A very effective summary of Tess of the d’Urbervilles

 

Tess of the d’Urbervilles
By Thomas Hardy

Four main characters (and one-sentence description of each)

Tess Durbeyfield - She is the main character who is raped, then married, but shunned(rejected) by her husband because of the rape while before they were married, he had an affair.

Alec d’Urberville - He is a man believed by the Durbeyfield’s to be a relative, but Tess finds out that he is no relative.  He falls in love with Tess and rapes her.

Angel Clare - Tess met him at Talbothay’s farm and they fell in love to later get married but separated immediately after the marriage.

Joan Durbeyfield - She is Tess’ mother who pushed Tess to find help in the d’Urbervilles only to get Tess raped, and tells Tess to never mention the rape or the child to anyone.

Two minor characters (and one-sentence description of each)

Marian - She was a worker at Talbothay’s with Tess and fell in love with Angel like Tess, but after Tess married Angel, she remained strong and helped Tess find work after Angel left.

The Clare’s - These are the members of Angel’s family who did not know of Tess’ problems, but would have helped her if they did.

Three main settings (and one-sentence description of each)

Marlott - This is Tess’ home town where she grew up and returned to after the incident at the d’Urbervilles.

Alec d’Urberville’s house - Tess went to stay at this house after their family fell in need and sought help from the supposed relatives.

Talbothays - Trying to find a new life, Tess came here and met Angel whom she fell in love with and married despite competition from three other girls.

One paragraph plot outline

The father of the Durbeyfield household is wandering home when he is told that he is of the ancient line of the d’Urbervilles, a once powerful family.  Knowing this, he returns home happy and relays the news to his family.  Although being from a once great family, his current family is in need and decides to seek help from relatives by the name of d’Urberville.  The family sent Tess to ask them for help.  Tess went and began working for them.  However, she finds out that they are not truly of the d’Urberville line and simply changed their names to d’Urberville.  Also, she finds out that the son of the house, Alec, is not of good character.  He rapes her and she gets pregnant.  She leaves for home in a bad mood.  Gives birth, and works with the other girls in the fields.  The baby dies and Tess decides to look for a new life elsewhere where no one knows of her and the incident after promising herself that she would never get married.  She ends up at Talbothays working as a milk maid.  There, she meets three girls and a man, Angel Clare, working there.  She and the other three girls like Angel, but Angel picks Tess out of the three.  They fall in love, and get married.  However, Tess never told Angel about the rape and the child until the night after the wedding.  Although he had an affair before the wedding, he grows furious and leaves her to go to America where he grows ill.  In the meantime, Tess returns home distraught(distressed) and seeks to flee from her troubles.  She meets Alec who still loves her and keeps pressing her to marry him saying that Angel is never going to come back.  Marian, one of the girls who liked Angel, finds Tess work at the farm she works at.  There she works for a year before deciding to live with Alec.  She lives with Alec for a while before Angel comes back expressing his continuing love for her.  However, to leave Alec, she murders him and leaves with Angel.  They stay in a house on the way home for a week.  However, when they leave, Tess is arrested for murder and executed.  Angel marries Tess’ younger sister as Tess’ last wish.

Two symbols and references

The pillar with the hand print - This pillar symbolizes Tess’ guilt of adultery and murder.  Alec says that it was erected by the druid’s for some punishment, while others say it was a cross.  Tess was arrested after sleeping by it.

Tess’ baby - This baby symbolized Tess’ bad circumstances which was out of Tess’ control.  It symbolizes innocence in a sense since this baby was innocent having done nothing wrong, but it was punished by society for coming from such an evil act.  Having been raped, Tess was also innocent of the crime, but she was still punished and pushed aside by society.

Two or three sentences on style

Hardy’s writing style is simple but wordy.  His sentence structures are not long or very complicated, but the complexity in his work comes from the way he uses several sentences.  For example, he uses a lot of imagery and describes the scenery in great detail.  While each individual sentence may not be difficult to understand, it is the way the various sentences fit together to form a whole picture which separates him from other authors.

One or two sentences on dominant philosophy

This book deals with the oppression of an innocent girl.  Most of the consequences she faced were not consequences of her own actions which makes this story somewhat of a tragedy in that sense giving the book a mood that you can try to make for yourself a good life, but you do not determine your own outcome.

