Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792-1822)
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aus: www.bartleby.com/139/ |
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- 1816 All three (Shelley, Mary Godwin, Claire Clairemont) visited Switzerland (Genf) and met George Gordon Byron. Among other works Shelley published the poem "Hymn to Intellectual Beauty" and "Mont Blanc".When he returned to England he found out that his first wife Harriet Westbrook had committed suicide. William Shelley was born.
- 1817 Shelley`s daughter Clara Shelley was born.
- 1818 Financial problems continued to plague him and so he went to Italy (Venedig,Rom,Pisa. He always had an eye on the social conditions in England and the political trouble spots.
- 1819 Workers of the cotton- industry rebelled in Manchester, but this protest rally was knocked down in a very bloody way.That is the reason why Shelley wrote a quite radical political poem, "The Mask of Anarchy".
- Clara Shelley died.
- 1819 His son William Shelley died.
- 1822 When Shelley`s sailing ship capsized near Viareggio, he and two other passengers of the ship died
Shelley’s view of life
To understand Shelley’s view of life it is necessary to know some details of his personal life. He grew up in an educated and prosperous family. But after his suspension from Oxford he broke with his family and married at nineteen. In his college days he got to know Plato and so his interest in science grew. But that caused problems to him, because questioning God and religion was not usual at that time. This feeling of control, misunderstanding and captivity always accompanied him all the time. His life was not like other lives, because of his view of life, he did not think much of the opinion of the others. His view was radical. His political activities were inspired by Locke, Paine and Godwin. For them the only function of government was to save the liberty and freedom of the people. He always tried to live his life fully in his poems. He used them to critize the social and political conditions. After a revolt of workers which resulted in many casualties he wrote a poem about it. Shelley saw in nature the solution of the problems, but his life was determined by his personal problems. His first wife committed suicide and his two children died early. These events influenced his work. Death was also a main topic of his work.
Nature and the phenomena of nature like the cycle of life formed the background to his work, which is connected with his own life and the social and political circumstances at that time.
| Percy Bysshe Shelley, Ode to the West Wind (1820) | |
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O wild West Wind, thou breath of Autumn's being, Thou, from whose unseen presence the leaves dead Are driven, like ghosts from an enchanter fleeing,
Yellow, and black, and pale, and hectic red, Pestilence-stricken multitudes: O thou, Who chariotest to their dark wintry bed
The winged seeds, where they lie cold and low, Each like a corpse within its grave, until Thine azure sister of the Spring shall blow
Her clarion o'er the dreaming earth, and fill (Driving sweet buds like flocks to feed in air) With living hues and odours plain and hill:
Wild Spirit, which art moving everywhere; Destroyer and preserver; hear, oh hear!
Thou on whose stream, mid the steep sky's commotion, Loose clouds like earth's decaying leaves are shed, Shook from the tangled boughs of Heaven and Ocean,
Angels of rain and lightning: there are spread On the blue surface of thine aëry surge, Like the bright hair uplifted from the head
Of some fierce Maenad, even from the dim verge Of the horizon to the zenith's height, The locks of the approaching storm. Thou dirge
Of the dying year, to which this closing night Will be the dome of a vast sepulchre, Vaulted with all thy congregated might
Of vapours, from whose solid atmosphere Black rain, and fire, and hail will burst: oh hear! |
Thou who didst waken from his summer dreams The blue Mediterranean, where he lay, Lull'd by the coil of his crystàlline streams,
Beside a pumice isle in Baiae's bay, And saw in sleep old palaces and towers Quivering within the wave's intenser day,
All overgrown with azure moss and flowers So sweet, the sense faints picturing them! Thou For whose path the Atlantic's level powers
Cleave themselves into chasms, while far below The sea-blooms and the oozy woods which wear The sapless foliage of the ocean, know
Thy voice, and suddenly grow gray with fear, And tremble and despoil themselves: oh hear!
If I were a dead leaf thou mightest bear; If I were a swift cloud to fly with thee; A wave to pant beneath thy power, and share
The impulse of thy strength, only less free Than thou, O uncontrollable! If even I were as in my boyhood, and could be
The comrade of thy wanderings over Heaven, As then, when to outstrip thy skiey speed Scarce seem'd a vision; I would ne'er have striven
As thus with thee in prayer in my sore need. Oh, lift me as a wave, a leaf, a cloud! I fall upon the thorns of life! I bleed!
A heavy weight of hours has chain'd and bow'd One too like thee: tameless, and swift, and proud. |
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Make me thy lyre, even as the forest is: What if my leaves are falling like its own! The tumult of thy mighty harmonies
Will take from both a deep, autumnal tone, Sweet though in sadness. Be thou, Spirit fierce, My spirit! Be thou me, impetuous one!
Drive my dead thoughts over the universe Like wither'd leaves to quicken a new birth! And, by the incantation of this verse,
Scatter, as from an unextinguish'd hearth Ashes and sparks, my words among mankind! Be through my lips to unawaken'd earth
The trumpet of a prophecy! O Wind, If Winter comes, can Spring be far behind? |
Interpretation
"Ode to the West Wind" reveals Shelley’s view of life. The power and the cycle of nature are presented in a mythical way. The wind represents the revival, but just of the existing things.
