The document discusses Romanticism and the Romantic poet John Keats. It provides context about Romanticism as a literary movement and examines Keats' life and work, focusing on his 1819 ode "To Autumn." The poem personifies Autumn and uses vivid sensory imagery to depict the sights, sounds, smells and feelings of the season through three stanzas.

1. Romanticism
John Keats
Ode to Autumn
By : Douha Almansour,
Maram Aljehani.

2. Romanticism
18th and 19th centuries
The Romantic Age :
Romanticism was a movement in literature, art, and music that emphasized
feeling over thought. In many ways it was a reaction to The
Enlightenment, or at least it was a reaction against the philosophic notion
that human actions were guided by the unchangeable forces of
economics, sociology, and physics.
Romanticism has very little to do with things popularly thought of as
"romantic," although love may occasionally be the subject of Romantic art.
Rather, it is an international artistic and philosophical movement that
redefined the fundamental ways in which people in Western cultures
thought about themselves and about their world.

3. Romantic Literature
Romantic literature is dominated by poetry. The triumvirate of
Keats, Shelley, and Byron are still well-known. The poetry of Keats is
sentimental, that of Shelley intense, and Byron displays a mastery of
sardonic wit.
*Romanticism was an artistic and intellectual movement that originated in
late 18th century Western Europe. It stressed strong
emotion, imagination, freedom within or even from classical notions of
form in art, and overturning of previous social conventions, particularly
the position of the aristocracy.
*The Romantics asserted the importance of the individual, the unique, even
the eccentric. Also Romanticism is often understood as a set of new
cultural and aesthetic values. It might be taken to include the rise of
individualism.

4. John Keats (1795 – 1821)
John Keats ( born in 1795 - dead in 1821) was an English Romantic poet. He
was one of the main figures of the second generation of romantic poets
along with Lord Byron and P. B. Shelley, although his work only having
been in publication for four years before his death.
Also John Keats one of England’s greatest poets, he was a key element in the
Romantic Movement. Known especially for his love of the country and
sensuous descriptions of the beauty of nature, his poetry also resonated
with deep philosophic questions.
Although his poems were not generally well-received by critics during his
life, his name grew after his death, so that by the end of the 19th century
he had become one of the most beloved of all English poets. He had a
significant influence on a various range of poets and writers.

5. The poetry of Keats is characterized by sensual imagery, most notably in the
series of odes. Today his poems and letters are some of the most popular
and most analyzed in English literature.
Themes :
Many of John Keats poems contain the themes of the effects of
time, change, life vs. death, the mortality of human life, suffering, and
beauty.
The theme of "To Autumn" is that time passes and that each portion is
appreciated by different individuals and the theme of change is also
present in this poem.

6. Introduction
* "To Autumn" is a poem for anyone who has a little trouble letting good
things come to an end. It could be a relationship, a cherished experience, or
just something you outgrow. And, of course, it could even be a favorite time
of year.
* Before writing this poem, John Keats surely knew that the rational thing to
do would have been to write a poem in praise of spring, the season of life and
rebirth. But despite their reputation for intense emotions, the British
Romantic poets were not sentimentalists. They famously wrote odes in praise
of things that most people wouldn't think to praise, like "Dejection" or
"Melancholy." They found beauty in the neglected corners of life. In "To
Autumn," Keats finds beauty in the lengthening days, chilly weather, and
brown fields of fall, the time just before winter squelches the last bit of
warmth and everyone retreats to their fires and hot cider.
* Sadly, Keats was to become a living example of things coming to an end too
soon. He died at the age of 25, only two years after completing this poem.

