Lamia notes- John Keats

 

Notes on 'Lamia'

Negative capability- concept  by John Keats, who was of the opinion that literary achievers,  should be able to come to terms with the fact that some matters might have to be left unsolved and uncertain.  some certainties were best left open to imagination and that the element of doubt and ambiguity added romanticism and specialty to a concept.

Lamia transforms from a half woman/half serpent into a woman. Metamorpheses. This is slick and crafty, showing that she cannot be trusted. It's an allegorical poem- it has deeper meanings. It is also ambiguous, which is how Keats always refers to women, as ambiguous.
 
Lamia was written in 1819, and published in 1820, after going to Rome and learning about his illness. Just before he wrote Lamia, he had a brain haemorage, so he knew he was dying. His brother had also just died, and his brother George was in financial difficulty. George stole from his mother and went gambling much of the time. When George asked John for money, John had Lamia published to provide the money.
 
The Greek myth behind the poem is that Lamia had an affair with Zues (one of the Gods). Zues' wife, Hera was outraged when she found out, and punished Lamia by condemning her to a life of sleeplessness. Hera also killed Lamia's children, according to some versions of the myth. Lamia hunted for children to replace the ones she lost, and Zues gave her the ability to take out her own eyes so she could sleep.
 
In the Victorian era, people thought that Lamia actually hunted for men, not children, which emphasised the shockingness of her promiscuousness.
 
However, Lamia is also a woman who has emotions and needs- she is not just a repulsive creature.
Keats believed the poem to be a masterpiece, hoping it would "start a fire in people and give them either an unpleasant or pleasant sensation". (in a letter he wrote). He wanted people to experience the poem, whether they had a good or a bad time reading it. 
 
Lamia is possible example of Negative Capability- transforming into mortal woman. As how it happens is left to our imagination.
 
Critics
 
R.H Fogle commented that 'Lamia appears to lend itself to allegorial interpretation'.
 
Garrett Stewart has remarked that the poem 'seems to invite allegorical reading'. In most cases the allegorical readings focus on the ways in which the three main characters in the poem, Lamia, Lycius and Apollonius may be said to represent something other than themselves. For example, Lamia could represent Fanny Brawne while Lycius represents Keats himself, and Apollonius could represent Charles Brown.

Keats does not seem to be on the side of any particular character and by the end of the poem they all seem equally inadequate.

The tone of the poem is by turns: Ironic, Sarcastic, Dramatic, Self Conscious.

The story begins with Hermes seaching for a beautiful nymph. He asks Lamia, a snake creature, to help him find the nymph. She says she will do this, if he changes her back into a woman so that she can be with the mortal she loves, Lucius. Hermes grants her wish and she is transformed into a beautiful woman. Lucius falls in love with the beautiful Lamia, not realising that she is a snake that assumed human form in order to win his admiration. Lamia knows that Apollonius, a wise old man, will recognise her and reveal her secret. So she asks Lycius not to ask him to the wedding. Apollonius talks Lycius into letting him attend, and he exposes Lamia at the wedding feast. She disappears and Lucius dies.

source- http://www.keatsian.co.uk/keats-poetry-lamia.php


The Love affair
The poem starts with a love affair between the god Hermes and a nymph, which is a prefatory literary idyll. It highlights by ironic contrast the principal narrative where not one of the main characters is thoroughly desirable.

Critics

Leigh Hunt: Triumph of thought over feeling, feeling over imagination. Lamia has a soul of humanity. She is not a mathematical truth.
Some critics view the poem as a satirical denunciation of philosophy (or rationalism).
David Perkins: no heroes/villains, showing Keats’ ambivalence. The poem is about the consequences of being a dreamer.
Hazlitt (essayist and Keats’s mentor): ‘’the progress of knowledge and refinement has a tendency to circumscribe the limits of the imagination, and to clip the wings of poetry.’

Source- http://englishtutorbournemouth.co.uk/john-keats-biography/lamia/

Characters-

Hermes: astronomical/heavenly imagery: ‘star of Lethe’, ‘bright planet’, has ‘serpent rod’. He grants love aspirations.

Lamia also has astronomical/heavenly imagery: ‘silver moons’, ‘mooned body’s grace, stars’, starry crown’. Lamia as a serpent also suggests Satan. Lamia is mocked in Hermes’ ‘beauteous wreath’.

