Poetry - To Autumn Flashcards
Comparisons for To Autumn
AIAG - acceptance and inevitable that time and nature is beyond our control.
Afternoons - time passing.
Themes for To Autumn
Humanity versus nature
Passing of time / seasons
The beauty of nature
Acceptance of the uncontrollable and beautiful aspects of nature
Inevitability that time is beyond our control
Life and nature is cyclical
Possible topic statements for To Autumn
Keats uses the poem as a cathartic means to process and come to terms with his ever-increasing awareness of his own mortality.
Keats heralds the beauty in every season of life - from birth all the way through to death.
Keats draws comfort from the knowledge that the cycle of life goes on, and nature will persist after our own lives come to an end.
Who wrote To Autumn
John Keats
To Autumn context
John Keats was an English romantic poet.
Near the end of his life he contracted tuberculosis causing his health to deteriorate quickly.
In 1820, Keats published six odes, one of which was ‘To Autumn’.
To Autumn form
Ode, which is a serious poem usually written in praise of a person or thing.
Its written in iambic pentameter, but its rhyme scheme changes slightly.
First four lines of each stanza have ABAB pattern but the rest of the second and third stanzas are different to the first. Keats other odes have ten lines per stanza- this one has eleven reinforcing the plentiful nature of autumn.
To Autumn structure
In each stanza Keats introduces an aspect of autumn in the first line, before expanding on it in the remaining ten lines. The poems structure can be seen as showing the passage of time.
The first stanza links with morning with early autumn. The sleepy mood in the second stanza symbolises the mid-autumn and afternoon and the final stanza hints at both the approach pf winter and the sunset.
‘Seasons of mists and mellow fruitfulness!’
The narrator directly addresses Autumn at the start.
Keats uses soothing alliteration to make autumn seem gentle.
The exclamation mark hints at the narrators awe.
This stanza directly starts talking about the senses of Autumn giving the reader full imagery of the season.
‘Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun’
This implies that nature and humans are interlinked.
This use of noun ‘blossom-friend already implies they are very close however this is exaggerated by the use of the adjective ‘close’.
This relation with friend of the sun implies theres a connection between humans and nature.
This personification used to describe the sunrise is also effective as it shows the sun being human like and vice versa.
‘moss’d cottage-trees’
This poem is rich in adjectives and details symbolising the abundance of autumn.
‘Fill all fruit’
The use of the superlative is used to create symbolism of fruit representing whole life.
‘Until they think warm days will never cease’
This use of foreshadowing hints at the idea that there is also death as well as life within Autumn.
Also indicating the literal change in seasons to winter.
‘Who hath not seen thee oft amid thy store?’
Each stanza is made up of two parts- the first line if one and the remaining lines form the other.
The second part is a very long sentence which reflects the idea of abundance.
‘While thy hook spares the next swat’
The hook used for cutting and the word ‘spares’ evoke this imagery of the grim reaper (death personified) which hints at the decay winter brings.
‘hours by hours’
This repetition of the word hours exaggerates the slow time passing through the seasons.
This could show the time passing towards Keats death of tuberculosis.
