"Ode on a Grecian urn" is a poem, which focuses on the contrast between the eternal beauty and perfection of art work and the shortness of real human pleasures. The urn was carved with a succession of beautiful scenes and numbers and the way the poet describes it creates the reader understand that he cannot take his sight off of it. The urn in this poem has presents two main scenes: 1) the masses of fleeing maidens and seeking men in lines 8-10, 2) the sacrificial procession on line 31-37.
In the first stanza, the poet personifies the urn phoning it a "Sylvan historian". Moreover, the poet explains what is represented on the urn; from the "flowery story" and an Arcadian landscaping, which is the classical circumstance of Pastoral poetry. He details with a whole lot of details displays of love and beauty, that may remain forever impressed on the urn. The first stanza is a description of the impression of the narrator when he looks at the with urn. . In the next part of the stanza, begins some questions by the writer who has previously called the urn "Narrator"; he asks who are those figures represented on the urn itself, which notify legends, and from where they come from. Within this stanza, hearing is the sense, which the author favors. This can be seen by the different expressions used, which characterizes this sense: "silence", "pipes and timbrels". Even the sense of look is associated with "what leaf-fring'd star haunts about thy shape". Alternatively, the questions are immediately addressed to the author him-self, and they are strictly linked to a sylvan and mythological world, and not by chance the author uses the word "legend" to underline this interconnection.
In the next stanza, the narrator dwells on another image of the urn, which really is a young man participating in a flute. The narrator explains to the youngster that he shouldn't be sad because he'll never have the ability to kiss his dearest. In this stanza, at the beginning, there is a mention of the sense of ability to hear, such as the first one: "Heard melodies are great, but those unheard/ are sweeter", and persists with "soft pipes, play on", "pipe to the nature ditties of no tone", "thy songs" and "ear". Furthermore in this stanza the author uses manifestation that relate with the sense of touch: "never canst thou kiss"; on the other hand others relate with view: "she cannot diminish" and "she be good". But there is a further interconnection between these lines: this interconnection is eternity, given that they will never be completed. Other actions related to eternity are: "thou canst not leave/ thy tune"; "nor ever before can those trees be bare"; "permanently wilt thou love". With this stanza, on the urn is represented a musician, a "Bold lover". And here comes the connection with eternity: this son won't stop participating in his music, but, at exactly the same time, he will never have the ability to kiss the lady. He will love her permanently and she will be beautiful forever.
In the 3rd stanza, the narrator looks at the trees that surround the lovers, which is happy, because they do not lose their leaves. According to the author, love will never end, contrary from loss of life, that slowly and gradually slides from the "the breathing human love love" to the "a heart and soul high-sorrowful and cloyed. A burning forehead, and a parching tongue. " Within the urn there is an eternal spring and coil: "nor ever bid the Spring and coil adieu". In this stanza the prevailing sense is experiencing: "piping melodies" and "melodist". In this particular stanza, the poem becomes particularly joyful: "Ah, happy, happy boughs!", "more happy love! More content, happy love!", "happy melodist". These repetitions want to underline the delight of the poet when he talks about the urn. Moreover, there are many references to enthusiasm which affects humans: "All deep breathing human love for above, / that leaves a heart and soul high-sorrowful and cloy'd". The other personal references to love are: "for ever warm and still to be enjoy'd", "for ever panting", "a using up forehead, and a parching tongue". Also in this stanza you can find reference to eternity; in truth, the repetition of the expression "for ever" and "permanently young" both refer to eternity.
In the fourth stanza will be examined by another image that symbolizes farmers leading a heifer to sacrifice. The author wonders where these people 're going, and where they result from. In the fourth stanza, the circumstance changes completely. The images symbolized on the urn no more portray displays of love, but on the urn now is represented the religious solemnity of a "sacrifice". Despite the brutality of the arena described, there are different terms which relate with quietness: "peaceful", "pious morn" and "will silent be".
