Why did I laugh tonight? No voice will tell by John Keats

nightele

Why did I laugh tonight? No voice will tell:  
     No god, no demon of severe response,  
     Deigns to reply from heaven or from hell.  
     Then to my human heart I turn at once —  
5   Heart! thou and I are here sad and alone;  
     Say, wherefore did I laugh! O mortal pain!  
     O darkness! darkness! ever must I moan,  
     To question heaven and hell and heart in vain!  
     Why did I laugh? I know this being's lease —  
10  My fancy to its utmost blisses spreads:  
     Yet could I on this very midnight cease,  
     And the world's gaudy ensigns see in shreds.  
     Verse, fame, and beauty are intense indeed,  
     But death intenser — death is life's high meed.

怀抱花朵的孩子

Many a biography says that:

While still in good health, Keats was ambitious of doing the world some good, instead of focusing on his own sensitive soul. Keats felt that the deepest meaning of life lay in the apprehension of material beauty, although his mature poems reveal his fascination with a world of death and decay.

There are so many Keats' poems that reveal his fascination with a world of death and decay.
I don't know how much individual's health condition can impact a poet's creation, but it do had a great impact on Keats' poems. But I still think there are sth more important lurking behind what we always focus on.

Keats felt that the deepest meaning of life lay in the apprehension of material beauty

I think this kind of philosophy can easily give a way to desperation, to fascination with a world of death and decay.
Keats was indeed different from all the other Romantic Poets. But I think there must be sth similar they all possess together.

[ 本帖最后由 怀抱花朵的孩子 于 2006-6-25 23:05 编辑 ]

nightele

原帖由 怀抱花朵的孩子 于 2006-6-25 23:01 发表
Keats was indeed different from all the other Romantic Poets. But I think there must be sth similar they all possess together

maybe everyone's experience wiil do?     the experience and the view of the world are diffierent but the desperation are the same?      the way they express themsleves are diffierent but the poems reveal their fascination with a world of death and decay

is it sth similar they all possess together?

怀抱花朵的孩子

原帖由 nightele 于 2006-6-26 04:57 发表


maybe everyone's experience wiil do?     the experience and the view of the world are diffierent but the desperation are the same?      the way they express themsleves are diffierent but the po ...

I am sorry. I am afraid you've absolutely misunderstood me.  The fascination with a world of death and decay is the most important difference between Keats and the other Romantic poets. There isn't any other Romantic poet who really paid a special attention upon death and decay like Keats.

what I want to say is that since they lived in the same epoch and were under the same influnce of the Great English literature convention, there must be some essential common grounds. So many pepole have pointed out the differences between every Romantic poets, and every great poet inevitablely have his/her own individual style and manner of writing. But I think we should find some associations between them and find some lurking clues in Romantic Movement.

[ 本帖最后由 怀抱花朵的孩子 于 2006-6-26 13:56 编辑 ]

nightele

en......yeah and that you said "some lurking clues in Romantic Movement." is ?

怀抱花朵的孩子

原帖由 nightele 于 2006-6-26 21:46 发表
en......yeah and that you said "some lurking clues in Romantic Movement." is ?

I don't have any clear thought about this subject.

But I know Keats paid very great respect to Wordsworth whose writting style was very different from his, and took this kind of respect as certainty, all the Romantic poets except Byron took Wordsworth as father and mental preceptor. This is not trifle but give a implication that Romantic Movement is not a word some later critic creat but a very serious Literature revolution and had great background.

What I've said seems like redundant nonsense, but I feel there are still too many things need to be discovered, and my knowledge is so poor, can not give any real revolutionary suggestion.

[ 本帖最后由 怀抱花朵的孩子 于 2006-6-26 23:46 编辑 ]

jakjak

what will you do when you lay in the hospital bed all day and your lunge doesnt allow you the breath to walk 10 yards? certainly your mind wanders, and safely its destination is world of death and after life. it is as difficult for a patient to remember his days of merry as for a man in summer to remember his colds days in winter.
keats made himself familiar with the theme of death. he wrote about it too often,but i believe, it was only the natural outcome of his poor health(like above) rather than anything else that craved him so.
keats profoundedly loved life. this love is deeper than the love byron showed in his worldy legends(though not wider in contents), more sincere than the love shelly showed in his lovers' words (notice keats never bothered himself with so many shelly's questions). it sees living, its definite ending and their co-existing, which composes life as a whole. when compeled to walk into the other shadow, keats did not fight back. death doesnt and cant conquer him. and he wouldnt win, either. it is a step in the circle. he walked it and was still walking on life. keats believed death was sweet, not that living painful, but life, the whole, greater. that is why even at his lowest, his poems are calm, graceful, full of love and dignity. can anyone entitle these qualities as pessimistic and decadent? had he lived a healthier and lengthier life, he would have been the merriest song bird, celebrating a world of splendid colors and overwhelming senses.  however, he lived short and miserable, therefore, he forwarded his hope from the world unable to grant it to another, odd and uncomprehended, also true and definite. is he a poem of death? he never said 'oh death you cannot conquer' (god konws when you speak it out, you are already on the losing track), or 'come come my beauty'(he was not that weary of living). all his poems celebrate  life, not the living pain nor the dying esctacy. eloit must have seen this quality of his and quite agreed with him.

怀抱花朵的孩子

原帖由 jakjak 于 2006-6-28 11:14 发表
what will you do when you lay in the hospital bed all day and your lunge doesnt allow you the breath to walk 10 yards? certainly your mind wanders, and safely its destination is world of death and  ...

Thank you for your comments, you've given us some original reviews about Keats. But I feel this subject is too complicated to explain with some words. I feel you are a little subjective, you've given so many  judgement but without the same quantity of testimonies. Maybe I am too scholasticism, but I do feel when we discuss so great a poet we shouldn't add too many our own colors, we should try to find some other things which we can ascertain.

I've read many comments on Keats, you can get some comments here there was a professor told her student that they shouldn't read Keats biographily. I feel so difficult to give you some further comments now. Maybe Maybe later I can give you some more detailed review on what you've said above.

Thank you so much! You are welcome to participate in our communications.

[ 本帖最后由 怀抱花朵的孩子 于 2006-6-28 12:21 编辑 ]

jakjak

yeah i quite agree that i am often personal about things
but these analysis stuff is horribly boring and suprisingly uninteresting.

i just believe it is more fun to say sth of your own than to quote others' words even though that other is byron or wordsworth. i dont mean of course to deny the classic good works. we need them, though i doubt how much.

wow, i really need to take a look at these all-you-need-to-learn-to-be-an-english-literature-maste books in summer holiday.

怀抱花朵的孩子

yeah i quite agree that i am often personal about things
but these analysis stuff is horribly boring and suprisingly uninteresting.

Uninteresting? maybe some of them are as you say. But most of the times I feel happy to read them cause I can get sth which I don't know or can not understand.

i just believe it is more fun to say sth of your own than to quote others' words even though that other is byron or wordsworth. i dont mean of course to deny the classic good works. we need them, though i doubt how much.

Yeah, to say sth of your own is more interesting, but I often felt myself so stupid and lack of basic criticism concept and need to learn from others.
I always think that Literature criticism is a very serious business, and have its own realms, I deeply honor The Great critics such as M.H.Abrams,  Matthew Arnold and so on.

[ 本帖最后由 怀抱花朵的孩子 于 2006-7-1 00:15 编辑 ]