Four short quotations typical of the work (include speaker, occasion)

“’Well it’s true.  Throw up your chin a moment, so that I may catch the profile of your face better.  Yes, that’s the d’Urberville nose and chin--a little debased.  Your ancestor was one of the twelve knights who assisted the Lord of Estremavilla in Normandy in his conquest of Glamorganshire.  Branches of your family held manors over all this part of England; their names appear in the pipe rolls in the time of King Stephen.  In the reign of King John one of them was rich enough to give a manor to the Knights Hospitallers; ...  In short,’ concluded the parson, decisively smacking his leg with his switch, ‘there’s hardly such another family in England.’”  This is where the parson tells Durbeyfield of his great heritage causing him to search for help in other d’Urbervilles.  Although the parson regrets telling Durbeyfield this news, the tone in which he said it show that he was trying to cheer Durbeyfield up.

“Let me put one little kiss on those holmberry lips, Tess, or even on that warmed cheek, and I’ll stop--on my honour, I will!”  Alec says this to Tess while driving her to his house.  He drives too fast for Tess and says he’ll slow down if she’ll give him a kiss.  This shows his low character and foreshadows the future pains he will give her.

“’O Tess, forgiveness does not apply to the case!  You were one person; now you are another.  My God--how can forgiveness meet such a grotesque--prestidigitation as that!’”  Angel says this to Tess after they revealed their sins to one another.  He displays his hypocrisy here.  While he committed a similar crime (worse in my opinion) of having an affair, he will not forgive Tess of being raped while she wholeheartedly forgives him.

“’What is it Angel?’ she said, starting up.  ‘Have they come for me? ... It is as it should be....  Angel, I am almost glad--yes, glad!  This happiness could not have lasted.  It was too much.  I have had enough; and now I shall not live for you to despise me! ... I am ready.”  Tess says this to Angel after finding the soldiers who had come to arrest her.  This statements shows that she is ready to go and knows the gravity of her murder.  She knew before that incident that she could not live happy after committing such a crime and knew that she had to face the consequences.  She died at peace knowing that she was made right with Angel.

Q: How does Byron criticize the trend and tendencies of the contemporary society?

Lord Byron, the most consistent satirist of the period and by far the best, has written the satiric piece Don Juan in a wholly fresh manner. His purpose is to expose the hypocrisy and the corruption of high society. However, he has used wit, humor and irony plentiful to satirize his objects effectively.
In the opening stanza we find a very explicit irony in the attempts and procedure of Juan’s education chosen for him by his mother Donna Inez. Juan always kept away from the company of other boys for fear of being corrupted. The subjects and texts of his study are taken from great authors’ works which have no even the slightest touch of sexual reference. For this sake, some of the classical literature is remained unknown to Juan. As a result, Juan is not becoming a pure learner. Through this irony Byron mocks at the society where “love is taught hypocrisy from youth.”
In the brilliant description of the characters of Donna Julia and Donna Inez, Byron satire upon the hypocrisy of women. Though Donna Inez is a devoted Christian, we find that she had relationship with Alfonso before her marriage. Even she had good terms with Alfonso’s mistress to show her love for Alfonso. Even Donna Inez had tried to convince the physicians to prove her husband, Don Jose, as an insane. In the case of Donna Julia; though she is married and fully conscious about social, moral and religious law, she made physical relationship with Don Juan. One day when Alfonso come to investigate but fails to discover Juan. At this Julia harshly rebukes her husband for his baseless suspicion. Even to prove her innocence she pretends of weeping and goes into a fainting fir to declare her own innocence.
Byron also deliberately criticizes Robert Southey for his poetic attitude to introduce a new taste in poetry for public which rejects the poetry of Pope and Dryden. He also mocks at Wordsworth for his dimness in his poems and Coleridge for his immature metaphysics, and Plato for his mystified fantasies.
Byron does not attack mankind, but behavior of man which lacks reason and morality. Byron has criticizes the brutality, immortality, hypocrisy in man. But everywhere he has used wit, humor, irony as his tools to satirize them.

Critical appreciation of “Locksley Hall”

This poem was first published in 1842.The idea of this poem came to Tennyson from Sir william Jones’s prose translation of Moallakat, The seven Arabic poems hanging up in the temple of Mecca.  

The speaker of Locksley Hall wishes to release himself from the limitations of his present life. He thinks over possibilities not only about his own future but about that of the world. He speaks those famous verses of prophecy which seem to predict the coming of the airplane, of aerial fighting and the world war, the League of Nations and the U.N.O. everything goes with a faith that ultimately all will be well and Future progress is not so far away. The lines spoken in “Locksley Hall” have a “ring and swing”; they are firm, short, concise and memorable.

