Reading Great Books of
Humanities
Week 10
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Romanticism Poetry
William Blake
Robert Burns
William Wordsworth
Samuel Taylor Coleridge
George Golden Byron
Percy Busshe Shelley
John Keats
• William Blake (November 28, 1757 – August 12, 1827)
was an English poet, painter, and printmaker.
• Largely unrecognized during his lifetime, Blake's work is
today considered seminal and significant in the history of
both poetry and the visual arts.
• He was voted 38th in a poll of the 100 Greatest Britons
organized by the BBC in 2002.
• According to Northrop Frye, who undertook a study of
Blake's entire poetic corpus, his prophetic poems form
"what is in proportion to its merits the least read body of
poetry in the English language."
• Others have praised Blake's visual artistry, at least one
modern critic proclaiming Blake "far and away the
greatest artist Britain has ever produced.“
• Once considered mad for his idiosyncratic views, Blake is
highly regarded today for his expressiveness and
creativity, and the philosophical vision that underlies his
work.
• He himself once indicated, "The imagination is not a
State: it is the Human existence itself."
• While his visual art and written poetry are usually
considered separately, Blake often employed them in
concert to create a product that at once defied and
superseded convention.
• Though he believed himself able to converse aloud with
Old Testament prophets, and despite his work in
illustrating the Book of Job, Blake's affection for the Bible
was accompanied by hostility for the established Church,
his beliefs modified by a fascination with Mysticism and
the unfolding of the Romantic Movement around him.
• Ultimately, the difficulty of placing William Blake in any
one chronological stage of art history is perhaps the
distinction that best defines him.
• 〈秋之詠〉（To Autumn）
• 秋啊，你滿載果實，染著葡萄的
血色，別走，請到我陰涼的屋頂下
坐一坐；那裡你可以稍事休憩，
將歡樂的聲調調進我清新的蘆笛，
所有歲月的女兒會翩然起舞！
那時，請你唱果實與花朵的歡歌。
「細嫩的蓓蕾向太陽綻開嬌美，
愛在她那顫動的血管裡蕩漾；
鮮花環飾著黎明的眉宇，飄盪著
垂掛到羞怯的黃昏那明亮的臉龐，
於是稠密的夏迸發出歌聲，
長翅的雲在她頭上灑滿花朵。
大氣中的精靈靠果實的芬芳生存；
而歡樂，則帶著有翼的光，繞花園
遊蕩，或者棲息在樹叢中歌唱。」
歡樂的秋坐著的時候，這樣唱歌。
然後起身，整整衣服，就越過蒼山
從視野中消失；但遺落了金色的擔子。
• 布雷克（William-Blake，1757年－1827年）這
首〈秋之詠〉寫出秋天這個豐收的季節，大自然
萬物歡唱的喜悅。
• 看看：秋天金黃色的稻穗閃閃發亮，紫色的葡萄
圓潤又多汁，鮮紅的柿子如夕陽那般耀眼。
• 這些都像是秋天的孩子，大家爭相出色，但是秋
天這個母親珍愛每一個孩子，她說：「你們盡情
