The Ode to the West Wind by Percy Bysshee Shelley
The Ode to the West Wind, by Percy Bysshee Shelley, is a poem of spiritual power. The power is demonstrated through the use of visual, auditory, and kinetic (motion) imagery. The poem was written on a day that the “tempestuous wind, whose temperature is at once mild and animating, was collecting the vapors which pour down the autumns rains [Shelly’s notes].” The poem uses terza rima to portray a very rhythmic rhyming pattern. This pattern is used to describe five very distinct and different stanzas, which describe: autumn, rainstorms, the sea, man merging with the wind, and man being the sound of the wind. Shelley uses three types of imagery in each of these stanzas. His use of visual, auditory, and kinetic imagery is demonstrated in each of the five stanzas throughout Ode to the West Wind.
In the first stanza of Shelley’s poem, Shelley describes autumn and the changing of colors. “Yellow, and black, and pale, and hectic red, Pestilence-stricken multitudes,” is a visual imagery of the leaves that change colors in the fall. “Her clarion o’er the dreaming earth,” is a strong auditory image of the wild west winds blowing in as autumn arrives. “Wild Spirit, which art moving everywhere,” is kinetic imagery, which describes the energy, and the force that drives the spirited west wind.
In stanza two Shelley talks of the effects that the west wind has on a rainstorm. “Angels of rain and lightning there are a spread On the blue surface of thine aery surge, Like the bright hair uplifted from the head,” is a very vivid and colorful use of visual imagery. These lines do a great job of imaginatively taking the reader to the front of the wind to see its power on a storm. ...
... middle of paper ...
...agine the sound of the wind as it blows through the trees, knocking the leaves off and their descent to the forest floor. “Scatter, as from an unextinguished hearth Ashes and sparks,” is an example kinetic imagery used by Shelly to describe the awesome power that sweeps the wind through the sea of trees.
Throughout all five stanzas, Shelley uses three types of imagery in Ode to the West Wind. He uses visual imagery, which is the thought portrayed by the vision of an object. He uses auditory imagery, which is the thought of something through a sound, and he uses kinetic imagery, which is a vision of something by motion, or a powerful force. The use of imagery in this poem creates a feeling that the poem is alive. By using the three types of imagery the wind is given such powers that it feels like the reader is a simple object in the path of such a great force.
...ictures for the reader. The similar use of personification in “Snapping Beans” by Lisa Parker and the use of diction and imagery in “Nighttime Fires” by Regina Barreca support how the use of different poetic devices aid in imagery. The contrasting tones of “Song” by John Donne and “Love Poem” by John Frederick Nims show how even though the poems have opposite tones of each other, that doesn’t mean the amount of imagery changes.
Shelley uses symbolic meaning to depict the destruction of a statue and the “sands that stretch far away” in relation to the effects of pride, a direct contrast from the words on the pedestal. The images of the deteriorating items gives the readers an understanding of time’s ultimate power beyond both life and pride. However, the cliché use of sands as a means of representing time still explains to readers that the passing of time is prevalent in the poem and related to the destroyed items presents the concept of a useless
“He uses similes such as the breeze that ‘blew curtains in at one end and out the other like pale frogs’ and that also made a shadow on the ‘wine-colored rug’ as ‘wind does on the sea’.”
At first glance the poem may appear to have no purpose other than the, describing the hash Australian outback, but the last two lines suggest some additional significance. The poet shows that this simple, pleasant memory and how it re-in-acts his childhood. The way in which the windmills squeaks and groans to bring water from the ground whereas during the period of rain they work in harmony, as the rain comes down.
