To Autumn: John Keats                 Critical Response                 Shaunna Deeney

Sometimes a poem can be successful in helping us to look at an aspect of human life or nature from a fresh perspective. Choose a poem in which you think is successful in doing this and show how the writer’s poetic techniques help you to view an aspect of human life or nature differently.

In ‘To Autumn’ John Keats talks about the three distinct stages of Autumn, this is why he is successful in helping the reader to look at aspects of human life and nature from a fresh perspective. The three stages John Keats mentions are the growth periods of time, the harvesting and the dying of the crops. In the first stanza Keats shows us the growing stage of Autumn, yet in the third stanza the main theme is death and how Autumn is the season of ‘dying’. However, by using the stages of Autumn as a metaphor for the process of death, Keats manages to put the concept of death into a different, more positive light. Keats also uses many different writing techniques to help the reader to view the aspects of human life and nature differently, throughout Keats put this in a favourable light and this is why the poem is enjoyable to read.

One of the many poetic techniques which Keats uses is word choice. In the first stanza of the poem it is about the end of the summer, beginning of Autumn. In this stanza Keats uses powerful adjectives to captivate the reader and portray an idea of a traditional Autumn. An example of this is the lines,

‘And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core; to swell the gourd and plump the hazel shells.’ The adjectives ripeness and plump create and paint an image of large numbers of fruit, and also makes you think of lush warm colours like read and orange. Fruits are mentioned as it is coming up to the time when all is harvested. Keats, throughout the poem uses highly descriptive language as well as words which appeal to our auditory sense.

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Some examples of words which appeal to our auditory sense are contained mostly in stanza 3, where John Keats is discussing Autumn’s song, which many people forget about. Keats reinforces in this stanza that Autumn is just as important as any other season using the expressions,

‘wailful choir the small gnats mourn’, ‘full grown lambs loud bleat..’, ‘hedge crickets sing; and now with treble soft’, ‘red-breast whistles’, ‘gathering swallows twitter in the skies’. These animals seem to be using their own way of communication and singing, reading those lines gives the reader the idea that they are sad. This ...

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