表現吧！媽媽永遠以你們為榮。」孩子聽了，各
個雀躍不已，稻穗更加飽滿，葡萄更加豐潤，柿
子更加鮮豔。
• 中段他描寫秋之歌的詩句，清新、輕快又充滿活
力，詩句流動之美滲透出生命極致的鮮活。他的
詩讚頌季節、讚頌大自然，也是讚頌生命。
• 『羔羊』(“The Lamb”) 和『老虎』(“The Tiger”)
這一組最著名的對詩來說，截然不同的兩種生物
帶給觀者/敘述者極為分歧的世界觀。
• 『羔羊』簡單直接的吟唱和自問自答的反詰問句
訴說著基督教義裡造物主和被造物(包括自然萬物
和人類)合而為一，自給自足的純真境界。
• Bryan Aubrey 在解析 『羔羊』一詩時，有下列的
見解：「探討『羔羊』會遭遇的真正問題並不是
它缺乏深度，而是讀者必須跳脫本身的眼界去理
解它所擁有的那種深度，那個孩童視為理所當然，
不過而對成人卻是不尋常的現實
• 對於布雷克而言，孩提時代並非完全依賴或者無
知的狀態，反而是精神視野最清明的階段。
• 反觀在經驗之歌的『老虎』，幾乎每個詩節都是沒有明確
答案的疑問句，透露出對老虎這個兇猛威武的受造物以及
其背後造物主的懼怕和敬畏。
• 敘述者的口吻充滿不確定感，懸而未決卻又必須追問的張
力反映在詩行的揚抑格(trochaic meter)以及不斷重複的頭
韻(alliteration)上。
• Trochee (n.) a measure of poetry consisting of one
strong (or long) beat followed by one weak (or short)
beat, as in “father” (術語)(詩律的)抑揚格, 長短格
• 最後的終極哉問既可以視為布雷克對於當時法國大革命所
帶來的衝擊、暴動的省思，更可進一步與 『羔羊』互通
有無，純真世界裡受限的視野，在經驗的累積下補足；而
經驗所帶來的疑惑和不安只有回歸到純真的境界才能獲得
平息。
• 評論家像是Erica Smith和Harold C. Pagliaro都不約而同
提出，『羔羊』以至於『老虎』正反合的過程，不僅代表
了布雷克感知外在世界、人事物關係視野上的轉變，也是
對於存在於自己內裡不同的自我，「就像老虎一樣致命，
像創造者一樣大膽，也像羔羊一般溫和」一次徹底的檢視
與調和 。
• 18世紀末的英國畫家與
詩人 William Blake
的「一個黑人小男孩」
始終備受爭議
因為涉及兩個最敏感的
議題：種族和宗教
光是白的，心是白的，
安全的遮蔽卻是黑的
愛的光，尤其當來自至
高他者，總是傷及凡人。
• 掃煙囪的小孩(The Chimney Sweeper)
白雪裏有個小小的黑東西，
“掃煙！掃煙！”喊叫得慘悽！
“孩子！你爸爸媽媽在哪裡？”
“他們都去教堂禱告上帝。
“只因我在家鄉跳來蹦去，
又在冬天雪地裏嬉笑，
他們便給我穿上這喪衣，
還教我唱這凄涼調。
“又因我唱歌跳舞挺歡暢，
他們認為對我沒有傷害，
便去讚美上帝、牧師和君王，
用我們的痛苦來造一個樂園。”
• William Blake wrote "The Chimney Sweeper" of "Songs
of Innocence" in 1789.
• This poem shows that the children have a very positive
outlook on life.
• They make the best of their lives and do not fear death.
• This is quite the opposite in it's companion poem in
"Songs of Experience" which was written in 1794.
• In this poem, the child blames his parents for putting him
in the position he was in. He is miserable in his situation
and he also blames "God & his Priest & King".
• This point of view is different from that of its companion
poem because the chimney sweeper has been
influenced by society and has an "experienced" point of
view.
•
神之肖像(The Divine Image)
向著仁慈、悲憫、和平與愛
眾人在苦惱中獻上祈禱；
同樣地，對這些帶來喜悅的美德
人們報之以感謝。
因為仁慈、悲憫、和平與愛
便是天主，我們親愛的父，
同時仁慈、悲憫、和平與愛
也是人，祂的孩子，祂所關心的。
因仁慈有一顆血肉的心，
悲憫有人的面貌，
愛，是取了人形的神聖，
和平穿著人的衣裳。
於是，來自四面八方的每個人
在他的困苦中祈禱時，
便是向取了人形的神聖──
仁慈、悲憫、和平與愛祈求。
而眾人均須愛有形之人，
即使在外邦、猶太或土耳其；
凡有仁慈、悲憫、和平與愛居住之處
天主也居住在那裡。
• "The Divine Image" of "Songs of Innocence"
attributes the virtues of Mercy, Pity, Peace, and
Love to the human form.
