PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY Ode to the West Wind. This poem was conceived and chiefly written in a wood that skirts the Arno, near Florence, and on a day when the tempestuous wind, whose temperature is at once mild and animating, was collecting the vapors that pour down the autumnal rains. They began, as I foresaw, at sunset with a violent tempest of hail and rain attended with that magnificent thunder and lightning peculiar to the Cisalpine regions.' - Shelley's note. 2. Would anything be lost by changing the order of the last two words? 11. What is the effect of the parenthesis on the movement of the verse? What line in stanza III moves most smoothly? Why? 43-45. How do these lines summarize the three preceding stanzas? What new element is here introduced? 56. Do you imagine this characterization of the poet's self a good one? 70. With what inflection of the voice should this line be read? Study Shelley's wonderful variety in the use of the pause throughout the poem. With what poems previously studied may we compare the Ode in emotional fervor? To a Skylark. 15. unbodied. Some editions read embodied. Which is the better reading, and why? 21. Note all the different qualities of the bird's song expressed either directly, e.g. keen', or indirectly by suggestion. 22. Does Shelley here mean the sun or the moon? 36 ff. Study carefully the four comparisons. Which is the most beautiful poetically? Why has the poet arranged them in just this order? 39-40. The regeneration of mankind was a favorite idea with Shelley. 86. What word should be accented in reading this line? 90. Poe says, 'Let me remind you that (how we know not) this certain taint of sadness is inseparably connected with all the highest manifestations of beauty.' Are Poe and Shelley right in their belief? What does the skylark symbolize to Shelley? What resemblance between the close of this poem and that of the Ode to the West Wind? With this poem compare Wordsworth's strikingly different treatment of the same subject. Adonais. Shelley here laments the death of Keats, which he, accept ing the belief common at that time, ascribes to a cruel review by Gifford in the Quarterly. Why did Shelley select the name Adonais? 12. Urania. Who was she? Paradise Lost, VII, 1-20. 11. See Psalm xci. 6. For the significance of the name see 30. Milton, 'the sire of an immortal strain,' is here represented as third with Homer and Vergil among the 'sons of light.' 44. some, Byron and Shelley. 47. nursling of her widowhood. Possibly this means that Urania mourned for him as a widowed mother might such a child. 63. liquid. Meaning? 64-72. What adjective in this stanza is best chosen? 100. Splendor. Meaning? 116. How is the movement of this line retarded? 117. With this fine figure compare Paradise Lost, XII, 628–632. 155. Compare with Tennyson's In Memoriam, cxv. 169. With this idea compare Lowell's Every clod feels a stir of might, An instinct within it that reaches and towers, Climbs to a soul in grass and flowers. 172. Explain the line. 172-189. What is the relation between the two stanzas? 186. who lends, etc. Death lends the means of perpetuating life. 238. unpastured dragon, the critic who attacked Keats. 250. The Pythian of the age, Byron, who, in his English Bards and Scotch Reviewers, replied to the savage attacks of the Quarterly. 264. The Pilgrim of Eternity is Byron. The 'sweetest lyrist' of lerne, or Ireland, is Moore. 281-306. Compare Shelley's characterization of himself here with that in the Skylark, and that in the Ode to the West Wind. 307 ff. Leigh Hunt, who was a friend of Keats in London. 343. The beginning of the second part of the poem. What is the effect in this line of the monosyllables? 370. Where is a similar idea expressed in Lycidas? Compare Shelley's conception of the Deity with that expressed by Wordsworth in the Lines composed a Few Miles above Tintern Abbey. 399 ff. Why should these particular poets be chosen? 424. With this compare Byron's Childe Harold, IV, LXXVIII ff. 459. Three months after writing this poem Shelley was drowned. 485. celestial fire. Meaning? What is the metrical form of the poem? Is it appropriate? Would the elegiac stanza have been better? What phrases serve as a refrain? What lines describe well the nature of Shelley's own poems? What phrases recall similar ones in the Ode to a Nightingale? What can you gather from the poem of Shelley's religious belief? Compare Lycidas and Adonais. In which is the grief more personal? In which does the poet make proportionately the more frequent reference to himself? Which poem better characterizes the one lamented? In which is the moral indignation the greater? In which are the transitions the more skillful? Point out the many phrases in Adonais, as in line 10, that are echoes of Lycidas. Compare the