In the previous stanza, the narrator addresses the urn again, expressing that it, like Eternity, "dost tease us out of thought. " He considers that once that his generation is settled, the urn will remain, and preserve for the future generations this lesson: "Beauty is truth, real truth beauty. " The narrator says that this is all the urn recognizes, and is also everything it requires to know. In the fifth stanza what's explained on the urn is an "attic shape". Keats addresses the urn as a "cool pastoral" since it is merely an inanimate thing, made of marble. But, at exactly the same time, he also identifies it as "a pal to man" contrasting it to a tomb, which preserves the memory space of the useless and provides men the opportunity to became eternal through artwork. Again there may be reference to sight: "Good attitude". In addition, as in the previous stanzas there are personal references to eternity: "thou shalt remain" and "eternity".
This poem is a iambic pentameter, shaped by 5 stanzas each composed with a quatrain and a sestet. The rhyme design is ABAB CDE DCE. Each stanza employs a rhyme design that may be divided into two parts, in which the previous three lines are variable. The first seven verses follow the structure of every stanza ABABCDE, which is fixed, while the second, CDE are located in merged order. In the first stanza, the previous three verses follow the routine DCE, in the second, CED, in the third and fourth, CDE, and in the fifth, just as the first DCE. The tone of the poem is very light and relaxed and emphasis only in certain items, for example in the question phrases of the first stanza. This calmness transpires the writers' admiration for the beauty of the urn.
In the first stanza, there are a few apostrophes and by the end there are two question phrases. Furthermore, Keats uses some metaphors discussing the urn: "unravish'd bride-to-be of quietness", "foster-child of silence and slow-moving time", and "Sylvan historian". The is an assonance "bride of quietness, / Thou foster-child of silence and slow-moving time", an alliteration "Thou foster-child of silence and slow-moving time, / Sylvan historian, who canst thus express", and two oxymoron "those unheard" and "peaceful citadel". Rhetorical questions are used to tell what's displayed on the urn and all question sentences get started with "What" which produce an anaphora. There is an apostrophe, which refers to the "Bold lover".
In the second stanza "Heard melodies are great, but those unheard/ are sweeter" is a paradox. Furthermore, there is an apostrophe and a personification of the pipes: "ye soft pipes, play on". On line 14 "ditties on no shade" is another paradox, and practices another apostrophe referred to the "youth". Online 16 there's a parallelism "thou canst not leave they song, nor ever before can those trees and shrubs be bare. " In the rest of the lines of the stanza the poet is dealing with to the "Bold Lover". His desire will be eternal as the urn, because he will never be able to kiss the girl. Online 29 there's a metonymy: "heart high-sorrowful and cloy'd", and the poet uses two synecdoche: "burning forehead" and "parching tongue".
Unlike the third stanza were the author shows on the short-lived passions of humans, the fourth stanza presents a note of sadness and desolation. This is understood by what utilized by the poet in this stanza: "sacrifice" online 31, "silent" online 39 and "desolate" on line 40. In line 32-34 "green alter", "heifer lowing at the skies", and "silken flanks" are all area of the typical landscape of pastoral poetry. The final stanza instead is a sort of summarize of the poet's "experience". In the quatrain, the apostrophes used for the urn are: "Attic shape!" "Fair frame of mind!" on line 41, "thou, silent form" on line 44, "cold pastoral" on line 45 and "friend to man" online 48. There are also personifications of the urn in virtually all the stanzas of the poem.
In this ode, for Keats the main kind of beauty is the spiritual one, which identifies eternity, and not the physical one. Through art work, man can become eternal and be kept in mind by future era after death. The complete poem is a metaphor for poetry and its eternity over time and death. In fact, the scenes displayed on the urn are freezing for ever, time does not have any power on it and this is of all the poem can be summarized within the last couplet of the poem: "Beauty is fact, truth beauty, »- that is all / Ye know on the planet, and all ye need to know. "