• It also gives God all of the glory for the creation
of the human in his own form. This can be seen
in the last two lines of the poem."
• The companion poem of "The Divine Image" in
"Songs of Experience" had the same title, but it
only appeared in one copy of "Songs of
Innocence and Experience."
• Many believe that this is because Blake thought
that a better companion poem for "The Divine
Image" would be "The Human Abstract"
• "The Human Abstract" also attributes Pity and Mercy to
the human form.
• However, it also implies that humans only have these
characteristics through the poverty or unhappiness of
others.
• It also says that humans have traits of Cruelty, Mystery,
and Deceit.
• According to the poem, they also have Humility, but only
because they have "holy fears."
• According to the poem, the characteristics of mankind
are all there because of selfishness and self-absorption.
• This is quite a change from the point of view of "The
Lamb," which praises the human form. The
"experienced" author of "The Human Abstract" has seen
how people really are.
• Through experience of hard times and wrong-doings, his
perspective of everything has changed to something
very far from his once innocent point of view.
• "Holy Thursday" in "Songs of Innocence" was
written in 1789. The poem describes the English
church's celebration of Jesus's ascension which
takes place on Thursday 39 days after Easter.
On this day, children from the charity schools of
London were marched to a service at St. Paul's
Cathedral. The beadles of the church were lower
officers who were in charge of keeping order. In
the last stanza of the poem, the children are
singing in the balcony and the "aged men" are
seated below them. The last line, "Then cherish
pity, lest you drive an angel from your door." is
an allusion to Hebrews 13:2, "Be not forgetful to
entertain strangers: for thereby some have
entertained angels unawares." This poem gives
the reader a portrayal of the children as angelic.
• "Holy Thursday" from "Songs of Experience" was written
in 1794.
• This poem is also about the English church's ceremony
on Holy Thursday, but the tone is a bit more depressing.
• The last line of the second stanza, "It is eternal winter
there," is describing how they see the ceremony from
their experienced point of view.
• This is very different from the image created in "Holy
Thursday" of "Songs of Innocence."
• The last stanza of the poem adds to the analogy of the
ceremony to winter by saying that when the sun shines
and the rain falls, there can never be hunger or poverty.
• Obviously, the sun doesn't shine and the rain doesn't fall
in winter, which means that, according to this poem,
there is hunger and poverty among the children; a much
different image from the one seen in its companion poem.
• 泥塊與卵石(The Clod & The Peddle)
• “愛情不求讓自己高興，
從不把自己放在心上；
它只為別人獻出安寧，
任地獄絶望，它建造天堂。”
• 雖被一群牛的腳踩踏，
小小泥塊依然這樣唱；
但是溪水中一顆卵石，
唱出這樣貼切的詩行：
• “愛情只求讓自己高興，
為找樂趣把別人捆牢，
歡樂時人家就沒安寧，
它撇下天堂，把地獄建造。”
• Robert Burns (25 January 1759 - 21 July 1796)
(also known as Rabbie Burns, Scotland's
favorite son, the Ploughman Poet, the Bard of
Ayrshire and in Scotland as simply The Bard)
• He is widely regarded as the national poet of
Scotland.
• He is the best-known of the poets who have
written in the Scots language, although much of
his writing is also in English and a 'light' Scots
dialect.
• He also wrote in standard English, and in these
pieces, his political or civil commentary is often
at its most blunt.
• Robert Burns is regarded as a pioneer of the
Romantic movement.
• After his death he became an important source
of inspiration to the founders of both liberalism
and socialism.
• A cultural icon in Scotland and among Scots who
have relocated to other parts of the world,
celebration of his life and work became almost a
national charismatic cult during the 19th and 20th
centuries, and his influence has long been strong
on Scottish literature.
• As well as making original compositions, Burns
also collected folk songs from across Scotland,
often revising or adapting them.
