The ode itself is a mixture of characteristics from the traditional Shakespearean and Petrachan sonnets, like ‘Ode to Autumn’. The first quatrain rhyme scheme is ABAB with the ending sestet of the stanza being a deliberate corruption of the Petrachan rhyme scheme, following the pattern of CDE DCE rather than the traditional form of CDE CDE. The poem also exhibits other poetic conventions by the way it is written mainly in iambic pentameter. However, Keats is tractable with this trait whilst retaining classical formality. Line 7 is a nine-syllable line with two unstressed syllables. This adds to the excitement of the tumbling amount of questions the poet is asking of the scenes depicted on the Grecian urn. The use of anaphora is also evident, each question drawing attention to itself by beginning with ‘What’.
X / x x / x / x /
‘In tempe or the dales of Arcady?’
Stanzas 2 and 3 explore the images and scenes on the urn. Repetition of words is most prevalent in these stanzas; ‘heard melodies are sweet, […] unheard / Are sweeter’, ‘ye soft pipes […] Pipe to the spirit’, ‘happy, happy boughs! […] More happy love! More happy, happy love!’ This repetition draws attention to the poem as a poem, acknowledging to the reader that like the urn is a work of art, so is the poem, and like the urn is eternal, so is the poem. The problems that we encounter with the urn being sterile and fixed, are the problems we will encounter with the poem. It can only explore a momentary feeling – it is not transient like life itself. The repetition of the word ‘happy’, although essentially is an uplifting word, is made to sound uncomfortable through the insistence it creates. Poetic devices such as these warn us that language can be ambiguous and the initial interpretation may not be all it appears to be, and the job of the poet is to exploit these ambiguities like that concerned with feelings upon life.
The poet celebrates the pipes and their sweet melodies. He celebrates the fact they are sweeter when we can’t hear them suggesting that the beauty of imagination is true beauty of the world. What our mind perceives is truth and beauty and we can see and hear beyond the original natural form itself. This sentiment is echoed in the final two lines of the poem. The trees will never know what it is like to be bare of leaves, they will always be bountiful and full. The lover will ‘never, never’ kiss the fair maid. This repetition finalises the insistence of ‘never’ contrasting the art with real life. It is dead in its moment of pleasure. For although the lovers will be ‘for ever’ fair and in love they will never reach the moment of ‘bliss’. The poet expresses the images or people depicted on the urn are far above ‘human passion’ and will never feel the absolute sorrow and unhappiness that accompanies our humanity.
Keats also makes use of other poetic systems such as run-on lines and half rhymes. This aids the diction of nature and pagan mythology by imitating the natural flow of speech with all its nuances. Natural speech does not automatically follow iambic pentameter with a definite pause after every 5 feet so the poem parallels natural speech, which is in accordance with the poet addressing the urn; ‘happy, happy boughs! That cannot shed / Your leaves,’ and ‘Fair youth, thou canst not leave / Thy song’. It is interesting that the words ‘shed’ and ‘leave’ are the words emphasised here, suggesting that the urn has a never-ending beauty which it cannot ‘leave’. The opposition of the virtues of existing forever in this state, and the sorrow of it being fixed, are deliberately pondered on before the poet makes his decision choosing the upheaval of life over the desolation of eternity. The half rhyme of ‘play on’ and ‘no tone’ resonates in a prolonged fashion. The half rhyme unsettles the imagery of enchantment and acts as an indication that nothing is inherently ‘happy’ or balanced. The assonance of this also reverberates around us reminding us of the control of time, something that this piece of art and its images will never have to confront. The inverted word order of ‘streets for evermore / Will silent be;’
In stanza 4 the poet asks questions of the sacrifice that is illustrated on the urn and speculates about the empty town the spectators have left. It is here when the true meaning of the poem accumulates. The barren town that it’s ‘folk’ have left converts the joy into an eternity of bleakness. The beauty of art is death-like with no motion, variance or fulfilment. Therefore life, with its altering moods and emotions is preferable to living in a death-like state for eternity. The literary device of alliteration is heard throughout this stanza with the repetition of ‘s’ sound; ‘skies’, ‘silken flanks’ ‘sea-shore’ and ‘citadel’ to name but a few. These insistent sound patterns elaborate on the poem as a work of art.
In stanza 5 the splendour of the Grecian urn is transformed into a ‘silent form’ as the narrator calls it ‘Cold pastoral!’. This paradox exemplifies the meaning, that true beauty is in the process of the imagination, not in the eternal. The imagination weaves and wanders whereas this beauty is rigid and sterile. The ending lines on this stanza have been hotly debated through time but my interpretation is that the ‘silent’ urn mimics the thoughts of the poet that ‘Beauty is truth, truth beauty…’ through the malleable nature of the imagination. Imagination is truth and in truth there is beauty. Beauty is beyond the cold image before us, beauty is evident in what we see other than its form.
Although the ode is written from the point of view of the narrator and his constantly questioning mind, it is impersonal as there is no ‘I’ evident. Therefore this leads me to believe it is a universal ode, one that any emotive being can relate to. It’s meaning is located within the poem and there is no hidden message or moral for us to tease out of it.
In consequence I find this ode richly eloquent through Keats preferred use of diction and imagery. The fact that the poem, which is a work of art, discusses a work of art draws attention to the techniques that artists use to make something pleasing. The inverted word order of ‘streets for evermore / Will silent be;’ is an example of art drawing attention to itself. In this way, Keats exploits various poetic devices to draw attention that the same meaning can be applicable to all works of art. What we extract from them is beautiful, not just the art itself, which exemplifies one of the many endearing characteristics of the Romantic Movement!
TOTAL WORDS: 1527
BIBLIOGRAPHY
The Open University (2002), Approaching Poetry,
The Open University, Milton Keynes
Stephen Bygrave ed. (1996), Romantic Writings,
The Open University, Bath
The Open University, Persisting Dreams, TV2
The Open University, A210 AC2131, Romantic Poets
The Open University, A210 AC2132, Poetry Tutorial
WR Owens and Hamish Johnson (2001), Romantic Writings: An Anthology,
The Open University, Milton Keynes
Marilyn Butler (1981), Romantics, Rebels and Reactionaries,
Oxford University Press, Oxford
Paul O’Flinn (2001), How to study Romantic poetry 2nd edition,
Palgrave, Basingstoke
