Keats' last poem:This Living Hand

怀抱花朵的孩子

This Living Hand

This living hand, now warm and capable
Of earnest grasping, would, if it were cold
And in the icy silence of the tomb,
So haunt thy days and chill thy dreaming nights
That thou wouldst wish thine own heart dry of blood
So in my veins red life might stream again,
And thou be conscience-calmed--see here it is--
I hold it towards you.

From: http://www.john-keats.com/phpboa ... der=asc&start=0

Note:
I have found this poem from John Keats Forum. it was written 1819-20. A perspective of death from the living, where the living might feel the force of the dead, and perhaps feel a little guilty. It's very different from any of his other poems.in this poem he sounds very menacing!
You can read many splendid comments from here

[ 本帖最后由 怀抱花朵的孩子 于 2006-5-26 17:15 编辑 ]

duessa

Keats's poems are always heavily sensuous, full of conflicts, especially those of life and death. Maybe it is the shadow of death that has provided him with a unique feeling towards this world and all its belongings. As for this poem, it's easier to understand to hear it in a drama. Somewhat shakespearean.

怀抱花朵的孩子

原帖由 duessa 于 2006-5-26 22:28 发表
Keats's poems are always heavily sensuous, full of conflicts, especially those of life and death. Maybe it is the shadow of death that has provided him with a unique feeling towards this world and  ...

You are right. But I can't agree with you wholly, cause I have found a problem about my reading on Keats. For example, when I am reading his Ode to a Nightingale, I will associate it with many things about Keats which I have read in his biographies and letters, I will unconsciously associate some of his lines with some of his special incidents, his brother's death, his engagement with Fanny Brawne and so on. I gradually realised that I am reading Keats biographily! Sometimes I asked myself what is more I can find from him.  I always try to approach him from another aspect, cause I believe that we can get more from such a great poet as Keats. But I have not find any other way to understand him. I have tried to find something from his critism , but I found the sources about it is so little that someone say any biogrophier have much more things to say about Negative Capability than Keats himself.
I am reading his long poem Endymion, but I found it very difficult , not difficult to undestand but to .....I don't kown how to say , maybe I want too more.

[ 本帖最后由 怀抱花朵的孩子 于 2006-5-28 15:46 编辑 ]

舞者

It feels to me, this is about rampaging offering and yearning of life force (be it love or otherwise), so powerful that it rivals and compares to the insurmountable force of haunting death.

It is force, rather than menace.  

Menace, perhaps is your association with your interpretation of death.  Death is neither good or menacing.  It is transformation, a change of form.

怀抱花朵的孩子

原帖由 舞者 于 2006-5-28 14:25 发表
It feels to me, this is about rampaging offering and yearning of life force (be it love or otherwise), so powerful that it rivals and compares to the insurmountable force of haunting death.

It i ...

Have you read what I wrote above? I said we can't read Keats biographily! Mybe this poem is too special for us and also for Keats himself!

舞者

原帖由 怀抱花朵的孩子 于 2006-5-28 15:16 发表


Have you read what I wrote above? I said we can't read Keats biographily! Mybe this poem is too special for us and also for Keats himself!

I have.  Perhaps you could consider re-writing it, which is the fastest way of improving your English writing.

怀抱花朵的孩子

原帖由 舞者 于 2006-5-28 15:20 发表


I have.  Perhaps you could consider re-writing it, which is the fastest way of improving your English writing.  

My English is so poor that can't be improved in a few days! You have to bear it!
You ask me to rewrite it , but you know it is difficult to find faults from your own writting? What should I do with that?

[ 本帖最后由 怀抱花朵的孩子 于 2006-5-28 15:49 编辑 ]

duessa

According to the New Critic theories, one should focus on the text itself and nothing else. I think it is a very good approach. However, it does help us to get a better understanding if we can know something more, such as the backgrounds of the writer, of the time, etc. Only we should not be trapped by these things.
In this Keats's last poem there is an obvious shadow of death. Or the poet would not say "this LIVING hand". Facing the irresistible death (not necessarily one's own), on the one hand one must manage to bear it philosophically, on the other hand one is more keenly aware of all the beauty of this world and more unwilling to leave. I think maybe Edgar Allan Poe also feels this conflict another way round. Conflicts make poets.

怀抱花朵的孩子

原帖由 duessa 于 2006-5-28 23:05 发表
According to the New Critic theories, one should focus on the text itself and nothing else. I think it is a very good approach. However, it does help us to get a better understanding if we can know ...

So many people don't like or can't agree with New Critics, They think New Critics is too narrow, But I want to know how they read a poem on the text itself and nothing else especially, I have read many Broad Criticisms but little narrow ones like New Critics.

duessa

You can read Understading Poetry, by Cleanth Brooks and Robert Penn Warren, one of the most important books of the New Critic theories.