Role Of Aestheticism In Keats` `ode On Grecian Urn`

Artistic texts are often valued in accordance with the idea that they are explorations of "fundamental questions" and therefore express the collective concerns of humanity. From this argument, one can propose that art, and artistic objects, gain a durability and permanence from their subject matter which removes art from the ephemerality and decay of humanity and provides a method for transcending the constraints of time and context.

Within Keats' sonnet, the urn is presented as a metaphor for the preservation which life and reality undergoes when presented within an artistic context. The title foregrounds the idea of a 'lost time' by its allusion to Greek art and the ancient traditions which have since been lost or degraded and suggests that the poem seeks to preserve the past; indeed the "Sylvan historian" which the urn is compared to, acts as a recorder of lost eras. Indeed, around the urn only "slow time" reigns, suggesting that there is a discord between 'real' time and the aesthetic time of the urn. By depicting a frozen scene, the urn slows the advance of time and allows the image to be preserved. The decoration "haunts" the urn, as if the scene has decayed and been withered and resigned to the past, and yet still prevails within the spiritual imprint of the urn. The woman "cannot fade", her beauty and presence prolonged by their expression in art, turning her into a symbol of eternal romance. The anaphora of "for ever" evokes yearning for preservation through its repetition, each repeat deepening the longing for eternity. In addition, syntactically the lines enact the perpetual nature of the urn as their opening does not move from "for ever"; the lines open and close in stasis. The form of the ode, a variation of the Shakespearian sonnet, uses iambic pentameter to craft a constant underlying rhythm through the poem, enacting the perceptual scene on the urn; the rhythm is constant like the vase. The image upon the urn is presented through a naturalistic semantic field. The "leaf fringed legend" indicates that the urn shows a bucolic scene of natural and unforced love. Similarly "dales" evokes the freedom and expansiveness of the natural landscape, whilst "happy boughs" projects the emotions of the couple onto the natural landscape, constructing a natural mirror for their state. Likewise, it almost suggests that the urn itself is the "leaf fringed legend", literally taken as being surrounded by leaves or transposed to suggest that the urn has grown out of its surroundings; it is not artificially constructed but rather an organic object. From this the urn itself can be the "happy boughs" which mirrors the mood of the persona. Moreover, if it is a "legend", it is suggested as an object that is unconfined to a point in history, the story told of "marble men" preserved forever in the urn's relief transcends the bounds of its time and becomes a mythic deity. The poem itself functions as Keats' act of preservation; he dedicates a poem to the romance upon the urn, thus preserving it for 'all time' by its acceptance into the literary canon.

One can argue that Keats' ode is the result of a fear of desire, and explores a 'fundamental question', positioning it as part of the human condition. In the letters from Keats to Fanny Brawne (his lover) he speaks of being "tormented day and night", arguing that she "ravish'd [him] away". This direct parallel to the "unravish'd bride" of the opening lines suggests that one can read the poem as an ode to the fear of desire and of the frustrated nature of his romance. "Unravish'd" connotes the preservation and stasis of the urn, whilst also suggesting the all-consuming power of lust to devour and destroy. This contrasts the "silent form" of the urn which is unperturbed by time. The lovers of the urn are told "never, never canst thou kiss", the repetition evoking the depth of the thwarted desire and the fixation on the prolonging of the chaste romance. However, there is an opposition between desire and fear, and the poem alludes to the lust of the lovers. The woman is "warm and still to be enjoyed", whilst "warm" connotes the heat metaphor associated with desire, in opposition to the cold urn, positioning it as a hindrance to the fulfilment of desire. "Still" suggests that the woman is preserved and therefore can be enjoyed at any moment, although one can also argue that there is an almost perverse reading of "still". "Still" evokes the silent image of death or lack of life, which perhaps indicating that the persona, and by extension Keats, can only enjoy desire if it is restricted to the abodes of art. The love shown on the urn is "forever panting", suggesting the elevated breathing linked to sexual desire. This image also draws attention to the vitality of desire, which is, by nature, ephemeral. The urn preserves the chaste desire from the ravages of time and disease, allowing it to be for 'all time'. What could be "cloy'd" and therefore ruined is held in perpetual beauty by the vase. Perhaps alluding to his brother Tom (who died of consumption), the opposition between the cool urn and the scorching physicality of "burning forehead" and "parching tongue" evokes the intense illness and suffering within humanity, indicates the eternal nature of art by contrast. Though "old age shall this generation waste", and the beauty and desire be negated to the past and destroyed through time, the urn will remain.