• His poem Auld Lang Syne is often sung at
Hogmanay (蘇格蘭的除夕聚會), and Scots Wha
Hae served for a long time as an unofficial
national anthem of the country.
• Other poems and songs of Burns that remain
well-known across the world today, include A
Red, Red Rose, A Man's A Man for A' That, To a
Louse, To a Mouse, The Battle of Sherramuir,
and A Fond Kiss.
• Burns Night, effectively a second national day, is
celebrated on 25 January with Burns suppers
around the world, and is still more widely
observed than the official national day, Saint
Andrew‘s Day, or the proposed North American
celebration Tartan Day (蘇格蘭節).
• The format of Burns suppers has not changed
since Robert's death in 1796.
• The basic format starts with a general welcome
and announcements followed with the Selkirk
Grace.
• Just post the grace comes the piping and cutting
of the Haggis, where Robert‘s famous Address To
a Haggis is read, and the haggis (肚包羊雜碎) is
cut open.
• The event usually allows for people to start eating
just after the haggis is presented.
• This is when the reading called the "immortal
memory", an overview of Robert's life and work is
given; the event usually concludes with the
singing of Auld Lang Syne.
A Red, Red Rose
• Burns had intended the work to be published as part of
Thomson's selection.
• However, he wrote to a friend that Thomson and himself
disagreed on the merits of that type of song. "What to me
appears to be the simple and the wild, to him, and I suspect
to you likewise, will be looked on as the ludicrous and the
absurd."
• Instead, Burns gave the song to Scots singer Pietro Urbani
who published it in his Scots Songs.
• In his book, Urbani claimed the words of The Red Red Rose
were obligingly given to him by a celebrated Scots poet, who
was so struck by them when sung by a country girl that he
wrote them down and, not being pleased with the air, begged
the author to set them to music in the style of a Scots tune,
which he has done accordingly.
• In other correspondence, Burns referred to it as a "simple old
Scots song which I had picked up in the country."
Auld Lang Syne
• It is often sung at the stroke of midnight on New Year's
Day.
• The song is commonly accompanied by a traditional
dance.
• The group who is singing forms a ring, holding hands for
the first verse. For the second verse, arms are crossed
and again linked. For the third verse, everyone moves in
to the centre of the ring and then out again.
• The song's title may be translated into English literally as
'old long since', or more idiomatically 'long ago', or 'days
gone by'.
• In his retelling of fairy tales in the Scots language,
Matthew Fitt uses the phrase “In the days of auld lang
syne” as the equivalent of “Once upon a time”.
• In Scots Syne is pronounced like the English word
sign — IPA: [sain]—not [zain] as many people
pronounce it.
To A Mouse
• Surely one of the finest poems written by Burns,
containing some of the most famous and
memorable lines ever written by a poet, yet, to
this day not really understood by the mass of
English-speaking poetry lovers, for no other
reason than that the dialect causes it to be read
as though in a foreign language.
• All readers of Burns know of the "Wee sleekit
cow'rin tim'rous beastie" but not many
understand the sadness and despair contained
within the lines of this poem.
For a’ That and a’ That
• Burns sent it to Thomson with the note, "I do not give
you the foregoing song for your book, but merely by
way of vive la bagatelle; for the piece is not really
poetry."
• The French use it to talk about a petty love affair
when they disassociate the idea of love and sex.
• For A' That asserts the idea that basic human dignity
was the heritage of any man and "liberty, equality,
fraternity" should be the basis of economic as well as
social intercourse.
• An outspoken champion Republican cause for social
reform during The French Revolution, after Franco
British relations deteriorated he curbed his radical
sympathies and in the same year as this composition
he joined the Dunfriesshire Volunteers.
Robert Burns
• He sent the piece to George Thomson in 1795
because he found a compatriot spirit in the
similar poem Rights of Man by Thomas Paine.
