ODE ON A GRECIAN URN

Ode on a Grecian Urn

Ode on a Grecian Urn

Edward Bliss Reed has claimed that "the odes of Keats are not only the greatest lyric achievement, but they are the finest expression of his genius" (425). These works of John Keats are particularly notable for their fine sense of lyricism. Most definitions of lyricism include four aspects which are found in abundance in Keats' odes: musicality, simplicity of subject, emphasis on tone and mood, and subjectivity in thought and feeling. According to Schelling, one of the most important features of lyric poetry is the use of devices to create musicality.

Keats's speaker opens the poem with an address to the goddess Psyche, urging her to hear his words, and asking that she forgive him for singing to her own secrets. He says that while wandering through the forest that very day, he stumbled upon "two fair creatures" lying side by side in the grass, beneath a "whispering roof" of leaves, surrounded by flowers. They embraced one another with both their arms and wings, and though their lips did not touch, they were close to one another and ready "past kisses to outnumber." The speaker says he knew the winged boy, but asks who the girl was. He answers his own question: She was Psyche.

Always is as scary a word as never. That phrase relates to the theme of Keats' “Ode on a Grecian Urn”, which is an exploration of the border between desire and fulfilment in human life. Keats' “Ode on a Grecian Urn” features a narrator musing upon the face of an urn that holds, for him, more life in its earthenware curves than does the curves of the temporal earth. The title itself reflects the reader-response reading of the urn's text: the ode is on (about) the urn, and the ode is also depicted on the urn."

From the start, it is given that this poem is going to contain depressed images, imagery of sad mythological creatures and those whose worlds were turned upside down and filled with great sorrow because of the choices made by individuals.

In the “Ode on a Grecian Urn”, the urn represents a story without regard to time. The unchanging marble arrests time through the urn. This shows the immortal side of the Grecian urn physical appearance. The unchangeable urn also displays a tale of an everyday place. The urn shows the people with their endless deeds.

Life is halted and can never continue from this point. The fair youth, the Bold Lover, the trees of spring, and the season spring, can ever leave their endless deeds. Immortality of the town is shown. The town will never see people inhibiting it, bringing loneliness and immorality throughout the town. These are the advantages mortality give to the living. The themes of immortality and morality can be seen throughout “Ode of a Grecian Urn.” The unchanging marble of the urn can be considered immortal just as the tale displayed on the ...