Lycius is a hoodwink’d dreamer, falling in love with Lamia who has ‘elfin blood’ and lingers by the wayside ‘faerily’, with whom he lives in a magical palace with a ‘faery roof.'
(http://englishtutorbournemouth.co.uk/john-keats-biography/lamia/)

Lamia- a sorceress who is transformed from a serpent into a beautiful women
Orpheus- legendary musician, poet, and prophet in ancient Greek religion and myth, ability to charm all living things and even stones with his music
Pluto-ruler of the underworld in classical mythology, represents a more positive concept of the god who presides over the afterlife.
Hermes- One of the greek gods who leaves olmpus (home of the Gods) in search for a beautiful nymph.
Jove- (Jupiter) the king of the gods and the god of sky and thunder
Nymph- mythological nature spirits that appear as beautiful young women (divine spirits who animate nature)
Satyrs- lustful, drunken woodland gods. In Greek art they were represented as a man with a horse's ears and tail
Proserpine-Goddess of the Underworld
Olympus- Home of the Gods
Apollo- a wise advisor and former tutor of lycius
Eurydice-oak nymph or one of the daughters of Apollo, She was the wife of Orpheus, who tried to bring her back from the dead with his enchanting music.
Thetis- goddess of the sea and the leader of the fifty Nereides
Plato(ic)- philosopher and mathematician in Classical Greece, and the founder of the Academy in Athens, the first institution of higher learning in the Western world.
Lethe- one of the five rivers of Hades
Circe(an)-goddess of magic, daughter of Helios, the god of the sun, and Perse, an Oceanid.
Crete- largest and most populous of the Greek islands
Corinth- the mythical founder of the city was believed to have been King Sisyphus, famed for his punishment in Hades where he was made to forever roll a large boulder up a hill.- winged-horse Pegasus became a symbol of the city,  the narrow stretch of land that joins the Peloponnese to the mainland of Greece, roughly halfway between Athens and Sparta.
Elysium- conception of the afterlife that developed over time and was maintained by certain Greek religious and philosophical sects and cults.
Nereids-sea nymphs (female spirits of sea waters.) They often accompany Poseidon (god of the sea, the god of the sea, and can be friendly and helpful to sailors fighting perilous storms

Explore the ways in which Keats depicts power in 'La Belle Dame Sans Merci.'

Explore the ways in which Keats depicts power in 'La Belle Dame Sans Merci.' 

The poem La Belle Dame Sans Merci is a ballad, a medieval genre which John Keats revived making his poem simple. by using this form Keats is able to make his poem accessible for people to understand leading him to speak to his audience and place his views across. The poem is about a knight who is on the verge of death, the poem isn't explicit about why the knight is dying. However, it is left partly to our imagination. Ultimately, the poem is about the dangers of obsession and fixation. La Belle Dame Sans Merci was written towards the end of Keats's life, after his brother Tom died of tuberculosis but before Keats found out he too was dying of tuberculosis. During Keats life he had suffered and lost many important things and has experienced many tragic losses which he portrays in his poetry. He wrote this poem in 1819 and it was published in 1820. Keats depicts power in many ways throughout La Belle Dame Sans Merci, he uses the characters to represent different aspects of living during that time he witnessed.

First of all, the protagonist who is the knight is shown as weak with the first stanza. As the reader we can automatically see something is wrong with the knight as he is 'alone and palely loitering?' The knight doesn't fulfil the traditional chivalric idea of a knight as he is 'pale.' With the use of 'loitering' this could suggest he doesn't know what to do with no direction in life. The consonance of the L sound makes the line sound musical, drawing attention to the words. Keats uses the character of the knight to symbolise himself as he wrote this poem after his brothers death as he would of felt many strong emotions and felt like he didn't belong in society. The knight is weak in the poem as the narrator is asking all the questions and its not until stanza 4 where the knight actually speaks reflecting the powerlessness he has. Keats uses flower imagery  to describe the knight. 'I see a lily on thy brow' this metaphor suggesting how haggard the knight looks, it also conveys his paleness. The lily is also the flower associated with death and therefore contributes to the deathly feel of the poem.

Keats depicts power  through the use of the narrator in the poem who is a powerful character. The narrator takes control of  the poem however nameless, is still able to frame the narration. The narrator starts the poem with a question  'O what can ail thee. Knight- at- arms' which then is repeated in the second stanza as the knight doesn't answer immediately. Therefore, the unnamed narrator has to repeat the question due to voiceless knight. The effect of the dysfunctional communication could represent the poet as the speaker and poetical inspiration as the knight who is has lost its voice and lost its inspiration as in the days where Keats was writing, inspiration was very little. However, Keats then finds Spenser which is his inspiration and this is represented when the knight replies, as it's Keats finding his inspiration. The narrator also describes the knights appearance by using the adjectives 'haggard' meaning tired looking and 'woe- begone' meaning the knight is obviously sick and depressed and these words describe the knight which highlights how deathly and drawn he looks.


The title of the poem translates into a beautiful women without mercy, suggesting she is powerful due to the fact she has no mercy. We met the fairy lady in the story, where the knight 'made a garland for her head/ And bracelets too, and fragrant zone.' However in the next stanza 'I set her on my pacing steed,/ And nothing else saw all day long.' The knight thinks he has control and power over her as she sat on his horse however this could be sexual connotations. The knight is so absorbed with his erotic encounter with this fairy lady that he saw nothing else for 'all day long.' She was able to hypnotise him with her beauty suggesting she has the power. Similarly in the next stanza the fairy lady is feeding the knight 'she found me roots of relish sweet,/ And honey wild, and manna dew' Keats is suggesting she holds the power over the knight as she is able to provide for him.