• He added some comments with regard to his
intense dislike bloated rank and privilege, `two
or three pretty good prose thoughts, inverted
into rhyme'; the same month in a letter to
another friend, he referred to the executions of
Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette as `the deserved
fate of ... a perjured Blockhead and an
unprincipled Prostitute.'
William Wordsworth
• William Wordsworth (April 7, 1770 – April 23, 1850)
was a major English romantic poet who, with Samuel
Taylor Coleridge, helped launch the Romantic Age in
English literature with their 1798 joint publication, Lyrical
Ballads.
• Wordsworth's masterpiece is generally considered to be
The Prelude, an autobiographical poem of his early
years that was revised and expanded a number of times.
• It was never published during his lifetime, and was only
given the title after his death.
• Up until this time it was generally known as the poem "to
Coleridge".
William Wordsworth
Simon lee
• "Simon Lee" is a direct attempt to put into action many of
the ideas expressed in his Preface to the Lyrical Ballads.
• The poem itself, being based on an actual person, is a
manifestation of Wordsworth's assertion that poetry is a
"spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings" that "takes its
origin from emotion recollected in tranquility" .
• Wordsworth's fascination with the social implications of the
old huntsman's situation led him to draw certain
conclusions, and society is indicted here for its lack of
compassion for and involvement with those people living
on the fringes of society.
• He states in the Preface to the Lyrical Ballads that "Simon
Lee" is designed to "illustrate the manner in which our
feelings and ideas are associated in a state of excitement
[. . .] by placing the reader in the way of receiving from
ordinary moral sensations another and more salutary
impression" .
William Wordsworth
• Wordsworth invites his readers to think about his
experience--and his reaction to it--in the same way he
has, and challenges them to find in it a higher, more
relevant truth than pity.
• Simon's meager existence is juxtaposed against the
reader's; the sharp contrasts illustrate Wordsworth's view
of this poverty-stricken and forgotten old man as
exemplifying the failure of human kindness toward the
unfortunate and marginalized.
• The poem moves the reader to feel pity, and then
empathy, and finally to a state of social awareness.
• Wordsworth's ultimate message, however, is that the
reader should move beyond a mere contemplation of
these emotions and realities and actually become
involved. The poem is a call to action.
A slumber did my spirit seal
• 我的心灵一度出尘；
不知人世的恐惧：
她宛如仙子
不食人间的烟火。
如今伊人不再；
音容消逝；
伴着山林，
与大地同行
• It consists of two stanzas rhyming abab.
• As soon as the reader recognizes that he is dealing with
a poem certain expectations arise.
• He anticipates to be confronted with a special poetical
language corresponding to the conventions of poetry.
• The reader is alert; he is now looking eagerly for those
poetical devices.
• Fortunately his expectations are already confirmed in the
first line of the poem. “Slumber” is not used in everyday
language and in the dictionary it is acknowledged as an
old fashioned literary term.
• The syntax deviates from the standard as well; the poet
uses “did seal” instead of “sealed” which would be the
grammatical correct past tense used nowadays.
