Analyse the first stanza of Keats’ “To Autumn.”
The poem “To Autumn” describes the changing of nature as Autumn progresses to Winter The first stanza of this poem describes the abundance of nature and the rewards in which it reaps. The stanza begins with autumn at the peak of fulfillment and continues the ripening to an almost unbearable intensity which is shown by the use of verbs such as “load,” “bend,” “fill,” and “swell.” The structure of the first stanza compounds this impression with the first stanza contained all in one sentence as if it’s over-brimming with the products of harvest and the rich language of this stanza reflect the richness of the fruit. The consonance of the m, l and s sounds in the line first line of the first stanza, “Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness,” sets the melancholic tone carried throughout. The alliteration of “mists,” and “mellow,” and the internal rhyme of “mists,” and “fruitfulness,” enables the reader to associate each word with the other so where fruitfulness would usually be seen as a positive act of nature is juxtaposed by the modifier “mellow,” to create a somber tone.
