Palazzo Milzetti - Apollo e Minerva

Apollo and Minerva

JOHN KEATS:
"A THING OF BEAUTY IS A JOY FOR EVER"
(from "Endymion"-1818)

The poem deals with the idea, the cult of beauty that Keats has and sees in Nature and also in our souls. "A thing" of beauty is eternal, it doesn’t die, and it will remain forever.
The natural elements Keats describes are the sun, the moon, the trees, the daffodils, the rills, the brakes and all these elements show the presence of beauty in Nature.
But this immortal beauty is also into our souls, it "moves away the pall from our dark spirits" (l. 13) and it leads us to quietness, it won’t never leave us or we will die.
This is a spiritualised view of beauty, that recalls the neo-classical conception of art, not grounded on a mere impression of senses and connected with transience of life: beauty is life and won’t never fall, it’s a "joy for ever" (l. 1).
In the poem the sense of beauty is showed through many images of natural elements, which are the mirror of quietness and sweetness that beauty leads to.
The rhythm also conveys the idea of quietness through the iambic pentameter and couples of rhymes (aa, bb, cc...) which give the idea of perfection and harmony.
In conclusion, according to Keats’ neoplatonistic and romantic point of view, his poetry is a research of the ideal beauty in which our soul can rest and in all his life he tried to find this perfection, even if he had always experienced sorrow and death.

keats.jpg (11873 byte)
John Keats
(1795-1821)

A thing of beauty is a joy for ever

Its loveliness increases; it will never

Pass into nothingness: but still will keep

A bower quiet for us, and a sleep

Full of sweet dreams, and health, and quiet breathing.

Therefore, on every morrow, are we wreathing.

A flowery band to bind us to the earth,

Spite of despondence, of the inhuman dearth

Of noble natures, of the gloomy days,

Of all the unhealthy and o’er-darkened ways

Made for our searching: yes, in spite of all,

Some shape of beauty moves away the pall

From our dark spirits. Such as the sun, the moon,

Trees old and young, sprouting a shady boon

For simple sheep; and such are daffodils

With the green world they live in; and clear rills

That for themselves a cooling covert make

‘Gainst the hot season; the mid-forest brake,

Rich with a sprinkling of fair musk-rose blooms:

And such too is the grandeur of the dooms

We have imagined for the mighty dead;

All lovely tales that we have heard or read:

An endless fountain of immortal drink,

Pouring into us from the heaven’s brink.

Nor do we merely feel these essences

For one short hour; no, even as the trees

That whisper round a temple’s self, so does the moon,

The passion poesy, glories infinite,

Haunt us till they become a cheering light

Unto our souls, and bound to us so fast,

That whether there be shine, or gloom o’er cast,

They always must be with us, or we die.

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