• The reader feels at ease because his expectations have
been confirmed. But the reading experience has only just
begun
The Tables Turned
• 书桌，走开！
快起！快起！我的朋友，丢开你的书本；
否则我干确定你将变成驼背；
快起！快起！我的朋友，清晰你的面容；
为何满是辛劳和困惑？
太阳，落在山岗上，
清新的光泽催熟了
整片长长翠绿的稻田 散播
在他第一缕甜蜜晚霞的金灿灿下
书！是愚蠢而又无止尽的争吵；
快来，听林地红雀，
多甜美的歌声！以我的生命
起誓：有多少智慧在其中啊！
• 听！ 多么轻快，画眉的歌唱！
他，同样地，是一种召唤：
快来吧，进入阳光地带，
让大自然充当你们的老师。
他用所拥有整个世界预备的财富，
我们的思想和心灵来 祈祷——
智慧的启迪孕育于健康，
真理的领悟迸发于欢悦。
一种激情，勃发于春天的林木
能教会你更多关于人类，
关于道德的罪恶和友善，
较之于所有智人的教诲。
甜美是大自然带来的熏陶；
我们爱干涉的才智
总错误地扭曲事物美丽的形式，——
谋杀似地分辨一切。
够了，那些科学和艺术；
盖上那空洞乏味的书页；
来吧，带上你的心灵
一颗愿观察愿接纳的心灵。
I Traveled Among Unknown Men
•
•
我旅行在陌生人间
---我旅行在陌生人间
那离海较远的陆地上；
并不知道是英格兰啊！直到
我发现自己有多么爱你。
过去了，那忧伤的梦！
难道，我将离开你的海岸
又一次；却时常发现
我对你的爱越来越深。
在山岚间，我清晰地
感觉到渴望的喜悦；
而我珍视地她，掉转船桅
靠向一处，英格兰的烽火。
清晨你展露，夜晚你遮掩
那些露茜曾玩耍地村落；
你的，也就是那最后的绿野
也曾被露茜的眼睛丈量过。
Samuel Taylor Coleridge
• Samuel Taylor Coleridge
(October 21, 1772 – July 25,
1834) was an English poet, critic,
and philosopher, one of the
founders of the Romantic
Movement in England and one of
the Lake Poets.
• He is probably best known for his
poems The Rime of the Ancient
Mariner and Kubla Khan, as well
as his major prose work
Biographia Literaria.
• Coleridge is probably best known for his long poems,
The Rime of the Ancient Mariner and Christabel.
• Christabel is known for its musical rhythm, language,
and its Gothic tale.
• Kubla Khan, or, A Vision in a Dream, A Fragment,
although shorter, is also widely known and loved.
• It has strange, dreamy imagery and can be read on
many levels.
• Both Kubla Khan and Christabel have an additional
"romantic" aura because they were never finished.
• Stopford Brooke characterised both poems as having no
rival due to their "exquisite metrical movement" and
"imaginative phrasing." It is one of history's tragedies
that Coleridge was interrupted while writing Kubla Khan
by a visitor and could not recall any more of the poem
afterwards.
• However, it is now acknowledged that Coleridge had
composed previous drafts of Kubla Khan, perhaps a
reflection of his desire to flag the 'power' of imagination.
• Coleridge's shorter, meditative "conversation poems,"
however, proved to be the most influential of his work.
These include both quiet poems like This Lime-Tree
Bower My Prison and Frost at Midnight and also strongly
emotional poems like Dejection and The Pains of Sleep.
• Wordsworth immediately adopted the model of these
poems, and used it to compose several of his major
poems.
• Via Wordsworth, the conversation poem became a
standard vehicle for English poetic expression, and
perhaps the most common approach among modern
poets.
• Coleridge's poetry so impressed the parents of British
composer Samuel Coleridge-Taylor (1875-1912) that
they named him after the poet.
George Gordon Byron
• George Gordon Byron, 6th
Baron Byron (22 January 1788 –
19 April 1824) was an AngloScottish poet and a leading figure
in Romanticism. Among Lord
Byron's best-known works are the
narrative poems Childe Harold's
Pilgrimage and Don Juan.
• The latter remained incomplete on
his death.
• He was regarded as one of the
greatest European poets and
remains widely read.
Written after swimming from sestos to abydos
• The Hellespont is a narrow stretch of sea in the Strait of
Dardanelles, separating western FROM eastern Turkey.
Legend has it that the beautiful maiden Hero was on one
side of the strait and her lover, Leander on the other.
• Leander swam across to her one dark and stormy night
and was drowned.
• Lord Byron prided himself on his physical fitness. He
walked with a limp and had been spoken of slightingly by
a girl that he fancied in his youth as "that limping lad".
• Ever after he was out to prove himself as the equal of
any man in any arena of physical competition, but
particularly sexual.
• Aside FROM this, he was an excellent boxer and fencer,
played cricket for his school and unlike most Englishmen
of his date, was a very strong swimmer.
