John Keats and his literary legacy

Keats

John Keats in his sonnet "On First Looking into Chapman's Homer" celebrates the artistry of the poet and the way the pet can make the individual see even the familiar in a new way. Clearly, such power works even from one poet to another, as is apparent as the poet Keats recognizes the value of the poet Chapman. Chapman cannot be seen merely as a translator, for in translating from Greek to English, Chapman must shape the text into English that communicates while being true to the original.

Chapman does this in a poetic and meaningful manner, creating images that appealed to Keats, especially when the text was compared to other versions by other translators. In particular, Keats found Pope's version to be comical after he had been exposed to the more sublime poetry of Chapman.

In the sonnet, Keats sets up an argument starting with a statement of his own experience and then finding that reading Chapman is superior to this experience. He describes himself as one who ahs traveled widely "in the realms of gold," which might mean not simply traveling through different lands directly but reading about these realms in poetry and other accounts. The "realms of gold" are the realms of poetry. The poet might therefore be describing physical travel or the mental travel that can be as satisfying in terms of what is learned. He refers to the western islands he has traveled around, islands "Which bards in fealty to Apollo hold," bards being poets and Apollo being the sun. Apollo is also the Greek god of medicine and poetry, again indicating the importance of the poet and of the way he views the world and presents it to others. One of the sites he has often heard of was that ruled by Homer, and though the speaker had delved into that realm before, he finds that he never really saw it at all:

Yet did I never breathe its pure serene

Till I heard Chapman speak out loud and bold:

Then felt I like some watcher of the skies

When a new planet swims into his ken (7-10).

Reading Chapman is a major discovery, like an astronomer discovering a new planet, or, as the poet continues, like Cortez when he found the Pacific. The poet in fact places himself in the role of one of Cortez's men looking down at the Pacific from a "peak in Darien," though it was first Balboa who made the journey and took that view. In any case, the metaphor of a journey is coupled with the metaphor of discovery to suggest that Chapman has already made all the discoveries important in this particular journey and that the reader can follow by picking up the book and reading what Chapman has written. For that reader, the experience will surpass any he or she has had reading other versions of Homer.

The idea of traveling and the idea of discovery combine in this poem, suggesting in this context that the poet does both and takes the reader along through his poetry. Homer is evoked as the ultimate poet, the representative of poetry in the ancient world, and the "realms of gold" would refer to the legacy of the ancient world as embodied in the Iliad and the Odyssey specifically. This are of the world and of history is embodied in the referecnce to the "western islands" in line 4 as well, for this refers to the islands in the Aegean Sea where much of the Odyssey is set. The idea of exploration is wedded to the other ideas already discussed, and in context, Keats is celebrating the discovery made by Chapman a swell as his own discovery of Chapman. Another way of looking at the lines is that Keats sees the poet as one who has grater understanding because he is more self-aware then others, and Keats himself is also seeking this sort of self-discovery in order to be a better poet himself, aspiring to join Homer and Chapman in introducing others to more cogent perceptions he may have.

As is the case with the sonnet form, this sonnet is in fourteen lines. The rhyme scheme may vary in different tyes of sonnet, and Keats her uses a scheme of ABBA CDCDCD. The Shakespearian sonnet would normally end with a couplet, but Keats does not do that, effectively using two quatrains followed by a six-line conclusion. The meter for the sonnet is iambic pentameter, with variations that emphasize words and thoughts. For instance, line 10 is "When a new planet swims into his ken," a line that is hard to read in strict iambic pentameter and that begins with a trochee, an accented followed by an unaccented syllable, followed by a spondee, with two accented syllables. Lines 9 and 10 are thought to refer to the discovery of a new planet by Herschel, which Keats knew about at the time. Line 14 also begins with a trochee, emphasizing the word "Silent," which is also set apart by the comma that comes after it and separates it from the explanatory "upon a peak in Darien."

Keats does not use internal rhyme in this poem and uses no alliteration. He does use repeated sounds to link certain wards, such as the "d" in "deep-brow'd Homer" and "demesne," liking ruler and ruled in the same line. Homer as ruler also links to the use of terms like "state and kingdoms" in line 2 and "wide expanse" in line 5, all of which could be part of Homer's demesne. Homer is the ruler, and the world of poetry and of the "realms of gold" are his demesne. Chapman has made that demesne more beautiful and more meaningful with his translation, and this is what Keats is celebrating in this poem.

However, more than Chapman's accomplishment, Keats is celebrating his own discovery of that accomplishment and of the world it opens for him. All of the references to discovery and to the demesne of Homer keeps the idea before the reader that Chapman has a particular vision of the poetic world and that Chapman's discovery of Homer can be repeated by the reader as well. Just as Chapman has shown Homer to Keats in a different way, so is Keats able to recount this for the reader and show the reader how to follow the same path to achieve the same sort of insight Keats has reached. Doing so would also take the individual into the same world of discovery experienced by explorers like Cortex, astronomers like Herschel, poets like Homer, and later poets like Chapman and Keats. The voyage of self-discovery that is involved can also be taken ay anyone looking into Chapman's Homer or the work of any other great poet.