7. Ode to Autumn
John Keats (1795 – 1821)

8. Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness!
Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun;
Conspiring with him how to load and bless
With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eaves run;
To bend with apples the mossed cottage-trees,
And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core;
To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells
With a sweet kernel; to set budding more,
And still more, later flowers for the bees,
Until they think warm days will never cease,
For Summer has o’erbrimmed their clammy cells.
Who hath not seen thee oft amid thy store?
Sometimes whoever seeks abroad may find
Thee sitting careless on a granary floor,
Thy hair soft-lifted by the winnowing wind;
Or on a half-reaped furrow sound asleep,
Drowsed with the fume of poppies, while thy hook
Spares the next swath and all its twined flowers;
And sometimes like a gleaner thou dost keep
Steady thy laden head across a brook;
Or by a cider-press, with patient look,
Thou watchest the last oozings, hours by hours.
Where are the songs of Spring? Ay, where are the
Think not of them, thou hast thy music too, -
While barred clouds bloom the soft-dying day
And touch the stubble-plains with rosy hue;
Then in a wailful choir the small gnats mourn
Among the river sallows, borne aloft,
Or sinking as the light wind lives or dies;
And full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn;
Hedge-crickets sing, and now with treble soft
The redbreast whistles from a garden-croft;
And gathering swallows twitter in the skies.

9. Summary of the First Stanza
* Lines 1-2
Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness,
Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun;
* From the title it's clear that the speaker is talking about autumn. The speaker briefly
describes the season and immediately jumps into personification, suggesting that
autumn and the sun are old friends.
* "Mists" often accompany chilly weather.
* "Mellow fruitfulness”." The word "mellow," meaning low-key or
subdued, is a good fit for autumn, with its neutral colors and cool, yet not
cold, weather. And it's also the season when many fruits and other crops are
harvested, making autumn fruit-full.
* Autumn is a close friend of the sun, who is "maturing" as the year goes on.
"Maturing" could be a polite way of saying "getting old." The sun is no longer in its
prime.

10. * Lines 3-4
Conspiring with him how to load and bless
With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eves run;
*now the sun and autumn are "conspiring,“.
*They are planning how to make fruit grow on the vines that
curl around the roofs ("eves") of thatched cottages.
The image highlights the weight of the fruit as it "loads" down
the vines.
Thatched cottages suggest a pastoral setting, characterized by
shepherds, sheep, maidens, and agriculture. The "pastoral" as a
literary genre was thought to originate in Ancient Greece, and the ode
is a Greek form, so it is appropriate for this ode to include pastoral
themes. Keats's other Great Odes, especially "Ode on a Grecian Urn,"
include similar imagery.

11. * Lines 5-6
To bend with apples the moss'd cottage-trees,
And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core;
* The apples "bend" down the branches of
mossy trees with their weight. The trees belong
to the simple cottages of country folk.
*The ripeness penetrates deep to the very
center of the fruit.

12. *Lines 7-8
To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells
With a sweet kernel; to set budding more,
* In line 6, the ripeness converged on the center of
the fruit. Now, the ripeness expands like a balloon
to "fill up" nuts and gourds. The opposition of these
motions helps us visualize the process.
*"Gourds" include things like
squash, zucchini, and, especially, pumpkins.
*"Hazel" is a plant that produces the nuts that
add delicious flavor to coffee or gelato. The nut is
the "sweet kernel" that we eat.

13. *Lines 9-11
And still more, later flowers for the bees,
Until they think warm days will never cease,
*The "budding" that the speaker describes is in the future.
*Autumn isn't just a time of things dying off, turning
brown, and falling to the ground. It also sets the stage for the
return of growth in the spring. From nature's perspective, fruit
is the mechanism for planting new seeds.
*The speaker goes on a little imaginative trip into the
next spring and summer, where the bees take advantage of
the flowers that began as a small seed in autumn. The bees
think the summer will never end, and that the flowers will
always be in bloom.
*The bees are like prisoners inside of "clammy cells,"
the cells being the moist insides of the flowers in which they
seek nectar.

14. Summary of the Second Stanza
*Line 12
Who hath not seen thee oft amid thy store?
*Keats returns to the personification of spring. He
asks a rhetorical question: Who hasn't seen autumn
hanging out by his or her (we're not sure yet)
"store" of fruits, nuts, and other ripe things?
*The word "store" suggests the abundance of
crops.

15. *Lines 13-14
Sometimes whoever seeks abroad may find
Thee sitting careless on a granary floor,
*He is going to tell us how to find autumn now.
*All anyone has to do is travel through the
countryside hitting up every "granary" – buildings where
large amounts of harvested grain are kept cool and dry –
until you find autumn sitting on the floor of one of them.
*Now that the grain has been harvested, autumn
doesn't have a care in the world.
*"abroad" means "widely" or "through the
countryside" or "across the land," rather than "in a
foreign country."

