Ode to a Nightingale

Ode to a Nightingale (Critical Appreciation)

Written in May 1819, many believe Keats’ “Ode to a Nightingale” to have been written at the home of Charles Brown, when Keats sat and listened to the bird in the garden for some hours. In form this poem is a “regular ode”. There is a uniformity of the number of lines and of the rhyme-scheme in all the stanzas. Anyway this is more complex poem than "Ode to Autumn," consisting of eight stanzas and is a little more irregular in structure. Each stanza is rhymed ABABCDECDE. We cannot ‘name an English poem of the same length which contains so much beauty as this ode”. It is mostly about a melancholic figure that seems to find a little solace when hearing a Nightingale sing.

Four of Keats’s odes, “Ode to a Nightingale”,” Ode on a Grecian Urn”, “Ode on Melancholy”, and “Ode to Autumn” should be studied together. They were all written in 1819 and the same train of thought runs through them all. One can even say that these four odes sum up Keats’s philosophy.

A Masterpiece:-

“Ode to a Nightingale” shows the ripeness and maturity of Keats’s poetic faculty. This poem is truly a masterpiece, showing the splendour of Keats’s imagination on its pure romantic side, and remarkable also for its note of reflection and meditation. The central idea here is the contrast of the joy and beauty and apparent permanence of the nightingale’s song with the sorrows of human life and the transitoriness of beauty and love in this world. The transience of life and the tragedy of old age ("where palsy shakes a few, sad, last gray hairs, / Where youth grows pale, and spectre-thin, and dies") is set against the eternal renewal of the nightingale's fluid music. "Thou wast not born for death, immortal bird!".
Then with a splendid sweep of imagination he sees the bird and the song one. ‘The bird becomes pure song and inherits the eternity of beauty.’
‘Thou was not born for death, immortal bird,
No hungry generation: tread thee down.
The Cuckoo becomes a wandering voice for Wordsworth and turns this world into an idealistic one. In the “Immortality ode” Wordsworth passes from the finite to the infinite.
Development of Thought:-
Throughout the poem there is an overwhelming allusion to a drugged state, the opening two lines show this perfectly:
"My heart aches, and a drowsy numbness pains
My sense, as though of hemlock I had drunk." Other references to hallucinogenic substances include: "opiate" "draught of vintage" "Bacchus" the Greek god of wine, and the want to "drink, and leave the world unseen."
However, the character in the poem rejects such ideas and prefers the "viewless wings of Poesy,”. It is clear that the character is deeply melancholic as he says "I have been half in love with easeful Death" clearly showing the state of mind of the character.
It is with the possibility of the connection to nature that the character finds some little relief, gripping on to a fragility of beauty. The singing nightingale stirs thoughts of ages gone by where "emperor and clown" had perhaps "found a path in life" upon which to continue.
At the end of the poem it seems the character although touched by the beauty of the "high requiem" of the bird remains in a state of confusion "Do I wake or sleep?" is the final lines of the poem, though it seems that with the departing of the nightingale he is jolted abruptly back from his musings.
Melancholy and the Note of Pessimism:-
A passionate melancholy broods over the whole poem. The passage describing the sorrows and misfortunes of life is deeply pessimistic. The world is full of weariness, fever, and fret, and the groans of suffering humanity. Palsy afflicts the old and premature, death overtakes the young. To think here is to be full of sorrow; both beauty and love are short-lived.

Reason for the Poet’s Despondency:-

Keats wrote this poem shortly after the death (from consumption) of his brother Tom to whom he was deeply attached. He was also perhaps thinking of the premature death of Elizabeth Taylor. He was therefore weighed down by a profound sense of the tragedy of life; and of that sense of tragedy, this poem is a poignant expression.

Desire to Die:-

The note of pessimism is found also in the lines where the poet expresses a desire to die, “to cease upon the midnight with no pain”. When we remember that Keats actually died a premature death, we realise the note of unconscious prophecy in these lines, which for this reason become still more pathetic.

