagonist.

    Read More

  • Keats and Longfellow

    706 Words  | 2 Pages

    Time is endlessly flowing by and its unwanted yet pending arrival of death is noted in the two poems “When I Have Fears,” by John Keats and “Mezzo Cammin,” by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. Keats speaks with no energy; only an elegiac tone of euphoric sounds wondering if his life ends early with his never attained fame. He mentions never finding a “fair creature” (9) of his own, only experiencing unrequited love and feeling a deep loss of youth’s passion. Though melancholy, “Mezzo Cammin,” takes a more conversational tone as Longfellow faces what is commonly known as a midlife crisis. The two poems progressions contrast as Keats blames his sorrow for his lack of expression while Longfellow looks at life’s failures as passions never pursued. In spite of this contrast, both finish with similar references to death. The comparable rhyme and rhythm of both poems shows how both men safely followed a practiced path, never straying for any spontaneous chances. The ending tones evoking death ultimately reveal their indications towards it quickly advancing before accomplish...

    Read More

  • John Keats Bright Star Analysis

    1168 Words  | 3 Pages

    Imagery and symbolism merged to express his imagination, he became a unique poet in an evolving world where Romanticism was quickly expanding globally, not into a movement, but a way of thinking. Keats’ mother and brother, and eventually he too, passed away of tuberculosis. At the time of his brother 's passing, he developed ‘La Belle Dame sans Merci’. ‘La Belle’ expressed Keats’ intellect and creativity, although at the same time he himself expressed his angst and depression for the loss of his brother. His poem ‘Bright Star’ was written in a part of his life in which a woman had influenced Keats’ greatly, so much in fact that he was driven to write ‘Bright Star’ in appreciation and celebration of the love of his life. These poems reflect Keats’ intellect, originality, creativity, and his ability to merge the contextual aspects of his life and his imagination with the ideals and concepts of Romanticism to create powerful

    Read More

  • John Keats, Going against the grain: Changing perceptions of inspiration in music

    1627 Words  | 4 Pages

    Keats was inspired by spring to create his previous odes; this is because they were written in the spring of 1819. Spring is usually associated with inspiring music, because it represents a time of optimism and rebirth. “The speaker’s mentioning of the spring in the beginning of the third in Keats’s poem signals that spring is associated with the rebirth of the sun and thus with youth, whereas autumn with sunset and old age.”(Karadas 104) Thus we see the images in the third stanza are all associated with the dark. This achieved by he image of the “barred clouds” blooming and “the soft –dying day” (line 25). However, by focusing primarily on autumn and then implementing the idea of spring in the last stanza; Keats cre...

    Read More

  • Lord Byron And Shelley: Themes Of Destruction

    1229 Words  | 3 Pages

    “Nothing beside remains. Round the decay / Of that colossal Wreck,” wrote Percy Bysshe Shelly in his poem, “Ozymandias.” This theme of destruction also forms the basis of Lord Byron’s poem, “Darkness.” Although each poem has a very different narrative, tone and plot, they reflect fears about the legacy of human influence and the destruction of civilization. The common theme of destruction, found in Percy Bysshe Shelly’s poem “Ozymandias” and Lord Byron’s poem, “Darkness” reflects the poets’ shared fears about the future by writing about ideas of civilization, the fall of mankind due to nature and natural instincts, life and death.

    Read More

  • Literature and the Industrial Revolution

    349 Words  | 1 Pages

    Daffodils?. Percy Bysshe Shelley, John Keats, George Gordon Byron and Samuel Taylor Coleridge were all poets in the Romantic era. They all had a love of their country and wrote about nature and revolution in some of their poems. Shelley wrote many plays, some of which were Romantic and some about the French Revolution (as Shelley had experienced the French Revolution in his lifetime). This allowed him to state deep,

    Read More

  • When I Have Fears That I May Cease To Be By John Keats Analysis

    853 Words  | 2 Pages

    John Keats is an early nineteenth century Romantic poet. In his poem “When I have Fears that I May Cease to Be,” Keats makes excellent use of a majority of poetry elements. This sonnet concentrates merely on his fear of death and his reasons for fearing it. Though Keats’ emphasizes his greatest fear of death, he offers his own resolution by asserting that love and fame lacks any importance. Keats uses articulate wording to exemplify his tone, while using images, figures of speech, symbols, and allegory to illustrate his fear of death. His use of rhythm, sounds, and patters also contribute to his concentration of fear and the effects on his life. As one of the most famous Romantic poets, John Keats utilizes the elements of poetry in “When I Have Fears that I May Cease to Be” to convey his fears and allow the reader to realize how much these fears affect him.