16. *Line 15
Thy hair soft-lifted by the winnowing wind;
*From this line we will guess that autumn is a
woman. Not only because seasons were
traditionally personified as female in European
art, but also because this season has soft hair.
*Keats never uses "she" or "her" in a direct
way in this poem.
*Autumn has nothing to do but hang out. She
sits on the granary, and her hair is lifted by a gentle
wind.

17. *Lines 16-18
Or on a half-reap'd furrow sound asleep,
Drowsed with the fume of poppies, while thy hook
Spares the next swath and all its twined flowers:
*He says that if Autumn is not on the threshing floor, she
might also be on the furrow of a field that has only partially been
harvested. She's taking a nap because she's earned one. "Furrows" are
the long, undulating hills that you see in fields, on top of which crops
grow.
*The speaker claims that autumn is basically drunk on the
smell of the poppy flowers that she was going to harvest. She lies on
the furrow while the "hook," or sickle, that she uses to cut the flowers
lies unused. She hasn't gotten to the next "swatch" of flowers, so
they're saved... for now.
*The reference to poppies is no accident. Poppies were used
to make opium, a drug that was popular in England in the 19th
century.
*Of course, the smell of the flowers alone could not make
someone intoxicated, except metaphorically.

18. *Lines 19-20
And sometimes like a gleaner thou dost keep
Steady thy laden head across a brook;
*The harvesting metaphors continue, as autumn
is compared to a "gleaner," someone who picks
out the last stalks of grain that were missed
during the threshing process.
*Autumn puts her head down to cross
over a brook. Her head is "laden" or heavy – yet
another image of weight.

19. *Lines 21-22
Or by a cider-press, with patient look,
Thou watchest the last oozings, hours by hours.
*But, if we still haven't had autumn, after searching all
those other places, we might try the "cider-press," where
she's totally mesmerized watching the fruit get squeezed
into a thick, sugary juice.
*Cider is frequently alcoholic, so this could be
another reference to an intoxicant.
*Autumn has nothing to do, nowhere to be. She
can "patiently" watch the thick juice or "ooze" of the
apples drop from the press for hours.
*The word "Oozings" captures the concentrated
sweetness of the season.

20. Summary of the Third Stanza
*Lines 23-24
Where are the songs of Spring? Ay, where are they?
Think not of them, thou hast thy music too,--
*The final stanza begins with another rhetorical
question, which is, "Where are your songs Spring?
*He reassures autumn, who might be feeling inadequate
compared to her more celebrated counterpart, that she has
her own music.
*Keats alludes again to the pastoral tradition in
poetry, in which shepherds typically "sing" in
springtime, often while playing a lyre.

21. *Lines 25-26
While barred clouds bloom the soft-dying day,
And touch the stubble-plains with rosy hue;
*The speaker begins to describe the "song" of autumn. It's
more of a metaphorical song.
*He describes the patchy clouds, between which
patches of sky can be seen, as "barred." These clouds appear
to be in "bloom," like flowers, as they light up with the colors
of sunset. The use of "bloom" is a direct challenge, again, to
springtime.
*The day is "dying" at sunset, but it's not a tragic or
violent death. It's "soft" and gentle.
*The reddish colors of the sunlight "touch" the fields
gently. The fields have been harvested, so all that is left as a
flat "stubble" of crop.

22. *Lines 27-29
Then in a wailful choir the small gnats mourn
Among the river sallows, borne aloft
Or sinking as the light wind lives or dies;
*The gnats by the riverside "mourn" the dying day. They are "wailing"
as if the daylight had been a favorite grandparent or something.
*In fact, they are just doing what gnats do: coming out at
evening time. The choir sound is the collective buzzing of their tiny
little wings.
*Gnats especially like to hang out in wet areas, near trees, and here
we find them near the willow or "sallow" trees down by the river.
Their movement appears to be coordinated with the light.
Light gets brighter, gnats go up; light gets dimmer, gnats go down.
* Keats is having all kinds of fun with movement and directions in this
poem.
The speaker continues to paint the sunset as a life-or-death
struggle for the light.
*The sound of the gnats contributes to the song of autumn.

