A Bitter Harvest: Comparing the Autumn of Keats' and Holderin
Kaitlyn Park
CMLT 2220
Flemming
4 November, 2012
A Bitter Harvest: Comparing the Autumn of Keats’ and Holderlin In an initial reading of John Keats “To Autumn” and Friedrich Holderlin’s “Half of Life”, it may appear to the audience that the two poets are ruminating on two completely different topics. The poets significantly differ in their manipulation of imagery to portray autumn. Keats personifies the season into a goddess that brings the joy of harvest, and then consumes the last of its bounty as winter approaches. Holderlin however only portrays the beauty of the season and the great loss he feels in the wake of its end. Yet both poets capture the feeling of loss and isolation in the coming winter, Holderlin concluding with an image of this bleakness, and Keats resolving to find hope in the coming of spring. Through the use of tone and imagery Holderlin and Keats are both attempting to convey their response to the season of autumn and the inevitability of the cycles of nature, but Holderlin leaves his audience feeling the alienation he is experiencing in the coming of winter, while Keats provides a remedy to find solace and hope knowing that the stark winter itself must end. In the first stanza of both Keats’ “To Autumn” and Holderlin’s “Half of Life” both poets use heavy imagery to portray an autumn of bounty and beauty. Keats personifies Autumn, making it appear a “close bosom-friend” of the sun, who “conspires” with him to bring the world a bountiful harvest. Holderlin also describes this abundance, noting the “yellow pears/ And wild roses everywhere”. Both poets describe an almost gluttonous cornucopia; Keats describes apples that bend the trees, swollen gourds, and plump shells, and Holderlin pronounces the harvest appearing “everywhere” and the shore being so full it “hangs into the lake”. However, despite the vast fruit and foliage, both poets close the stanza by expressing a feeling of doubt, or impending doom, despite the beauty abound,
CMLT 2220
Flemming
4 November, 2012
A Bitter Harvest: Comparing the Autumn of Keats’ and Holderlin In an initial reading of John Keats “To Autumn” and Friedrich Holderlin’s “Half of Life”, it may appear to the audience that the two poets are ruminating on two completely different topics. The poets significantly differ in their manipulation of imagery to portray autumn. Keats personifies the season into a goddess that brings the joy of harvest, and then consumes the last of its bounty as winter approaches. Holderlin however only portrays the beauty of the season and the great loss he feels in the wake of its end. Yet both poets capture the feeling of loss and isolation in the coming winter, Holderlin concluding with an image of this bleakness, and Keats resolving to find hope in the coming of spring. Through the use of tone and imagery Holderlin and Keats are both attempting to convey their response to the season of autumn and the inevitability of the cycles of nature, but Holderlin leaves his audience feeling the alienation he is experiencing in the coming of winter, while Keats provides a remedy to find solace and hope knowing that the stark winter itself must end. In the first stanza of both Keats’ “To Autumn” and Holderlin’s “Half of Life” both poets use heavy imagery to portray an autumn of bounty and beauty. Keats personifies Autumn, making it appear a “close bosom-friend” of the sun, who “conspires” with him to bring the world a bountiful harvest. Holderlin also describes this abundance, noting the “yellow pears/ And wild roses everywhere”. Both poets describe an almost gluttonous cornucopia; Keats describes apples that bend the trees, swollen gourds, and plump shells, and Holderlin pronounces the harvest appearing “everywhere” and the shore being so full it “hangs into the lake”. However, despite the vast fruit and foliage, both poets close the stanza by expressing a feeling of doubt, or impending doom, despite the beauty abound,