Escapism of Keats

.Q: DISCUSS THE KEATS’ AS AN ESCAPIST. All Romantic poets more or less are escapists. Romantic poetry presents not the world of reality, but the world of dreams. Like all romantic poets, Keats longs to escape from the biter realities .But a careful study of his poetry reveals that his escapism is only a passing mood. Keats is better known as romantic escapist .In the “ode to a Nightingale” Keats fully expounds upon romantic escapism. He is pouring out his thoughts very beautifully and is longing for escape from the world full of strife, sadness and grief. While listening to and appreciating the sweetly sung song of the nightingale, Keats too, wishes to become like her so that he can fly away from the cruel world that has given him nothing else but pain. “… Fade far away, dissolve and quite forget … The weariness, the fever and the fret…” He tries to dip into or to fly to an ideal world of happiness, beauty, music and imagination forgetting his reality in the world. Keats’ wishes to escape with the help of poetic imagination but nothing else which his own word gives evidence, “Not charioted by Bacchus and his pards But on the viewless wings of poesy.” Keats repeatedly wishes to become like the nightingale whose melodious song is eternal and universal and soothes not only the mind but also the soul. He states that although he has no wings yet he would like to fly away on the viewless wings of Poesy. The poet thinks of forgetting his personal loss and suffering in life by drinking and sleeping under the influence of the liquor. He thinks that the sweet song of the nightingale is a sure testimony of the absolutely happy world of the bird. The poet therefore eagerly wants to escape from the life of reality, which has given him a surfeit of torment and misery in the form of ill health, failure in the poetic career and in love, and bereavement of a younger brother, and seek refuge in the forest world of the nightingale.His personal affections are also seen as part of the sad lot

of humanity as a whole. The general picture of malady is undeniably moving in its pitiful starkness: 'Here, where men sit and hear each... Then again, Keats expresses the desire to die an “easeful Death” so that he doesn’t have to bear the harsh realities of life. Also aware that he can’t become like the nightingale, who songs so melodiously, regardless of all the crisis in the world and whose beauty can’t be snatched away by passing time, Keats prefers death as a solution to his problems. When his illusion is broken; the poet comes back from his world of fancy into the real world, where he has to live and fight for his survival and Regrets that imagination has not the power to beguile him forever. He says “Forlorn! The very world is like a bell To toll me back from thee to my soul self! But Keats’ world of imagination remains only a short while. When he thinks that the Urn and the song of the nightingale will

Here he remembers the bitterness of his own life and reminds us that of our life. He considers that life is full of misery, sorrow and disease, of tiring struggle, of restlessness and pain; that life is nothing but a series of groans and complaints; that old men’s life is helpless and pitiful. Keats life-long creed is ‘A thing of beauty is a joy for ever’ (Endymion). So wherever he sees any beautiful picture or scenery or hears any attractive melody or song, he feels joy, and forgets his harsh reality, and becomes one with that, and thus he escapes. For examples, having seen a beautiful Urn in British Museum, he forgets his position, even he talks with the pictures depicted on the Urn, e.g. – Ah, happy, happy boughs that cannot shed Your leaves, nor ever bid the Spring adieu. In the “Ode on a Grecian Urn,” the poet takes us away from the world of time to the world of eternity. The imagination of the poet passes from the conceited form of beauty to the eternal spirit of beauty — that is, from the finite to the infinite. “Heard melodies are sweet, but those unheard Are sweeter; therefore, ye soft pipes, play on; Not to the sensual fear, but more endeared

Pipe to the spirit ditties of no tone.” Nevertheless, the world of fun which is the world of escapism has its drawbacks, asset is a “Cold Pastoral”. It has desolation and non-fulfillment. To sum up, we can confidently remark that Keats is essentially a poet of beauty and no one else, in pursuit of his life long aspired dream he enters sometime into a world which is not plausible regarding the standards of such a great poet, but his forgetfulness introduces him to the real meanings of life. He appreciates the beauty of art but he does not declare art as the ultimate finding of human struggle, with its beautified unrealistic presentation he also mentions its drawbacks. It is unsatisfied, cruel, though eternal world. Life is preferred by him in spite of all its transiteriness and flux. He declares loudly, “fancy cannot cheat well as it is fame to be”. This is what makes him a realist rather than an escapist.

it will be a gross injustice to consider Keats an escapist only on the basis of a single poem. Even if we take ode on a grecian urn only in consideration, it will soon be realised by us after a careful study of the ode that the poet is trying to objectify his primary idea regarding the difference between Nature and Work of Art, much like the greek philosophers who always thought that an Work of art cannot supersede Nature as it is a mere replication of nature. Work of art is always twice removed from the ideal and hence it has both its advantages and disadvantages. Time is captured/freezed in art while because of that very fact, there is neither any generation nor degeneration. In other words there is no palpable development in art whereas Nature seems to grow and change and engulf us all in its ever changing manifestations. #Escapism of Keats # Keats’ view of reality and imagination # Contrast between reality and imagination, between art and reality

he forgets his sorrow and joins the nightingale in spirit. This is the moment when nature with her moon and stars and flowers, enters into his soul and his soul is mergedin nature. Keats and nightingale are one, it is his soul that sings in the bird, and he sings. “Now more than ever seems it rich to die, To cease upon the midnight with no pain,

While thou art pouring forth thy soul abroad In such an ecstasy.” But Keats’ world of imagination remains only a short while. When he thinks that the Urn and the song of the nightingale will remain for ages but he will not, rather he is ‘forlorn’, he comes back to reality. He says in the last stanza of ‘Ode to a Nightingale’ – “Forlorn! The very would is like a bell To toll me back from thee to my sole self”. KEATS' PRESENTATION OF ROMANTIC ESCAPISM IN HIS POEMS John Keats is one of the most remarkable poets of English Literature. His poetry revolves around romanticism and idealism, bringing to the fore all his thoughts, ideas, experiences and desires.

In ‘Ode on a Grecian Urn’, Keats, seeing the pictures on the Urn, dissolves in them through imagination, as if he is with them who seem to be alive. Therefore, we see that Keats is so disgusted with the real life that he always tries to escape from it. Even he has no revolutionary concerns of the age in his poems, while other Romantic poets, e.g. Wordsworth, Shelley have eagerly greeted the revolutions and Byron deals with social problems. Though Keats’ escapism is individual, it sometimes becomes common, when we seek a suitable place to relieve from the bitterness of our life.