23. *Lines 30-33
And full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn;
Hedge-crickets sing; and now with treble soft
The redbreast whistles from a garden-croft,
And gathering swallows twitter in the skies.
*The poem concludes with more animal sounds, but those of a more
conventional variety than the buzzing of gnats.
*Lambs are bleating near the small stream, or "bourn," that flows
down a hill. The speaker calls them "full-grown lambs," which is like
saying, "full-grown child“. He seems to want to highlight the in-between stage
between the glorious ripeness of youth and plain old adulthood.
*Crickets are "singing" by rubbing their wings together, otherwise
known as "chirping."
*With a soft but high ("treble") voice, the redbreast robin is whistling
in an enclosed garden, or "garden-croft."
*The swallows have been taken to the sky at twilight, and they
"twitter" joyfully as the sun goes down.

24. The Analysis of The Five Senses of
Imagery
*Visual (Sight).
* Aural, Auditory (Sound).
* Smell, Olfactory.
* Taste, Gustatory.
* Sensation, Tactile (Touch).

25. Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness! •
Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun;
Conspiring with him how to load and bless
With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eaves run;
To bend with apples the mossed cottage-trees,
And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core;
To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells
With a sweet kernel; to set budding more,
And still more, later flowers for the bees,
Until they think warm days will never cease,
For Summer has o’erbrimmed their clammy cells.
Who hath not seen thee oft amid thy store?
Sometimes whoever seeks abroad may find
Thee sitting careless on a granary floor,
Thy hair soft-lifted by the winnowing wind;
Or on a half-reaped furrow sound asleep,
Drowsed with the fume of poppies, while thy hook
Spares the next swath and all its twined flowers;
And sometimes like a gleaner thou dost keep
Steady thy laden head across a brook;
Or by a cider-press, with patient look,
Thou watchest the last oozings, hours by hours.
Where are the songs of Spring? Ay, where are they?
Think not of them, thou hast thy music too, -
While barred clouds bloom the soft-dying day
And touch the stubble-plains with rosy hue;
Then in a wailful choir the small gnats mourn
Among the river sallows, borne aloft,
Or sinking as the light wind lives or dies;
And full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn;
Hedge-crickets sing, and now with treble soft
The redbreast whistles from a garden-croft;
And gathering swallows twitter in the skies.

26. Themes

27. Man and the Natural World
"To Autumn" contains very specific natural
landscapes and images. The first stanza offers
images of the interaction between humans and the
plants that surround them. The second describes
the production of agriculture, a natural process that
is controlled by people. The third stanza moves
outside of the human perspective to include things
that are not used or consumed by humans. This
third section captures some of the "wildness" and
unpredictability of nature.

28. Time
It is not a coincidence that "To Autumn"
mentions autumn and spring, but not winter.
Keats doesn't want to dwell on the cold days to
come. To appreciate autumn, we need to forget
about how each passing day seems a little
shorter and chillier. For the most part, the
speaker stays focused on the present moment.
The natural world is at the peak of sunlight and
ripeness in the first stanza, and by the third
stanza the sun is setting.

29. Transformation
Autumn is the time of transformation between the
growth of summer and the dormancy of winter. Things
are winding down, and once the harvest is
complete, there is nothing left to do but wait until the
next season. Much of the transformation in the poem
occurs between stanzas. For example, in the first stanza
fruits and gourds are swelling outward before they will be
picked for food. By the second stanza, the harvest is
already complete, or mostly complete, and the ripe
apples have been turned into rich, delicious cider. The
third stanza focuses only on one transformative
event, the setting of the sun.

30. Mortality
Autumn is frequently used as a symbol in
literature for old age, the time before
death, symbolized by winter. "To Autumn"
avoids any super-obvious references to
death, but we do get some subtle ones, like the
oblivious bees that think the summer will last
forever, or the "hook" that spares the poppy
flowers from their inevitable end. As the day
begins to "die" in the final section, the entire
landscape contributes to the song of mourning.