The poem mixes the English and the Italian form of sonnets so there are four tercets and one heroic couplet.
The first stanza of the poem starts with "O wild West Wind, thou breath of Autumn’s being"(l.1). The wind of destruction for which the "West Wind" stands is part of the cycle of nature. The revival is necessary, because without it nothing new can develop. This is as radical as Shelley’s political opinion. The flight of the dead leaves which are taken away by the wind is compared with the flight of ghosts from a magician (ll.2). But the wind is also responsible for the seed. It carries it away and when it falls down on the earth, it lies there till spring (l. 5-10). This cycle of death and birth cannot only be found in nature. Every part or life is a revival/birth, but death is part of it, too. The revival is portrayed by the wind which blows in the spring. It fills the air with fragrance and the country with colour. These two things represent something new. The multitude of flowers is compared with a herd that is meant to graze in the air and the wind is the shepherd (ll.11) . The verse ends with an appeal to the "Wild Spirit", which is the destroyer and preserver, to listen to Shelley and his ideas and demands.
The second stanza (l.15-28) presents the wind as a "stream" in which the clouds like dead leaves are taken away from heaven and sea and are then carried away. So the wind is not only part of our world, it has got also something to do with the universe (heaven, ocean). The world is a huge grave and the wind and the air are bringing "black rain, and fire, and hail" (l.28). Shelley’s presentation of the world and its condition at that time is negative, but also positive, because Shelley hopes that because of the cycle of life the bad and old things will be destroyed and so new things can develop and grow. The verse ends like the first one with an appeal to the wind.
The third stanza deals with the awakening of nature. The Mediterranean has been awakened by the "West Wind" out of his long sleep in which it has seen "old palaces and towers"which are covered with "moss and flowers"(ll.33). The scenery cannot be described with words, because its view robs Shelley and everyone else of his senses (l.36). It is difficult to describe nature. Shelley tries to find metaphors which presents nature as a person. But the third verse also tries to conveys the power of the "West Wind". Because of it, the Atlantic separates and "the sea-blooms and oozy woods" (l.37-40) change their colour and become grey. The Atlantic like the dead leaves obeys the wind. This makes plain how powerful the wind, on the one hand, and the power of the cycle of life, on the other hand, are, because the wind is only one part of the cycle. The verse ends like the others.
The next stanza differs from the preceding ones. In the following fourteen lines Shelley expresses his wishes (l.43-56). He wants to be as free as the wind, but not like it. He wants to be a dead leaf, a cloud or a wave, which escorts him on its way (l.43-49). The company of the wind would give him the chance to get his youth and his liberty back. And the wind could also help Shelley, because when he wrote the poem he had got a lot of problems (his two children died). The "West Wind" is meant to protect him from "the thorns of life" (ll.53). Life has changed him. Because of all the events he is "chained and bowed", but still "tameless, and swift, and proud" (ll.55). He compares himself with the wind and its liberty and untamedness.
Shelley uses the fifth stanza to tell the "West Wind" his wish and demands. "Make me thy lyre, even as the forest is" (l.57). Shelley wants to convey the spirit of the "West Wind" to mankind and at last he wants to be the "West Wind" itself. The wind is meant to inspire Shelley, because he feels like a dead leaf. The wind is meant to help Shelley to spread his words and ideas like ash and sparks in the world. This process could begin, when the ode is sung, because the original function of an ode is to praise something. So Shelley sees his poem like an ode although some charateristics of an ode are missing.
The "West Wind" is intented to be the lips which announce a prophecy (l.63-69). The poem ends with the question "O, Wind, If Winter comes, can Spring be far behind?" (l.70). This question connects the beginning of the poem with the three verses and the demands of Shelley. The Winter with its darkness and sleeping nature has begun. So now, because of the cycle of life, spring must follow.
The "West Wind" and Shelley himself are the main characters of the ode. The "West Wind" represents liberty, the untamedness of nature and power for Shelley. The wind is the changing part in nature, which also controls heaven and the sea. It can stand for death, but at the same time it means life.
On the one hand, the wind that Shelley discribes is simple in its function ("Destroyer and preserver"), but on the other hand it is a mystical thing. Its power and its position in nature can only be compared with the function of a god. The wind decides on life and death.
Shelley sees the wind as a chance to get a new inspiration and to transmit his ideas and "prophecy".
Nature is the only place for Shelley where he is himself. In the first line of the ode, Shelley says that the "West Wind" is "wild". This is the most important thing. Everyone wants to be free and the wind is the best example of this idea. The world deprives the people of many things, but nature is a chance to get back liberty and wildness. And nature also stands for the cycle of life. Everything has got its place in it. Shelley hopes that because of this cycle bad, old and antiquated things will be removed. And new ideas get a chance to grow and to find a way to settle down in the minds of the people. But Shelley also hopes to get new ideas and some inspiration for himself.
Literatur:
http://www. parallel.park.uga.edu/~chatcher/shellbio.html
http://www.library.utoronto.ca/utel/rp/poems/shelley7.html
Wright, David: The Penguin Book of English Romantic Verse. Harmondsworth, Middlesex, England: 1972
Benton, William (Publisher): Encyclopedia Britannica, Volume 20. Chicago. 1971
Verfasser: Angela Lieber, Michaela Marks