The lines in “Locksley Hall” are spoken by a desperately unstable character where two voices are audible. One of the voices is heavy with doubt and unbelief; It is the voices of “palsied heart..The jaundiced eye”. Perhaps the progress of science will not bring happiness, Just as knowledge doesn’t always bring wisdom. For the speaker himself, happiness might even involve a reversal progress, with its machinery and its literature, its inhibitions and frustrations. This dark side of the speaker’s mind, desperate at having loved and lost at and he finds himself also the victim of money-ridden society.

Tennyson was annoyed when his readers gave a biographical interpretation of the poem. According to Tennyson “Locksley Hall is an imaginary place and the hero is also an imaginary. The whole poem represents young life, its good side, its lacks, and its desire”.

Tennyson gives what he calls a “dramatic impression”, that a man who has returned to the Hall Where he had spent his child hood. Now he recalls the hopes of his youth, his frustrated dating, social injustice, the materialism of the age, his disappointment. He considers the possibility of escape from this civilization. But finally accepts the progress established upon scientific discovery, trade and cooperation.

When Tennyson emphasized, that this is not an unbiased opinion of history, but events viewed by a highly characterized individual naïve passionate, rebellious, complex and annoyed. Changing mood, He moves through stages of anger, bluster, excitement, determination and so on. The portrait is of an unbalanced and fragmented personality.

“In Locksley Hall, we met an unconfident modern youth who is depressed and confused by his own inability to face busy competition of ordinary English life.

Restlessness, boredom, impatience of monotonous life, set him dreaming of something like a new odyssey. But the hero of Locksley Hall is no Ulysses. The bonds of culture and luxury are too strong for him. The plan of adventure is abandoned as quickly as it is formed. He remains to support himself with the march of mind (progress) and the wonders of scientific discovery. The great and lasting success of Locksley Hall shows the power of genius in presenting an ordinary situation poetically. It can kindle up and transform common emotion and deals boldly with the facts and feeling of everyday life.

Some of the Nature-pictures in the poem are remarkable. For example “Orion sloping slowly to the west” and “the Pleiades, rising thro’ the mellow shade”. There is a beautiful simile in the comparison of the Pleiades with “a swarm of fire flies tangled in a silver braid”. The picture of the spring which brings new color and new feathers to the robin and the dove is lovely. Another beautiful picture occurs when the speaker refers to the tropical land where he would like to settle down. The metaphors contained in lines 31-34 of the poem have justifiably been praised.

You can avoid the group of words which has been highlighted in red color.

Interesting Interpretation of “The lotos Eaters”

 

The poem talks about idle happiness. But the question is whether the author is supporting it or allowing it, or he keeps it neutral as debatable.

One can logically comment that the purpose of the poem is to criticize a life of do-nothing leisure. Tennyson himself and his father were both hard workers. When Tennyson wrote the poem, many of the upper class people in England and the rest of Europe lived a life of leisure and they used their inherited lands to earn money and expend these money for fashions , parties etc.

Although Tennyson himself belonged to a noble family but his father had been disinherited.As a result, he(Tennyson's father) had to manage money to maintain his large family because Alfred was one of twelve Tennyson children. While Alfred was joining Cambridge University, his father died and that's why he had to return to help out. It was not the time of his fame as a poet. He had to work hard for his family.

After reading his background, It's natural to seem that Tennyson would annoy on an unproductive life of leisure. He may also have anger on the use of drugs and alcohol as means to escape reality because his father started to drink heavily when Alfred was a teenager.

On the other hand, one can comment that Tennyson was approving a leisurely life as a way of working which indicates the profession of England's lower and middle classes. In the industrial age of the early nineteenth century, many workers were spending long hours in factories, shops and offices. Life was so fast. Industrial city like London were crowed and smoky. Everyone seemed busy to put a coin in his pocket. Life was just as busy at sea. Ships were sailing to the Americans, the East indies, and elsewhere to expand commerce and build the empire.

Ulysses' crewmen speak of melancholy and even death as their friend because of their distaste to a life of toil, tension, and sea travel and Perhaps Tennyson's dissatisfaction with the direction of the British Empire.

It is also possible that Tennyson was trying to keep balance and that is "Too much leisure is bad, and too much work is equally bad"

Summary on Ulysses

Having bored in his home, Ulysses declares that there is no reason to stay at home with his old wife. He also thinks that it's valueless to receive rewards as a king and give punishment those unknown people who live in his kingdom.