• His romantic notion of swimming the Hellespont like
Leander resulted in a fever- the ague that he refers to in
the last line.
• Byron's first drama, Manfred, details the
author's characterization of the Romantic
hero, a figure of superior abilities and
intense passions who rejects human
contact as well as the aid and comfort
offered by various religious
representatives.
• Consumed by his own sense of guilt for an
unspecified transgression involving Astarte,
the only human he ever loved, Manfred
finally seeks peace through his own death.
• Manfred represents Byron's articulation of
the Romantic hero, a figure so far superior
to other humans that he need not be
bound by the constraints of human society.
Similarly, he submits to no spiritual
authority, rejecting pantheism,
Zoroastrianism, and Christianity.
• Manfred answers only to himself, and
because of this he is the instrument of his
own destruction, fashioning a punishment
for his unexplained guilt that far exceeds
any possible retribution imposed by
human or religious authorities.
• Lord Byron's fame rests not only on his writings but also
on his life, which featured extravagant living, numerous
love affairs, debts, separation, and allegations of incest
and sodomy.
• He was famously described by Lady Caroline Lamb as
"mad, bad, and dangerous to know."
• Byron served as a regional leader of Italy's revolutionary
organization the Carbonari in its struggle against Austria,
and later travelled to fight against the Turks in the Greek
War of Independence, for which the Greeks consider him
a national hero. He died from a febrile illness in
Messolonghi.
• His daughter Ada Lovelace, notable in her own right,
collaborated with Charles Babbage on the analytical
engine, a predecessor to modern computers.
Percy Bysshe Shelley
• Percy Bysshe Shelley (August 4,
1792 – July 8, 1822) was one of
the major English Romantic poets
and is widely considered to be
among the finest lyric poets of the
English language.
• He is perhaps most famous for
such anthology pieces as
Ozymandias, Ode to the West
Wind, To a Skylark, and The
Masque of Anarchy.
• However, his major works were long visionary poems
including Alastor, Adonais, The Revolt of Islam,
Prometheus Unbound and the unfinished The Triumph of
Life.
• Shelley's unconventional life and
uncompromising idealism, combined with his
strong skeptical voice, made him a notorious
and much denigrated figure during his life.
• He became the idol of the next two or three
generations of poets, including the major
Victorian and Pre-Raphaelite poets Robert
Browning, Alfred, Lord Tennyson, Dante Gabriel
Rossetti, Algernon Charles Swinburne, as well
as William Butler Yeats and poets in other
languages such as Jibanananda Das and
Subramanya Bharathy).
• He was also admired by Karl Marx, Henry
Stephens Salt, and Bertrand Russell.
• Famous for his association with his equally
short-lived contemporaries John Keats and Lord
Byron, he was married to novelist Mary Shelley.
• In "Ode to the West Wind," Percy Bysshe
Shelley tries to gain transcendence, for he
shows that his thoughts, like the "winged seeds"
(7) are trapped.
• The West Wind acts as a driving force for
change and rejuvenation in the human and
natural world.
• Shelley views winter not just as last phase of
vegetation but as the last phase of life in the
individual, the imagination, civilization and
religion.
Ode to the West Wind
• Being set in Autumn, Shelley observes the
changing of the weather and its effects on the
internal and external environment.
• By examining this poem, the reader will see that
Shelley can only reach his sublime by having the
wind carry his "dead thoughts" (63) which
through an apocalyptic destruction, will lead to a
rejuvenation of the imagination, the individual
and the natural world.
John Keats
• John Keats (31 October 1795 – 23 February
1821) was one of the principal poets of the
English Romantic movement.
• During his short life, his work received constant
critical attacks from the periodicals of the day,
but his posthumous influence on poets such as
Alfred Tennyson has been immense.
• Elaborate word choice and sensual imagery
characterize Keats's poetry, including a series of
odes that were his masterpieces and which
remain among the most popular poems in
English literature.
• Keats's letters, which
expound on his aethetic
theory of "negative
capability", are among
the most celebrated by
any writer.