    Read More

  • Allusion In Ode To A Nightingale

    1461 Words  | 3 Pages

    Arguably one of John Keats’ most famous poems, “Ode to a nightingale” in and of itself is an allegory on the frail, conflicting aspects of life while also standing as a commentary on the want to escape life’s problems and the unavoidability of death. Keats’ poem utilizes a heavy amount of symbolism, simile and allusion to idealize nature as a perfect, almost mystical, world that holds no problems while using imagery taken from nature, combined with alliteration and assonance, to idealize the dream of escape from the problems life often presents; more specifically, aging and our inevitable deaths by allowing the reader to feel as if they are experiencing the speaker’s experience listening to the nightingale.

    Read More

  • Analysis Of Keats's Ode To Melancholy Essay

    844 Words  | 2 Pages

    In order to experience true sorrow one must feel true joy to see the beauty of melancholy. However, Keats’s poem is not all dark imagery, for interwoven into this poem is an emerging possibility of resurrection and the chance at a new life. The speaker in this poem starts by strongly advising against the actions and as the poem continues urges a person to take different actions. In this poem, the speaker tells of how to embrace life by needing the experience of melancholy to appreciate the true joy and beauty of

    Read More

  • An Analysis of the Symbols in Yeat’s Poems

    920 Words  | 2 Pages

    Throughout our lives, symbols and their meaning have had a great influence in our day to day living. Whether it is our country symbolizing itself with a flag or national seal, or our own faith, being symbolized as a cross, or as an angel; in fact religion has many sorts of symbols to tie it to together and for representation. Along with religion having many symbols, the great poet of William Butler Yeats had many symbols in his works and poetry. Throughout his countless poems, Yeats used different symbols to convey his message to his readers. Although from reading several of his works, many of Yeats’ poems revolve around death. In the texts by William Butler Yeats entitled, “When you are Old” “The Lake Isle of Innisfree” “The Wild Swans at Coole” “The Second Coming” and “Sailing to Byzantium” all have their own sort of symbolism that Yeats uses to convey his message to his readers.

    Read More

  • The Romantic Period

    920 Words  | 2 Pages

    The Romantic Period was a time in which music and poetry talked about love, nature, and the good of being human. Different poets like Blake, Wordsworth, and Coleridge made poetry that will live on in literature forever. The Romantic period didn’t only affect Britain. It affected the entire world

    Read More

  • American Romanticism And Transcendentalism

    1201 Words  | 3 Pages

    The Romantics lasted from “1830 to 1870” (The Romantic Period in American Literature and Arts). During this time the three main historical events happened which included. “Route such as the Santa Fe trail and the Oregon Trail brought a flood of settlers to the west a mass immigration that intensified with the Gold Rush of 1849”. (American Romanticism). The second was “At the same time,

    Read More

  • Essay On The Romantic Period

    1049 Words  | 3 Pages

    The Romantic Period was a time when authors and poets such as Longfellow, Bryant, Irving, and Wadsworth wrote stories and poems to illustrate the American Dream in a new light of love, freedom, and adventure. The will to succeed through feelings rather than intuition was evident throughout the Romanticism period, shown by authors through such characters as the Romantic Hero; tones of achieving reflected the American Dream shared among the people through stories and experiences.

    Read More

  • John Keats Speech

    794 Words  | 2 Pages

    The second poem I have studied is "Ode on Melancholy." The idea behind this poem is that with any intense feeling of joy and happiness, a sad and melancholy feeling must accompany it. Or to simplify this, what goes up must come down. This poem is an escape from the inevitable pain as to expect a light not to cast shadows. Keats uses personification in this poem. "Sudden from heaven like a weeping cloud." And, "Veiled melancholy has her sovran shrine." These two examples use personification to exaggerate the feelings being expressed and to help explain Keat's thoughts. To help explain joys and melancholy's interactions Keats personifies joy to be a male and melancholy to be female. This helps the reader understand how joy and melancholy are contributing factors to each other.

    Read More

More about Finding Hope in Mutability through Percy Bysshe Shelley and John Keats Poems

Open Document