Speaking to himself he declare that he feels bound to live here and no more want to rest and wishes to travel the sea. He also said that as a sailor he travelled the sea and wants to ideal for those who wants to wander and roam the earth. His travels have given him many opportunities to expose different type of people and ways of living. His experiences in the seas have exposed him in the "delight of battle" during fighting the Trojan War with his men. Ulysses asserts that his travels in the sea and his fight against the natural forces have formed who he is.

Ulysses declares that to stay in one place is boring and to remain motionless is to rust rather than shine. To him staying in one place is to pretend that there is nothing to do in life but simple acting of breathing. In fact he knows that life contains much novelty and he wishes to encounter this. His soul always searches for new experiences and he believes that these experiences will broaden his horizons.

Now Ulysses talks with an anonymous audience about his son Telemachus. According to Ulysses, his son will govern the island as his inheritor when the great hero resumes his travels in the terrible sea. He also speaks proudly that his son has capability to govern a reign. In a word, Telemachus will do his work of governing the island while Ulysses will do his work of traveling the seas.

In the final stanza, Ulysses addresses those mariners with whom he has worked, travelled over many years. He declares that although he and mariners are old now but they still have potential to do something noble and honorable. There is a possibility that angry bay may wash them down or their ships may land on happy island. Though they do not have the strength as they had in days of old, yet their spirit is still strong united by their heroic hearts. Their ultimate will is to straggle, to seek, to find and not to return. This proves Tennyson’s firm faith in man's unattainable will.

Critical summary on Locksley Hall by Tennyson

This poem is a wonderful creation of Tennyson which was published in 1842.

In the "Locksley Hall" the speaker shows "Locksley Hall" as young life and it also embodies moral aspect, lackness and thirst of new blood. This beautiful piece is nothing but a piece of fancy in which we get the idea about life of the author of the poem.

This dramatic monologue poem starts with sad because of the loss of his much loved cousin Amy.In fact, beyond the surface meaning, the poem contains notions of Victorian Age in which the poet lived. The speaker compares his loss of cousin with the loss of Victorian age which has lost his own artistic capability.

The speaker traces parental authority in the poem.The consequence of parental authority is uttered through pitiful misconception by making of irritable scenery which replicates the anguish. For example-The speaker displays his depression without expectation of spring. Imagery used ,with the reference of Orion and Pleiades, which shine in spring and winter are omitted by speakers depressed mood.

The images which hold the poem are the brutality of time and its rapidity and according to the poet , these elements destroy the relationship between lovers and lovers creative capability. Here, the symbol, harp which creates harmony is devastated. The loss of love makes comprehend and doubt the speaker about his fate when father of Amy forces her to marry a guy, whom her father seems perfect.

The speaker states that suicide is the only solution to escape from depressive condition. The speaker states that suicide is the only solution to escape from depressive condition. His thoughtfulness drives from individual to society. To him the harm of the effect indicates one aspect of social injustice. The speaker's consciousness over the social awareness offer him a new dream of future.

At the end of the poem, the speaker's mind remains with psychological problem through self-confidence which also indicate social progress that means spring is not so far away.

Q: Keats as an avid reader of Greek civilization – discuss it.

Shelley expressed the opinion that “Keats was a Greek”. But actually Keats was a representative of Greek civilization. The Greek spirit came to Keats through literature, Greek sculpture, mythology etc. that made Keats as an avid reader of Greek civilization.
Keats was born in such a house where the environments were not favorable to be a Greek passionate reader. He was not a Greek by education. His knowledge of Greek literature was come from the English translation only. There was also nothing of Greek culture in his tradition. But he was desperately portrayed everything that was Greek. That shows “Greekness in his mind”.
His famous sonnet “On first looking into Chapman’s Homer” Keats said that Homer, the blind epic poet of ancient Greek, came to Keats through Chapman’s translation. He says that his intellectual sphere was widened by Homeric poetry. No poet has been able to capture the spirit of ancient Greek poetry as Keats did.
His famous poem “Ode on Grecian Urn”, is directly inspired by the Greek sculpture which Keats saw in British museum. By giving us the imagery of the carvings on the urn, Keats was not thinking of a single urn but of Greek sculpture in general. Keats had sympathy for the Greek mind. This ode shows the full force of Greek influence in Keats works.
Towards the creations of Greek mythology Keats was attracted by their beauty, and a natural sympathy with the imagination that created them. We find the use of Greek myth in his poem “Ode to Psyche” where he became a great worshiper of Psyche, one of the Goddess in Greek Myth. His other poems such as “Endymion” and “Hyperion” he had borrowed subjects from Greek mythology.
Above all, he was a Greek on account of his passion for beauty. The Greeks were lovers of beauty. The beauty that Keats found through his imagination which was sensuous to him. For Keats to see things in their beauty is to know the whole truth about them. As he says –
“Beauty is truth, truth beauty that is all,
Ye know no earth, and all ye need to know.”

