Keats poetry Flashcards
“so sweet Isabel by gradual decay from beauty fell”
Isabella, is victimised, no longer pitied, she is described as ‘sweet’ instead of ‘poor’ and ‘simple’
“they could not in the self-same mansion dwell without some stir of heart, some malody”
Isabella - fate as a tragic element, forebodes death and tragedy, imagery in semantic field of illness from stanza one
“and she forgot the stars, the moon and the sun”
Isabella - anaphora of ‘and she forgot’ reveals the intensity of the tragedy and the obsessive nature of her love as it consumes her
“she withers like a palm”
Isabella - simile reveals she is physically deteriorating, palms symbolise freedom, religious imagery (palm Sunday preceded Jesus’ death therefore this could also forebode death)
“fair Isabel, poor, simple Isabel”
Isabella- premodifying adjectives emphasise her innocence, she is destined to be a victim due to feminine fragility
“For cruel ‘tis,” said she, “To steal my Basil-pot away from me.”
Isabella - natural imagery of the basil pot contrasts with the unnatural state of suffering
“she ever fed it with thin tears, whence thick, and green and beautiful it grew”
Isabella - oxymoron of beauty and decay, suggests freedom in death as her suffering is feeding beauty
“And so she pined, and so she died forlorn”
Isabella - Lorenzo and Isabella are reunited in death, forlorn denotes loneliness but she is only lonely in the real world they are united in the dream state
“O what can ail thee […] alone and palely loitering”
La Belle Dame - the knight is presented as a victim and we sympathise with his suffering
“fading rose”
La Belle Dame - narrative shift, story is an internal narrative, we begin at the end and go back to the start
“and no birds sing”
La Belle Dame - cyclical structure implies that the human spirit is trapped in the real world and it is only in the dream state (explored through the Knight’s memories) that you can be free
“she took me” “she lulled me”
La Belle Dame - unconventional victim (male victim) but the woman only has power because she is not human but rather an ethereal being who only exists in the dream world
“la Belle Dame sans merci Thee hath in thrall”
La Belle Dame - climactic moment, peripeteia and anagnorisis, he loves her so much she is able to manipulate him
“I saw pale kings and princes too” “elfin grot” “a faery’s song”
La Belle Dame - not really there/supernatural imagery, love so intense that it detaches the Knight from reality
“so haggard and so woe begone”
La Belle Dame - semantic field of illness, doesn’t collocate with chivalrous expectation of Knighthood
