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JOHN KEATS “A thing of beauty is a joy forever”  Born in England an died in Rome (symbol of the beauty of the Classics)  The story of Keats is much related with his love Fanny Brawne  His parents died early -> he was orphan and he had to maintain his family (he had a lot of siblings) -> he studied to become a surgeon, but he fell in love with poetry  In 1818 he wrote “Endymion” (long narrative work with a mythological theme)  Then he met Fanny, they fell in love, but Keats had problems with his social ranks and money so he couldn’t marry Fanny and they never lived together  Keats starts to write letters to Fanny which are all picked up in a collection  All his family was affected by tuberculosis so when Keats wrote this letters he already knew that he was going to die soon  He went to Rome in order to cure himself, but he died there very young and he’s buried in the Protestant cemetery of Rome -> he wrote his own epigraphy: This Grave contains all that was Mortal of a YOUNG ENGLISH POET, Who, on his Death Bed, in the Bitterness of his Heart, at the Malicious Power of his Enemies, Desired these words to be engraven on his Tomb Stone “Here lies One Whose Name was writ in Water” “If I should die, I have left no immortalwork behind me - nothing to make my friends proud of my memory - but I have loved the principle of beauty in all things, and if I had had time I would have made myself remembered.” ODE ON A GRECIAN URN  One of his most famous composition  In the title there are a lot of information: “Ode” (Keats wrote lots of odes) = description/ praise of the subject + “Grecian” (= Greek) + “Urn” (= vase used in funeral ceremonies which usually contains ashes of a dead body)  Keats designed an urn to accompany his poem (it doesn’t exists, but you can associate it to greek vases) -> the British Museum opened in those years and a collection of marbles coming from Greece was exposed  COMPOSITION: symmetrical = 5 stanzas + small rhyming scheme + elevated tone (because it was an ode, used for praising something or someone) -> full of archaism -> sense of belonging to an ancient tradition 1. FIRST STANZA:  the ode starts with a direct address to the urn -> the urn is the receiver  Keats uses many epithets for the urn: “pure bride (=sposa) of quietness” (contradiction, because usually brides are ready to have children) + “foster-child (figlia adottiva) of silence and slow time” + "sylvan (boschiva -> the urn has drawing of nature on it -> bucolic atmosphere) historian” (someone that tells a story)  Keats wants to know what story it can narrate -> you (urn) can tell a story more sweetly than my poetry (expressing Keats’ admiration for Classics)  Then Keats asks questions to the urn about its images that we don’t know yet 2. SECOND STANZA:  After addressing the urn, he starts a new stanza asking something to the urn -> he asks the urn to continue its story using the metaphor of music/melody (tale seen as a melody that perpetrated through story until nowadays)  This poem mixes up all the arts  This melody is unheard  “The melodies which we heard are sweet, but those unheard are sweeter”  Keats imagines that the urn can tell his story forever -> “play on not to the sensual ear, but, more endear’d” -> this is the power of poetry: it is accessible to everyone, even to people in the future  Then Keats starts to talk about what is represented on the urn (2 images): ➢ The “fair youth” who’s piping is instrument beneath a tree -> you cannot leave your song, and those tree can never be bare ➢ The “bold lover” and “she” (a couple of lovers) that they are about to kiss -> you (bold lover) you are never going to kiss her, though you’re near to do that, but don’t be sad because she cannot fade even if you’ll never have your “bliss” (the kiss), you’ll love her forever and she’ll be beautiful forever  These characters are going to be fixed forever on the urn -> Keats imagines how living on the urn can be  We can remember that this poem is written by a young talented poet who’s going to die and has a love that will never be completed -> he’s facing mans mortality and art immortality -> he’s in front of something which he’ll never have 3. THIRD STANZA:  Repetition of “happy” and “forever” -> focus on the happiness and the immortality of the urn -> Keats feels jealous • Trees -> the Spring (flourish period of the life of humans) will never come • Melodist -> unwearied + forever playing songs forever new • Lovers -> happy love + forever warn, enjoyed, painting, young  Comparison between love of the lovers and love on the Earth: you (lovers) are far above from the human passions; these passions leaves the heart high-sorrowful + burning forehead + thirsty tongue (wants always more) -> it causes always new sufferance 4. FOURTH STANZA:  Here Keats is describing a religious ceremony, probably belonging to the cult of Dioniso  Question: who are these coming to the sacrifice? (Pagan tradition) + at what green altar you are bringing that cow, which is looking at the sky, decorated with “silken flanks and garlands drest”?  Turning point: another question to the urn -> where do this people come from? What city was emptied for ever?  Then Keats imagines a little town and referring to it he says: you are going to be emptied, desolate, silent forever  Before this stanza “forever” was linked to positive sensations, but here the town will never see life again -> the urn condemns the city to be not alive  The immortality condemns you to be stuck forever in a moment, in bad or good endings, so you’re not alive 5. FIFTH STANZA:  he continues to explain what’s on the urn