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For Wednesday: Keats, The Eve of St. Agnes

William Holman Hunt, Romeo and Juliet 

Keats' poem, The Eve of St. Agnes, is like his own version of The Rime of the Ancient Mariner if he married it to a half-remembered version of Romeo and Juliet. In fact, you might think of this poem as Shakespeare as retold by the Romantics, since many elements of Romeo and here (forbidden love, two young lovers, an old nurse maid who assists them, even an old priest who watches over them), but the actual romance, and the background of the story, couldn't be more different than Shakespeare. But it sounds very familiar to those who have read The Rime!

These questions cover the entire poem, but feel free to stop somewhere in the middle if you're having trouble with it.  

Answer TWO of the following, even though I gave you five this time:

Q1: Keats, like Coleridge, tries to create the feel of an ancient poem set in a quasi-medieval world using words like "sooth" and "amort." Yet the poem still sounds utterly different than Coleridge's. What makes the poem 'sound' different? If this poem was a style of music, what would it sound like, based on the rhymes and the style?

Q2: Works of art in the poem are often described as frozen, cold, twisted, pained, and imprisoned, as in "The sculptur'd dead, on each side, seem to freeze,/Emprison'd in black, purgatorial rails" (II, 205) and "The music, yearning like a God in pain" (VII, 206).  Why does Keats portray works of art in such stark terms? What makes artwork 'dead' or 'tortured'? Would Wordsworth agree? 

Q3: The lover, Porphyro, wants to steal into Madeline's chamber and "gaze and worship all unseen" (VIII, 207). Indeed, he spends most of the poem staring and "peeping" at her rather than ever trying to talk with her, or woo her in a more formal manner. Why is this? Why would Keats risk making his lover such a creep? Is this supposed to be a romantic poem of love, or something more sinister?

Q4: When Madeline finally opens her eyes on St. Agnes' Eve and sees Porphyro, why is she disappointed? She clearly was dreaming about him, so why does she tell him, "how chang'd thou art! how pallid, chill, and drear!"(XXXV 214). How does the reality fall short of her dream? 

Q5: Even though this poem lacks a frame narrative, and sounds like it's taking place right in the moment, Keats later tells us, "And they are gone, aye, ages ago/These lovers fled away into the storm" (XLII, 215). Why does he shift the poem into the distant past, and make what seems like a vivid drama an old fairy tale? Is this similar to what Coleridge does with his frame story? 

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