two flower passages. What qualities are emphasized in each picture? Milton's dirge begins quietly, swells in its grief and moral indignation; then, bringing in the note of hope, subsides and ends in a peaceful strain. Trace the emotional changes in Adonais. In addition to the study here suggested, interesting comparisons may be made with Arnold's Thyrsis, with Tennyson's In Memoriam, and with Emerson's Threnody. A Lament. Is Shelley here master of his emotion or mastered by it? What lines in the Skylark are here recalled? What in nature and in human life appealed to Shelley? What is the source of Shelley's metaphors? Where does he aim to render the effect rather than the thing itself? Shelley has been called the poet of revolt. Cite some passage in support of this criticism. Swinburne calls Shelley a perfect singing god.' Why? Is it true, as Professor Courthope says, that Wordsworth speaks the language of philosophers; Shelley, of spirits; but Byron, of men? JOHN KEATS The Ode to a Nightingale was written in 1819, about three months after the death of Keats's brother Thomas by consumption, a disease of which the poet was destined to die two years later. 16. Hippocrene. Meaning? In which line in stanza II does the movement seem to you the best? 20-21. What use of echo words, a favorite device with Keats, is here illustrated? What other lines exemplify its use? 23, 27, 62. What significance is added to these lines by a knowledge of the poet's life? 43. Is embalmed a well-chosen adjective? 51. darkling. Meaning? 61. What is the emphatic word in this line? Stanza VII. This stanza suggests more than is expressed directly. Can you form a definite mental picture from the last two lines? If not, what is their purpose? 67. alien corn. Explain. What does the bird typify to the poet? What would have been gained or lost by making the scene more definite? Keats said that he looked on a fine phrase as a lover on his beloved. Point out the fine phrases in this poem. Which do you consider the most beautiful stanza? choice. Defend your Ode on a Grecian Urn. Why should Keats call this poem an ode? 1-2. What is the effect of the alliteration in these lines? 5-10. What is the purpose of casting this description into the question form? 7. Tempe and Arcady. Why are these special names chosen? 11. What justification is there for Keats's making this statement? With this compare Wordsworth's Yarrow Unvisited:· For when we're there, although 'tis fair, 'Twill be another Yarrow. 27-30. What lines of Shelley's Skylark are here recalled? 41. Attic shape. Meaning? tions of Keats's freedom in spelling. brede. One of numerous illustra 44. tease. What is the suggestion of this word? Compare this poem with the Ode to a Nightingale. Which of the two poems impresses you as the more compact? Which is the more harmonious? Which do you like the better, and why? La Belle Dame sans Merci. What effect has the poet wished to produce in this poem, and what means has he employed for securing it? How does the structure of the poem add to this effect? With the reading of lines 29-32 compare that of another edition, She took me to her elfin grot, And there she wept and sighed full sore, And there I shut her wild, wild eyes With kisses four. Which reading do you prefer, and why? On first looking into Chapman's Homer. Explain the first four lines. 6. What words in this line are especially suggestive, and why? 11. Does Keats's error in ascribing the discovery of the Pacific to Cortez materially affect the worth of this sonnet? Why is the close of the sonnet especially effective? The Eve of St. Agnes. When is the eve of St. Agnes? What is the legend concerning her? Why should this special time and name have been selected for the poem? 15. rails. Meaning? 37. Is argent here a suggestive adjective? 70. amort. Meaning? 133. Is brook ordinarily used in the sense in which it is here? 155-156. churchyard thing: passing bell. Meaning? 171. Merlin paid his debt. Merlin and Vivien. 188. amain. Meaning? What is the allusion? See Tennyson's 193. mission'd, divinely sent. 218. gules. Meaning? 237. Is poppied here an appropriate epithet? 241. Explain this line. 253-261. Note carefully the different sensuous appeals of this stanza. Could stanzas XXX-XXXI be omitted without materially affecting the poem? 277. Eremite. Meaning? 292. La belle Dame sans Merci was a poem written in the early part of the fifteenth century by Alain Chartier. What is the stanzaic form, and is it especially effective? How do the opening lines suggest the tone of the entire poem? Are the names of the characters well selected? Study Keats's wonderful use of words. What old words are revived ? Does he coin any new ones? What common ones has he made fresh and striking? Discuss the criticism sometimes made that the poem should end with line 371. |