Keats's Notion Of Writing Lines example essay topic

In the poem, "Ode to a Nightingale", written by John Keats, the speaker attempts to use a nightingale as a means of escaping the realities of human life. Throughout the poem Keats gradually discovers the concepts of creative expression and the morality of human life. The speaker is in search of the freedom that the nightingale so elegantly sings about. The nightingale's song of freedom is an expression of pure joy, which is oblivious to anguish and suffering. It appears in the poem that Keats is tempted into the nightingale's world of beauty and perfection. He is also longing to sooth his soul from his troubles and open up to a world that promises eternal enjoyment.

The answer to the poet's problems may lie in living a life similar to that of a nightingale's life. As the poem progresses the speaker explores multiple ways to join the nightingale. However, he eventually realizes that he must face the reality that fleeing from the human world is not possible. Keats not only writes this poem gracefully, but it reads fluently while using a discrete rhyme scheme.

Allusions are the main idea of this poem. The poet uses allusions involving alcohol and other drugs as a main idea throughout the poem. "Ode to a Nightingale" is written in eight ten-line stanzas and is metrically variable. The eighth line of each stanza is written in iambic trimester, while the first seven lines and last two are written in iambic pentameter. Iambic trimester occurs when there are only three accents in a line of poetry. This poem displays a complex form of end rhyme scheme unique to the poem.

Each verse of "Ode to a Nightingale" has a rhyme scheme ABABCDECDE. This rhyme scheme is used throughout the entire poem; however, there are a few instances where off-rhymes appear in place of the perfect rhymes. A good example of off-rhyming appears in the second stanza between lines in 16 and 19. Line 16 reads, "Full of the true, the blushful Hippocrene", while line 19 reads, "That I might drink, and leave the world unseen". I use these two lines as an example of off-rhyming because these two lines show Keats's notion of writing lines that have a centralized idea involving alcohol. Off-rhyming also appears in the sixth verse, specifically in lines 55 and 58 where the words die and ecstasy are used to end the lines.

These two words do not appear to perfectly rhyme with one another. Keats uses these kinds of rhymes to enhance the emotions of the poem. The first few stanzas of this poem are filled with allusions involving alcohol, drinking, and also drugs. In the first line, Keats says, "My heart aches, and a drowsy numbness pains". At the start of an "Ode to a Nightingale", the speaker seems to be initially in a sort of daze and describes it as a heart ache along with a drowsy numbness pain. The way Keats says this reminds me of the way you feel when you lose someone that you are in love with.

I would describe this pain as despair with a lack of self-regard or regard for others. After that in the second line the poet writes, "My sense, as though of hemlock I had drunk". First of all, hemlock is a type of poison made from an herb. Keats compares his daze like feeling to that of person is drugged up on hemlock. This line seems to be a reference to some type of regret towards something.

It appears to me that the speaker wishes to forget the bad and perhaps maybe the good of his past in this line. In the second line, Keats uses his first reference to a sedative or drug. The third line of the poem says, "Or emptied some dull opiate to the drains". The poet compares his current state to that of consuming opium in this line. This alludes to the poet only being half awake, somewhat vulnerable and less in control than normal.

In the fourth line of an "Ode to a Nightingale", Keats writes, "One minute past, and Lethe-wards had sunk". The Lethe is a river in Hades where souls about to be reincarnated drank from to forget their pasts. This alludes to the way the poet tries to escape his life by drinking wine in line 11 of the second stanza. Keats feels that the only way for him to live a carefree, pleasant life, just like the "nightingale", would be to use some sort of drug. With the start of the second stanza, the poet wants to be rid of his pain from life and instead live in a world of imagination or fantasy.

In line 11 Keats writes, "O, for a draught of vintage! That hath been". Keats calls for a glass of vintage in this line, which is more commonly known as wine. He calls for vintage rather than beer because vintage is more romantic and he wishes to experience the qualities associated with fine wines.

It appears that he is not in fact asking for a glass, but instead asking for the warm feeling of being content and relaxed. Keats feels that the liquid he drinks will provide inspiration as well as comfort. Also in the second stanza, Keats says in line 13, "Tasting of Flora and the country green". The word Flora is used here to represent the taste of the vintage. Flora is the goddess of flowers and fertility. From this I concur that the taste of this vintage would have been a very wonderful tasting drink.

Line 14 says, "Dance, and Provencal song, and sunburnt mirth!" Provincial is a region in southern France associated with song, pleasure, and luxury. France is known for their wine and that is why it is used in this poem to display another allusion to drinking. The use of sunburnt mirth is an excellent example of synesthesia. Dance is associated with song, and together they produce pleasure or mirth.

The mirth however is sunburnt because country dances are held outdoors. In line 16 Keats says, "Full of the true, the blushful Hippocrene". Hippocrene is the name of a spring sacred to the muses located on Mt. Helicon where poets became inspired after drinking its waters. Each of the nine muses was associated with different arts including epic poetry, sacred song, and dancing. The last two lines of this stanza say, "That I might drink, and leave the world unseen, And with thee fade away into the forest dim".

These two lines (lines 19& 20) give off the impression that the poet experienced something that hurt him traumatically and does not wish to feel it again. To me this appears to be perhaps about a love of his who left or passed on. These emotions may cause a person to not want to endure the good of the future in order to avoid the bad of their past. The second line of these two again show the poet's desire to get away from something and return to a peaceful state. Thus being in the forest would suit his emotional state well causing him to be very peaceful. The third stanza seems to be like a suicide note because Keats practically says that he desires to forget the past and does not wish to go on living.

At the end of the second stanza the word fade is used and it is again used in the beginning of the third stanza. This appears to be a way of to tie the stanzas together, so that it can move easily into the next thought. Line 21 and 22 begin the third verse and read, "Fade far away, dissolve, and quite forgot, What thou among the leaves hast never known". At this point, the poet is in deep despair and longs to fade away and forget his troubles. Keats wants to forget the strife of human life and believes that drugs and alcohol are the only answer to this.

The poet's awareness of the real world pulls him back from his fantasy world of drink-joy. Through the first three stanzas in this poem the tone of the speaker is dark and melancholic. I believe that the poem starts like this because in the first three stanzas Keats believes that alcohol and drugs are his only way out. Most alcoholics and drug users seem to be dark, melancholic individuals when not sober. With the start of the fourth stanza the tone somewhat lightens becoming almost cheerful. Keats begins this stanza with a return to life and a goal on staying focused within his emotions.

He has finally realized that alcohol is not the way to reach the nightingale. The first three lines of the fourth stanza (lines 31 - 33) read, "Away! Away! For I will fly to thee, Not chariot ed by Bacchus and his parts, But on the viewless wings of Poesy". In line 32 the poet rejects wine. There is also a reference to Bacchus, the Roman god of wine who was supposed to have been carried by a chariot pulled by leopards in line 32.

Instead of using alcohol to escape, the speaker says he will escape on the invisible wings of Poesy (poetic fantasy) in line 33. This is where the bulk of the allusions to alcohol and drugs end because Keats now says he does not need either to escape his problems. In "Ode to a Nightingale", Keats built the poem around a large amount of strategically placed allusions involving alcohol and drug use. Keats used extreme differences throughout the entirety of the poem. His emotions range from dark to light, but he never touches any melancholy ones. The use of drugs and alcohol in the poem seem to make the poem become funny and ironic at the same time when mixed with lines containing sobering experience.

Keats may not have meant that he actually wanted wine or something else, but just wanted the association of feeling high and carefree.