Q: Describe Keats notion of “negative capability” and apply this theory in one/two of his poems.

Negative capability is a phrase mostly used by the English poet John Keats means the capability of negating oneself. This can be possible when the character of the poet is not confirmed, when he has no ego, not any philosophy. The character of the poet should be flexible rather than confirmed.
As John Keats made up the phrase in the letter written to his brothers George and Thomas –
"I mean Negative Capability, that is when man is capable of being in uncertainties,Mysteries, doubts, without any irritable reaching after fact and reason."
As we know that John Keats life was full of sufferings; his mother’s death, Tom’s death, his own ill-health, the faithlessness of Fanny, financial difficulties, his fierce criticism as a poet by the reviewers of his time, etc. But his poetry does not show all these sorrows. To find these effects we have to read his poems carefully and deeply.
Keats’ odes are best example of this capability. In “Ode on a Grecian Urn” Keats avoids personal statements in his narration, rather choosing to focus on imagery instead of the impact of the imagery, and allows the urn to communicate its message to create a poem without self-interest, achieving negative capability. As the poet says in the second stanza:

"Forever wilt thou love, and she be fair!"

Here, the speaker comes closest to personal involvement as he empathizes with these characters, but even here the focus remains on the image and not on the image’s effect. This quality is related to the concept of beauty. The ability of discovering beauty in everything overpowers all other considerations. As the poet says-

‘Beauty is truth, truth Beauty’ – that is all
Ye know on earth and all ye need to know.'

In another “Ode to Autumn” the poet merges himself with the spirit of Autumn. He becomes in turn a reaper who is sitting in the granary floor, or as a gleaner. The poet finds pleasure in light as well as in shade. He does not care for spring when he treats of autumn. As he says-

“Think not of them, thou hast thy music too.”

Keats attached great importance to imagination, as Coleridge attached importance t fancy. The negative capability of a true poet is not the result of any intellectual process; it is the result from imagination. Keats was always suspicious of reason; he believed n imagination alone. It was with the help of his rich imagination that he could make his poems spontaneous.

Assignment On “Ode on Indolence” written by John Keats

This assignment has been published for those who are really interested about Keats’ poem. I made this assignment for the course which I finished the 5th semester named romantic literature II.The assignment has been given below.

The Ode on Indolence is one of five odes which are composed by English poet John Keats in the spring of 1819.The other are “Ode on a Grecian Urn”,”Ode on Melancholy”,”Ode to a Nightingale” and “Ode to Psyche”. Here is an attempt to give an interpretation about “the ode on Indolence” In two ways which has been given below.

First Interpretation

Bad health and misfortune harassed John keats’ life from his birth in 1795.Afterwards his parents died his early life and beside his health became worst that assured him an early death. He continued to write poetry throughout his short-lived life to illustrate his inner most anguish that came as a result of unrequited love and his coming death.

In Ode on indolence, the speaker confronts three figures on marble urn which attempt to lure him away from his sprit less life which is full of indolence and the speaker identifies those three figures as love, ambition, and poesy. Later the speaker, abandoning his praise for peaceful indolence, becomes greatly interested by these three figures and before his willingness to follow the three figures, he changes his mind and then rejects these very desires. In the ode, the speaker says,

“Vanish, ye phantoms! From my idle spright,

Into the clouds, and never more return!”

In this ode, Keats utilizes the speaker’s dilemma to convey his agonizing frustration that made reach him the inevitability of death and he is no longer interested to earthly life. Keats’ vivid word choice throughout the poem follows the narrators conflicting desires towards Love, Ambition, and Poesy. These conflicting desires ultimately come to represent keats’ own aspiration to avoid everything because they make the inevitable dying process far more difficult.

Second Stanza

How is it, shadows, that I knew ye not?

How came ye muffled in so hush a masque?

“Was it a silent deep-disguised plot

To steal away, and leave without a task

My idle days? Ripe was the drowsy hour;

Pain had no sting, and pleasure’s wreath no flower.

