ODE ON A GRECIAN URN

John Keats

A ode is a lyrical form of poetry with a high theme. It takes the form of a prayer.

The two important words which bring the stresses are "Grecian urn" à archaic use of Greek.

The reader should be curious about the reason why addressing a poem to an urn.

This urn belong to ancient times.

The first three lines the urn is addressed in different ways, underlining different qualities.

The concept of purity of the urn is set right from the start.

The exotic language puts the reader in a different setting, the Greece of Arcadia.

The semiotic circuit of the poem is complex because the speaker is the receiver at the same time: on one side the poet speaks and addresses the urn, so that the vase becomes the sender of a message that reaches the poet who becomes now the receiver. Right from the start John Keats makes clear that the poem is about the way art sends its messages.

The poet asks a questions: he wants to know the story told through a legend made of leaves.

Un desiderio è tale solo se non soddisfatto.

L'arte è un messaggio che trascende il tempo.

L'arte ti dà l'eternità ma a costo della vita; infatti poi rimarrai sempre così.

The poem consists of five stanzas, made up of ten lines each.

The songs with no music are the ones which can be imaginated.

The men in the urn cannot stop doing what they are doing because they has been engraved.

The poet is conscious that the two lovers will never kiss because they are engraved in that moment before kissing.

The poet invites the young man not to desperate even if he cannot receive a kiss in return, because they will always love and his woman will always be fair.

In Romanticism the idea of imagination was able to reconciliate opposite or discordant qualities so that what is unheard is more concrete than what is heard. The first one is a mental experience, the second is simply a sensorial experience.