Imagery in Ode on Melancholy

Imagery in Ode on Melancholy

Lyrical Poetry

Lyrical poetry:

• A form of poetry which does not involve characters or a plot, but usually deals with feelings and their complex evolution 
• now commonly associated with the lyrics to a song
• were written to be accompanied by the lyre
• expresses subjective, personal point of view
• usually in the form of ode or sonnet; a short poem 

On the word 'melancholy'

The word 'melancholy' comes from medieval times when people's moods were thought to come from 'humors', which deteremined a person's behavior. A depressed person was thought to have too much 'melancholy', which was literally black bile secreted by the spleen. 

Therefore we can deduce that melancholy is the highest state of depression, the harshest feeling of loneliness and negligence. 

Interesting passages 

'pale forehead': after reading 'La Belle Dame Sans Merci', the word 'pale' has acquired a new connotation, associated with death.

On the other hand, i find interesting the first line:
'NO, no, go not to Lethe': Lethe is the River of Forgetfulness in the Underworld, and the line sounds like a plea from the narrator asking somebody not to indulge in the nihilistic process of self-destruction that often comes hand in hand with forgetfulness... Alcohol?

Stanza imagery 

Stanza One

This image represents in my mind the feeling of melancholy expressed in the first stanza: the contemplation of the unknown, the sorrow, the romantic loneliness and the sadness of it all. 

'No, no, go no to Lethe'

The line refers to the fact that forgetfulness should not be an option, but its association with alcohol surges from the fact that it is a timeless recipe for melancholy.

'For shade to shade will come too drowsily, And drown the wakeful anguish of the soul.'

 I chose this image because it conveys the message of the line: even if anguish is what is in your soul, it is better to have one and experience and live the pain; it shows that agony and distress are not the source of calamity, but an instance of life. An optimistic line.

Stanza 2

This image rounds up the whole concept of the stanza: the romantic narrator's suggestion of taking in nature even 'when the melancholy fit shall fall sudden from haven like a weeping cloud', and healing melancholy with Mother Nature. 

'Or on the rainbow of the salt sandwave'

This image represents Keats' concept of transience: beauty is not everlasting, nothing lasts forever; life is too short to let melancholy ruin the moment. 

What also caught my attention is that Keats puts forward as a solution to the 'melancholy fit' immediate, transient things in nature: 'a morning rose', 'the rainbow of the salt sand-wave', 'the wealth of the globed peonies'. Keats satiates or rather gets rid of the melancholy through the appreciation of temporary elements of nature. However, this beauty is not unique: Keats knows that these ephemeral miracles of nature happen constantly, so personally here I get confused... Keats is concerned with the volatility of things and their briefness, yet nature's cycle spins, so that after death comes rebirth, and so on... Beauty in nature is eternally dying and resurrecting- We should seek consolation in Nature, not in flesh and transient things. 

This is reinforced in the last line 'feed deep, deep upon her peerless eyes': Keats suggests that we should  'feed' upon the eyes. The eyes are a mirror  of the soul, they reflect passions and emotions. Keats does not crave the earthly or the mundane, he seeks the transcendental, the eternal, the soul.

Stanza 3 

'And in the very Temple of Delight
 veil'd Melancholy has her sovran shrine,
Though seen of none save him whose strenuous tongue
can burst Joy's grape against his palate fine'  
 

I chose this image to represent the idea behind these lines because it depicts the concept of eternal and inevitable toil. Even at the heart of what is purest lies sorrow and grief, and only he who can find whats really pure will find real grief... Ying Yang.

'And Joy, whose hand is ever at his lips bidding adieu'

This painting by Edvard Munch reflects the sorrow of the line: Joy is momentary, brief, fleeting; the menace of goodbye is always present, as real as Joy.