Discuss the creation and purpose of a strong sense of setting and

Discuss the creation and purpose of a strong sense of setting and

atmosphere

Poets use a strong sense of setting and atmosphere in their poems to

get across the emotions and content of their writing. “To Autumn” and

“Ode on Melancholy” create a strong sense of setting and atmosphere.

These two poems are both Odes. Odes are very thoughtful poems and are

usually dedicated to someone or something. Also Odes are very

disciplined in the way they are written, in terms of structure. Both

poems are written by an author named John Keats. John Keats had a very

hard life, in that he watched his mother and brother die from what is

now know as leukaemia. He also knew that he would die from the same

disease. Therefore John Keats may have observed things differently and

was more appreciative of things. He seemed to be able to pick out the

positive things when times were bad, especially “Ode on Melancholy”.

These poems were also written in what is called the Romantic Era.

“To Autumn” is about John Keats feelings and thoughts towards autumn.

Straight away, in the first line Keats sets a strong sense of

atmosphere for the poem.

“Seasons of mists and mellow fruitfulness,”

The word mists implies beauty and mellow suggests calm and relaxed.

The way John Keats has used alliteration, makes the reader focus on

the two words “mists and mellow”. Not only does it start the poem of

with a soft and gentle tone, it makes the reader bring to mind autumn

in just these few words. Like many other poets Keats uses poetic

devices to make an image or to explain things in further detail. Keats

goes on to using personification in the next two lines.

“Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun;

Conspiring with him how to load and bless”

In these lines Keats personifies the sun and also autumn. The reason

for him doing this is it makes an image, that autumn and the sun are

more than what we think they are, they’re friends and they work

together to grow crops. Repetition of the idea of being friends,

“Close bosom-friend”. The repetition emphasises the relationship

between the sun and autumn, which makes the reader more clear and

aware of the imagery created.

“For Summer has o’er-brimme’d their clammy cells.”

This line at the end of the first verse is another image created of

the process of autumn. The setting is changing from summer to autumn.

This line suggests, summer has come to an end because all the goodness

of summer is full and is beginning to over flow into autumn.