O, why did ye not melt, and leave my sense

Unhaunted quite of all but- nothingness?”

In the second stanza the narrator states “the blissful cloud of summer-indolence benumb’d my eyes; my pulse grew less and less; Pain had no sting, and pleasure’s wreath no flower.” In this line keats’ depicts his own experience in his final years. In this “blissful cloud of indolence” he conveys that the pain and frustration that comes with life can be avoided simply by evading the aspects of life. A life of indolence doesn’t allow for a life of ache because nothing is present to cause pain. In the fourth stanza, the speaker states:

“They faded, and, the forsooth! I wanted wings:

O folly! What is Love? Where is it?

And for that poor Ambition-it springs

From a man’s little heart’s short fever-fit;

For poesy!-no, -she has not a joy, -

At least for me, - so sweet as drowsy noons.

And evening steep’d in honied indolence;

O, for an age so shelter’d from annoy,

That I may never know how change the moons,

Or hear the voice of busy common-sence!”

The speaker denounces his earlier desire to follow the love, Ambition, and poesy because he reasons that love is momentary and short-lived, ambition ultimately leaves a man disappointed, and poesy has nothing to offer that compares with an indolent summer day. For example , in the ode the speaker says,

For poesy! –no,-she has not a joy,-

Atleast for me,-so sweet as drowsy noons.

In the end, the speaker bids them adieu and decides to spend his days in indolence. However, if the poem is read as the final poem in the 1819 ode series,” Ode on indolence” suggests that Keats is resigned to giving up his career as a poet because poetry can’t give him the immortality that he wanted from it. Ironically, the poem provided Keats with such immortality.

Another interpretation

Ode on indolence was probably the second ode and it was composed in the spring of 1819 after “Ode on Melancholy” and a few months before “To Autumn”. However, when the odes are grouped together as a sequence, “Indolence” is often placed first in the group. This arrangement makes sense because Indolence raises the glimmering idea which explored more clearly in the other five odes.

Ode on indolence holds that the pleasant numbness of the speaker’s indolence is more preferable state than the more excitable states of love, ambition, and poetry. One of the great themes of Keats’s odes is the anguish of mortality - the pain and frustration caused by the changes and endings inevitable in human life which are contrasted throughout the poem with the permanence of art. In this Ode, the speaker’s indolence seems an attempt to forget this real world so that the “short fever-fit” of life seems no longer so agonizing. The speaker rejects love and ambition simply because they require him to experience his own life too intensely and hold the inevitable promise of ending. In terms of love, the speaker wonders what and where it is and in terms of ambition, he notes that “the pale cheek” and “fatigued eye” and observe that it springs directly from human mortality. On the other hand, poetry is not mortal and changeable. In fact, poesy is a demon. But it is a curse towards indolence and it also demand to the speaker to feel his life too acutely. Thus poetry has no joy for the speaker as sweet as indolence.

For poesy! –no,-she has not a joy,-

Atleast for me,-so sweet as drowsy noons.

Though the poem ends on a note of rejection, once the speaker’s impassioned indicate that he will have to raise his head eventually and confront Love, Ambition, and Poesy more directly.

Then faced, and to follow them I burn’d

And ached for wings, because I knew the three;

The first was a fair Maid, and Love her name;

The second was Ambition, pale of cheek.

And ever watchful with fatigued eye;

The last, whom I love more, the more of blame

I knew to be my demon poesy.

In this ode, we get some idea about odes which are coming eventually. Many of the ideas and images in “ode on indolence” anticipate more developed ideas and images in the later odes. For example: the portrait of summer landscape, with it’s “stirring shades/and baffled beams” anticipates the aesthetic numbness of “ode to a nightingale” and the anguish numbness of “Ode to a Melancholy”; the birdsong of the “throstle’s lay” anticipates the nightingale and the swallows of “To Autumn”. The Grecian dress of the figures and their urn-like procession anticipates the “Ode on a Grecian urn”. So, if we consider this poem as the first of those very five odes, then it is plain to us that this poem is the anticipation of later odes.

However, Interpretation can differ from person to person but it’s true that it’s another wonderful creation of John Keats’ and it’s beyond the question. Many critics praise this poem for its structurally infirm. Such as Walter Event wrote that “it is unlikely that the ‘Ode on Indolence’ has ever been anyone’s favorite poem, but it is repetitious and declamatory and structurally infirm, and these would be reasons enough”