Sorrows of Life in General; and the Personal Grief:-

The passionately personal and human character of this poem is thus obvious. It reveals Keats’s sense of the tragedy of human life in general and his sense of personal suffering in particular. The poem brings before our eyes a painful picture of the sorrows and grief of human life, and at the same time it conveys to us the melancholy and sadness which had afflicted Keats for various reasons. The poem is the cry of a wounded soul.

Rich Sensuousness and Pictorial Quality:-

The poem is one of the finest examples of Keats’s pictorial quality and his rich sensuousness. We have an abundance of rich, concrete, and sensuous imagery. The lines in which the poet expresses a passionate desire for some Provencal wine or the red wine from the fountain of the Muses has a rich appeal:
“O for a draught of vintage, that hath been
Cool’d a long age in the deep-delved earth,
Tasting of Flora and the country green,
Dance, and Provencal song, and sun-burnt mirth!”

These lines bring before us a delightful picture of Provence with its fun and frolic, jollity, merry-making, drinking and dancing. Similarly, the beaker full of the sparkling, blushful Hippocrene is highly pleasing. Then there is the magnificent picture of the moon shining in the sky and surrounded by stars, looking like a queen surrounded by her attendant fairies:

“And haply the Queen-Moon is on her throne. Cluster’d around by all her starry Fays.” The rich feast of flowers that awaits us in the next stanza is one of the outstanding beauties of the poem. Flowers, soft incense, the fruit trees, the white hawthorn, the eglantine, the fast-fading violets, the coming musk-rose full of sweet juice—all this is a delight for our senses.

Apart from these sensuous pictures, there is also the vivid and pathetic image of Ruth when, sick for home, she stood tearful amid the alien corn. This is a highly suggestive picture calling up many associations to the mind of one who is acquainted with the Bible.

Lyric Intensity:-

The poem is a beautiful example of lyrical poetry. The poem opens with a passionate feeling of joy akin to the benumbing effect of some drug. This is followed by a passionate desire for wine. Then comes a passionate melancholy born of the spectacle of sorrow in this world. Next is the passionate delight in flowers and blossoms, followed by and passionate desire for death. The lyrical intensity of this ode is, indeed, one of the reasons of its greatness as poetry.

Style:-

The poem is written in a superb style. Keats here shows consummate skill in a choice of words and in making original and highly expressive phrases. Certain phrases, expressions and lines continue to haunt the mind of the readers long after he has read the poem. The phrase “the blushful Hippocrene” which refers to the fountain of the Muses and its red wine looking like the blushing cheeks of a pretty girl is indeed beautiful. Again, this wine has beaded bubbles “winking at the brim”. The word “winking” here means sparkling but how much more is suggested by this word! The bubbles seem to be inviting a man to the wine as a girl’s wink would invite him to her company. Another expressive phrase is “purple-stained mouth”, that is, a mouth which has been stained red by wine.

Romantic Character of the Poem:-

“Ode to a Nightingale” is a highly romantic poem. Its romanticism is due to (a) its rich sensuousness, (b) its note of intense desire and its deep melancholy, (c) its suggestiveness, (d) its sweet music, and its fresh and original phrases. Two lines in the poem represent the high water-mark of pure romanticism:
“The same that oft-times hath
Charm’d magic casements, opening on the foam
Of perilous seas, in faery lands forlorn.”
The touch of the supernatural, the mystery, and above all the suggestiveness of these lines have made them a test by which purely romantic poetry can be judged and measured.

Conclusion:-In short, this poem is a watermark in romantic poetry. The emotion throughout is the emotion of beauty. There is a Shakespearian felicity of expression and excellent use of the epithets and picturesque compounds. The poet also establishes a connection between pleasure and pain and life and death. The nature of the poem is sensuous but that aestheticism grows intellectual.