critical account of Keats On seeing the Elgin Marbles
- This is a preview of the essay.
To view the full text you must login!
A critical account of Keats' 'On seeing the Elgin Marbles'
'On seeing the Elgin Marbles' describes the poet's first encounter with classical Greek art, rather than Roman copies. In place of a celebration of man's achievements, the wonder evoked in witnessing the exhibition results in a defeatist and nihilistic exploration of mortality and the poet's own approaching death.
The title, 'On seeing..' indicates that the poem which follows is a result of Keats' recent encounter, yet the Marbles are not directly referred to until the eleventh line, 'these wonders'. Rather, Keats begins with a despondent evocation of his own failure, 'My spirit is too weak'. The focus is on the poetic voice, rather than the Grecian art, with frequent reference to 'me'. The first four lines describe the imminence of death, bearing 'heavily' down on the poet 'like unwilling sleep'. Immediately, we sense the poet is ill-equipped to deal with mortality; rather he faces it with a claustrophobic, weakening fear. Like a heavy, impending structure, the thought of death 'Weighs' him down.
In the third line, 'steep' suggests a precipitous slope, implicitly danger, and the way in which it rhymes fully with 'sleep' in the second line indicates the poet's association of the sleep of death with a suddenness and extremity..