Within the poem, Keats' suggests that art is the highest form of understanding through the aphorism "Beauty is truth, truth beauty". One can suggest two readings of this statement. One is that "truth" is found exclusively within works of art and proposes that art is a didactic medium through which eternal truths and morals are presented, thus the meaning of art is for 'all time'. Keats himself coined the term "negative capability" to propose that an artistic medium is the means by which humanity can transcend their own existence and reach a higher level of understanding. The "beauty" alone is enough. This can be extended to suggest that as art is a product of a subjective filter (narrative is inherently biased) that all art is, by necessity, 'true' as it is created as true by the artist. The clarity and validity of this sentiment is affirmed by the return of the rhyme scheme to the ABAB CDE DCE of the opening stanza, which enacts the finality of the poem's resolution and indicates that this final conclusion was an inevitability as it is foreshadowed by the rhyme pattern. Moreover, the chiasmus of "Beauty/Truth" emphasises the definitiveness of the statement, syntactically surrounded by the technique the reader cannot escape the phrase. The voice which speaks also can be constructed as the reader, suggesting that the poem itself is performative of the idea that "truth" is found in art. The reader undergoes an aesthetic epiphany.

However, one can argue that the construction of Keats 'Ode' undermines the aphorism. The rhetorical questions and paradoxical images within the poem evoke art as a deceptive and multifaceted form; it cannot be confined to "truth" and thus the final statement is flawed. The ambiguity of the rhetorical questions "Tempe or the dales Arcady?/ What men or gods are these?" positions the urn as a mythical and magical object which cannot be defined. Moreover, one can suggest that these rhetorical questions highlight the inherent flaws of art. If the urn cannot be precise or confined to one interpretation then how can it present a 'truthful' narrative? Indeed, Keats questions the value of poetic expression. "Who canst thus express a flowery tale more sweetly than our rhyme" suggests that the urn, and its beauty as a physical object cannot be confined to "rhyme". The poem, though an act of worship to art, cannot itself take the place of the aesthetic experience, thus Keats is questioning the role of poetry within society and suggesting that poetry is inherently flawed. This position is exacerbated by the ambiguity of "thou" who speaks. The reader is subject to the questioning of whether the voice which interrupts the ode is Keats, the narrative persona, the reader or indeed the Urn itself, which subverts the assertion of "beauty is truth" through the ambiguous nature of art. Keats is aware of the unsatisfactory depiction art provides of reality and so indicates that art cannot be for 'all time' as it cannot ever truly represent 'reality'. This idea is continued in "heard melodies are sweet but those unheard are sweeter", if we suggest that to 'hear' music is to understand and define music, then Keats suggests that his poem, in an effort to define and understand the vase, loses some of the beauty of being "unheard". Moreover, the urn is said to "tease us out of thought", as though the artistic expression within the urn is almost a mockery. "Tease" evokes the sly and calculated trickery of the urn as it has been consciously constructed, suggesting the impossibility of capturing 'reality' within art. "Tease" also implies that we need to be brought out of conscious thought in order to appreciate art. The appreciation of artistic form is unconscious. In addition, it is the "silent form" which teases, indicating that although the "silent" scene is preserved and cultivated, it is a denuded and lifeless object which taunts the ephemeral and transient human race.