On First Looking into Chapman's Homer
• 我已經遨遊過不少黃金的領域，
造訪了許多美好的城邦和國度；
我曾經巡迴許多西方的島嶼，
那裡歌者一致效忠的是阿波羅。
人們時常對我提到一廣袤的空間
屬於那眉目深陷的荷馬統治之邑；
但我從未呼吸到那清純肅穆的空氣，
直到這一刻聆聽查普曼朗聲長吟。
我感覺如同一浩浩太空的凝望者
當一顆全新的星球泅入他的視野；
或者就像那果敢的戈奧迭，以他
蒼鷹之眼注視太平洋──當所有水手
都面面相覷，帶著荒忽的設想──
屏息於大雷岩之巔。
• Sleep and Poetry (1816) is a poem by John
Keats. It was started late one evening while
staying the night at Leigh Hunt's cottage.
• It is often cited as a clear example of Keats's
bower-centric poetry, yet it contains lines that
make such a simplistic reading problematic.
• Furthermore, Keats defends his early 'bowercentric' subject matter, which hearkens back to
the classical poetic tradition of Homer and Virgil.
• Keats mounts an attack against Alexander Pope
and many of his own fellow Romantic poets by
downplaying their poetic departures into the
imaginary.
• Although written in simplistic rhyming couplets,
the gradual turn towards inwardness serves as
an important anticipation for Keats's later poetry.
• Ode to a Nightingale was written in May, 1819,
in the garden of the Spaniards Inn, Hampstead.
• It was first published in 'Annals of the Fine Arts'
in July of the same year. Referred to by critics of
the time as "the longest and most personal of
the odes," the poem describes Keats' journey
into the state of Negative Capability.
• The poem explores the themes of nature,
transience and mortality.
• Keats imagines the loss of the physical world,
and sees himself dead--he uses an abrupt,
almost brutal word for it--as a "sod" over which
the nightingale sings.
• The contrast between the immortal nightingale
and mortal man, sitting in his garden, is made all
the more acute by an effort of the imagination.
• The presence of weather is noticeable in the
poem, as spring came early in 1819, which
brought nightingales all over the heath.
• According to Keats' friend, Charles Armitage
Brown, a nightingale had built its nest hear his
home in the spring of 1819.
• Keats felt a "tranquil and continual joy in her
song; and one morning he took his chair from
the breakfast table to the grass plot under a
plum tree, where he sat for two of three hours."
• "Ode on a Grecian Urn" is first published in
January 1820.
• Its inspiration is considered to be a visit by Keats
to the exhibition of Greek artifacts accompanying
the display of the "Elgin Marbles" at the British
Museum.
• The poem captures aspects of Keats's idea of
"Negative Capability", as the reader does not
know who the figures are on the urn, what they
are doing, or where they are going.
• Instead, the speaker revels in this mystery, as he
does in the final couplet, which does not make
immediate, ascertainable sense but continues to
have poetic significance nonetheless.
• The ode ultimately deals with the complexity of
art's relationship with real life.
Reference
http://blog.roodo.com/poe/archives/3910033.html
http://hk.geocities.com/ice_pears/william_blake.ht
m
http://asms.k12.ar.us/classes/humanities/britlit/9798/blake/POEMS.htm
http://www.amdgchinese.org/ss/s02.php
http://asms.k12.ar.us/classes/humanities/britlit/9798/blake/POEMS.htm
http://dfpoon.wordpress.com/2005/04/21
Reference
• http://www.everything2.com/index.pl?node
_id=1103889
• http://www.umd.umich.edu/casl/hum/eng/j
onsmith/sample1.html
• http://www.bilinguist.com/data/hanying/me
ssages/33952.html
• http://zhidao.baidu.com/question/1125164
7.html?fr=qrl3
Reference
• http://www.123helpme.com/assets/17455.
html
• http://lignifyart.blogspot.com/2007/03/onfirst-looking-into-chapmans-homer.html