Keats’ Endymion: An Eternal Beauty
A Thing of Beauty is a poem written by the famous romantic poet, John Keats. The poem tells about how nature and its wonder mesmerize us and take away all the sorrow that surrounds us from time to time. This poem is an excerpt from Keats’s‟ poem Endymion‟.
The poem is based on a classical Greek myth of the love of the Moon Goddess Cynthia, for a young shepherd prince, Endymion. His poem makes use of allegory to signify the quest of the human soul for ideal Beauty.
(An allegory demonstrative form of representation explaining meaning other than the words that are spoken. Allegory communicates its message using symbolic figures, using symbolic representation.) , Endymion stands for the poet as a man, Cynthia for ideal Beauty, and the Moon for the manifestation of Beauty in Nature.
The theme of the poem rests in the opening line of the poem. A beautiful object is treasured in our mind because it provides us with minds and everlasting joy. His happiness never fades into nothingness but multiplies manifold whenever it flashes into our minds.
Endymion is an epic poem in English. This poem by Keats is based on the Greek mythology of Endymion, the shepherd beloved by the moon goddess Selene. We see an elaboration of the original story and the moon Goddess Selene is named “Cynthia”.
Keats’ Endymion: An Eternal Beauty
This poem Endymion’s original romantic ardor with a more universal quest for a self-destroying transcendence in which he might achieve a blissful personal unity with all creation. Endymion in Greek mythology is a story of a handsome youth who spent much of his life sleeping.
There are different views related to Endymion. According to some traditions Endymion was the king of Elis. Several traditions say that he was offered by Zeus to choose anything he might desire and Endymion to remain young for an everlasting sleep.
While some tradition says Endymion’s eternal sleep was a punishment given by Zeus because Endymion fell in love with Zeus’s wife Hera. Selene was deeply in love with Endymion, some say Selene had cursed Endymion into everlasting sleep so that she can enjoy him all by herself. Selene’s love for Endymion made her visit him every night while he was asleep.
But in the poem Keats, emphasizes Endymion’s love for Diana rather than hers for him. Keats transformed this tale into prose to express the loves that have been felt on imaginative longings. This theme of love is determined in the adventure of the Endymion quest by Diana. In the search for Diana, Endymion falls in love with an earthly maiden. But in the end, Diana and the earthly maid, turn out to be the same.
Keats describes a thing of beauty as emanating joy forever. Beauty only increases and it will never cease. The benefits proffered by a thing of beauty are listed as giving sound rest with good dreams and well-being. The earth minus the beautiful things is a despondent, spiteful place thriving in callous insensitive dearth and is harsh toward human beings.
Every day human beings face gloomy days packed with unhealthy spite and darkness. However, despite all this, a thing of beauty helps remove the dark cloud that burdens our souls. Hence, the poet says that we – human beings – each day create an ornate band, made of all the lovely things we see. This band keeps us bound to the despondent earth – as we would otherwise be hopeless.
This closing paragraph simply tells us some of the beautiful things on Earth. After all, beauty lies in the eyes of the beholder – Everyone can highlight something beautiful in anything. The examples cited by the poet are as such: the sun, the moon, trees, flowers, streams, musk-rose blooms, architectural sepulchers, even fairy tales or and heroic legends.
The ‘simple sheep’ are human beings – the poet sympathizes with the innocence of human beings. Keats sees the beauty in innocent humans seeking solace in nature, and Mother Nature in its way sprouts a shade of relief and consolation. The expression „Lily of the valley‟ is quite well known and rouses images of a delicate lone white flower holding up its head amidst a setting of thorns and barbs and everything contrary in nature to delicateness – so too are the daffodils mentioned in the poem.
The poet also sees beauty in the death of martyrs and legends. ‘The mighty dead’ are those martyrs who have died bravely for a cause. We honor them by erecting magnificent, grand sepulchers in which beauty is seen. If one looks around, there are innumerable beautiful things to notice – they seem to flow immortally as a fountain, from the gods above to help the pitiable human beings to cope with the harshness of life.
