Keats 'Bright Star! would I were steadfast as thou art'

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  • Created by: Holly8988
  • Created on: 05-01-20 11:16
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  • 'Bright star! would I were steadfast as thou art'
    • Form/ structure
      • Shakespearean sonnet
      • One of the great sonnets
      • One of the last poems he wrote before his death
      • Original copy written on blank page at the back of the poetical works of Shakespeare - shows inspiration and indebtedness to him.
      • Italian sonnet in terms of structure - shift doesn't come at the end of line 12. A curious blend of English and Italian sonnets.
    • About being steadfast/permanenet/ robust enough to stand strong and be unwavering. Draws on metaphorical potential of a star which is steadfast.
    • "Not in lone splendour hung aloft the night / And watching, with eternal lids apart"- gives reasons why the star is steadfast, but the reasons why he doesn't like its steadfastness. Eternal suggests a kind of grandeur about the star & an innocence and purity.
      • Humanity by contrast is impure -> why he likes the innocence the star provides.
    • "The moving waters at their priestlike task / Of pure ablution round earth's human stores"
      • Ablutions - religious rite of cleansing to rid of impurity. These cleanse humanities' shores - humanity is sinful and impure.
      • Uses ascetic, religious imagery - e.g. monk or nun shuts themselves away from experience and richness of life.
    • Keats would not like life of a hermit - removing himself from the world means a removal of sensuousness and nature e.g. all things that give him joy.
    • "No - yet still steadfast, still unchangeable"
      • Takes everything he previously expressed and reverses it.
    • "Pillowed upon my fair love's ripening breast, / To feel for ever its soft swell"
      • "ripening" - imagery drawn from natural world like fruit or flowers blossoming. Image of growth & nourishment he is attracted to.
      • "swell" - sensory pleasure of feeling her breath. He wants to remain on Fanny's breast & wants warm, sensuous imagery of the last 6 lines.
    • "awake for ever in a sweet unrest"
      • "sweet unrest" - oxymoronic phrase. Likes unity of piano and pleasure - rich sensory experience. becomes sweet sharing the unrest of Fanny.
    • "Still, still to hear her tender-taken breath"
      • repetition of 'still' - freq used by Romantic poets. First 'still' means motionless, second 'still' mean continuing. The ambiguity.

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