One of the first things that Landau appeals to her readers is the aspect of imagery. Imagery is made up of the five senses, which are sight, hearing, touch, smell, and taste. The first sense of sight is seen through out the whole poem, specifically in the first two lines,
“…it broke into hundreds of pieces so that the rain fell here and there from high clouds in long, curving gray plumes.” The hyperbole about the storm produces a wild sense of the surroundings. Kingsolver uses the onomatopoeia and simile to describe appearance and the sound of the storm. The first-person point of view also assists on expressing Taylor’s senses and emotions. In describing Taylor’s feelings for Estevan, Kingsolver combines them into a one complex sentence, which displays the exhilaration that Taylor feels. Most of all the paragraphs’ structure is similar, adding consistency to the passage. The consistency makes it easier for the readers to follow and understand the message and concepts that the author conveys in the novel. Additionally, Kingsolver uses contrast to bring out the mood among Taylor’s group. In the beginning, she makes a deadly ambience with the storm and lightning, yet the characters are very high in spirit and energy to a point in which they dance under the storm. It enhances the characters’ emotion to attract the attention of the readers, which makes it more noticeable just like light being brighter in the dark. Kingsolver also uses this passage as a chance to build up for a shocking event unexpected by
The wind seems to be a symbol of hope. Hope that he has entrusted in the form of nature. A hope that maybe he can trust that there is no such thing as a ghost that is lurking around tapping on his widows and chamber doors. The narrator looks for a way to make the wind the source of his problems instead of the potential cause that he is having repercussions from a broken
The use of visual imagery in each poem immensely contributed to conveying the theme. In the poem “Reluctance”, Robert Frost used this poetic device to better illustrate the leaves of autumn:
In this poem, Frost includes his fear of the ocean and exaggerates its destructive power. As Judith Saunders stated that “The first thirteen lines have depicted an ocean storm of unusual force, and through personification the poet attributes to this storm a malign purposefulness” (1). Frost provided human characteristics on the storm to help prove his point that the ocean has bad intentions and its only purpose is to hurt him. Frost does not describe the waves as a result of unfavorable weather; he explains them as having a malignant intention to destroy the world. This poem revolves around the forces of nature and could be included in the long list of nature themed poems by Robert Frost.
In the first stanza, the poet seems to be offering a conventional romanticized view of Nature:
”To Autumn” is an ode written by John Keats on the 19th of September 1819. While walking near Winchester along a river, Keats became inspired to write the poem. The Rest of his other odes were completed in the spring of 1819. John died on the 23rd of February 1921 at the age of 25, just a year after the release of “To Autumn”. However, throughout his life he inspired many poets, but most notably Percy Shelly. In mourning, he wrote the elegy “Adonais” for Keats.”To Autumn “is his final poem and many have said it is his best. Keats use of imagery takes the reader on an adventure through the scenes and sounds of autumn. He achieves this by his use language, imagery, tone and structure. This is also what creates the mood and consequently allows him to challenge the notion that music is usually associated with spring. Thus, in this essay I will show how he challenges this belief, by looking at his use of imagery, tone and form. In addition I will look at what his influences were and the context in which he wrote the poem.
Second, the terza rima scheme helps the narrator to express his thoughts. In A Defense of Poetry, Shelley states that there exists harmony between the language that poets employ and the sounds that are contained in each word because both sounds and thoughts are intertwined to convey the message that they attempt to represent (763). In other words, there exists a close proximity between the sense of words and their sound; it is the enchainment of both ideas and sounds that creates an effect of harmony. Thus, language and sound work in conjunction to create a stylized and harmonious message which comes to life each time the poem is either read or recited out loud. We mentioned earlier that the Ode to the West Wind is an ode that addresses, that
Shelley’s stanzas are composed of four interlinking triplets, following the principle of terza rima, and one couplet. The stanzas have ABA BCB CDC DED EE rhyme-scheme. Both poems have alliteration to emphasize the quality of the season: “Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness” shows the kind nature of Keats’s autumn, while “O wild West Wind, thou breath of Autumns being” shows the powerful character of Shelley’s autumn.
There is a wealth of imagery in the first two lines alone. The poem begins:
Both Shelley, in "Ode to the West Wind," and Wordsworth, in "Intimations of Immortality," are very similar in their use of nature to describe the life and death of the human spirit. As they both describe nature these two poets use the comparison of how the Earth and all its life is the same as our own human life. I feel that Shelley uses the seasons as a way of portraying the human life during reincarnation. Wordsworth seems to concentrate more on the stages that a person goes through during life. Shelley compares himself to such things as clouds, leaves, and waves. He is writing the poem as if he were an object of the earth, and what it is like to once live and then die only to be reborn. On the other hand, Wordsworth takes images like meadows, fields, and birds and uses them to show what gives him life. Life being what ever a person needs to move on, and with out those objects can't have life. Wordsworth does not compare himself to these things like Shelley, but instead uses them as an example of how he feels about the stages of living. Starting from an infant to a young boy into a man, a man who knows death is coming and can do nothing about it because it's part of life.