Understanding Ode on A Grecian Urn

Understanding Ode on a Grecian Urn

Task 1:

a) There are several elements in the poem, which I could understand them clearly after designing the urn. It's a way to represent visually what is written. For instance, now I can see the images and the synesthesia physically and understand them correctly, especially the one of the lovers and the fact that he cannot kiss her as described in "Bold Lover, never, never canst thou kiss". 

   Furthermore, I could understand the language better as I had to look down and select certain words and then apply them to our urn. 

  Sounds were also clearer once we made the urn, as the "unheard" melodies, understanding this paradox in a precise way. 

   b) There are some questions that I asked myself after making the urn. For example, I wonder how would Keats’ make his own urn after writing "Ode on a Grecian Urn"? Or how did he imagined it? Would he include the same elements as we did? 

  Also, was he reflecting his existence when talking about death in "When old age shall this generation waste"? We can assume this as it talks about the destruction of a new generation. 

c) Two of the most important skills that we needed in the making of the urn were artistic and comprehension skills as we had to understand the poem, then select certain words from it and then apply them creatively to the urn. 

Task 2:

Notes:

• The poem presents a man talking and looking down to an urn, describing its shape and decorations. 
•    The four last verses of the first stanza are questions, which are stimulated by Keats’ imagination as "What pipes and timbrels? What wild ecstasy?" Imagination is the most powerful skill or Romanticism. Romantics believed that the world behaves because of the imagination of people. 
•    The last two verses of the third stanza show how life is change and how physical things can change as "burning forehead" and "a parching tongue".
•    Close to the end, Keats has a new perspective created by the meditation of the urn. 

Stanza One: 

Thou still unravish'd bride of quietness,

       Thou foster-child of silence and slow time,

Sylvan historian, who canst thus express

       A flowery tale more sweetly than our rhyme:

What leaf-fring'd legend haunts about thy shape

       Of deities or mortals, or of both,

               In Tempe or the dales of Arcady?

       What men or gods are these? What maidens loth?

What mad pursuit? What struggle to escape?

               What pipes and timbrels? What wild ecstasy?

Why is the urn compared to a " still unravish'd bride"?

• "still" has two meanings - "motionless" or "remaining in time". Time and motion are two concepts that the poem explores throughout.
• "unravish'd" means unspoiled - a bride yet to lose her virginity; similarly, the urn and the scenes it represents are "unspoiled" by the passage of time.

Explain the term "sylvan historian"(l.3)

• The urn is a "Sylvan historian" because it records scenes from a culture lived long ago (ancient greeks); and because it is bordered with leaves, as well as having scenes of the countryside within.
• Is it paradoxical that the urn, a "bride of quietness", can tell its stories "more sweetly than our rhyme" (meaning the poem itself)?
• The gentleness of the term "sylvan historian" and his "flowery tale" told "sweetly" do not prepare us for the wild sexuality of lines 8-10. (Another contrast!)

What change in viewpoint occurs in lines 8-10?

• The short questions and frequent repetitions inject pace into the poem. Notice how the speaker moves from contemplative observer to emotionally-involved participant with these breathless questions. (We have another contrast - that of the participant vs the observer). You may want to think about how I develop this idea throughout, and what it might suggest about the audience's relationship with "Art" in general...

Stanza two:

In lines 1-4 I contrast the ideal (in art, love, and nature) and the real - the "heard melodies"; which does my speaker seem to prefer at this point? How can you tell?

Heard melodies are sweet, but those unheard

       Are sweeter; therefore, ye soft pipes, play on;

Not to the sensual ear, but, more endear'd,

       Pipe to the spirit ditties of no tone:

      In these verses, the reader prefers the unreal rather than the real. Art, nature and love are portrayed precisely in this stanza, as the sound of the "soft" melodies from the pipes is combined with the beauty of nature. The music reaches the readers as a "sweet" melody. The ideal is represented with the words "spirit" and "endear'd". At the beginning, the reader may think that the urn is something empty that can't be given any interpretation. However, it ends up representing several themes as life and death.
     Instead, the reality of the poem is seen as something too superficial or without any meaning nor feelings. The urn may be seen as something material, which is definitely not one of the aims of Romanticism. 

Is the idea of unheard pipes an oxymoron?

    Oxymoron is a figure of speech in which two opposite ideas are joined to create an effect. The words "unheard pipes" is a clear example of an oxymoron as it contrasts the idea of ideal versus reality. It describes a musical instrument, which would normally emit sound, as something silent. This oxymoron reflects the speaker's ambivalence towards what he feels. 

In lines 5-10 we begin to sense a negative undercurrent to the ideal, to frozen time. How do I use language to help convey this negativity?

Fair youth, beneath the trees, thou canst not leave

       Thy song, nor ever can those trees be bare;

               Bold Lover, never, never canst thou kiss,

Though winning near the goal yet, do not grieve;

       She cannot fade, though thou hast not thy bliss,

               For ever wilt thou love, and she be fair!

      The second stanza of the poem portrays a sense of a negative atmosphere to the ideal, to frozen time, mainly expressed in the language used. 
      The poet starts to portray the adversity of love in his life and the frustration he feels. The words "canst not", and the repetition of the word "never" help to support this idea, the things that never happened in his life and will possibly never happen in a future life. The phrase "Never canst thou kiss" reflects this idea, that he cannot kiss her as he is frozen in time. 
     The idea of the "sweetly" "flowery tale" expressed in the first stanza is not present in this stanza anymore.
    The man lying "beneath the trees" reflects immortality as his music is "unheard", therefore it's not affected by the passing of time, which appears to be frozen.