Bright Star Were I as Steadfast as Thou Art Theme
Text transcribed past Keats into a volume of Shakespeare in belatedly September 1820.
"Bright star, would I were stedfast as thou art" is a love sonnet past John Keats.
Groundwork [edit]
It is unclear when Keats start drafted "Vivid Star"; his biographers suggest dissimilar dates. Andrew Motion suggests information technology was begun in October 1819.[ane] Robert Gittings states that Keats began the verse form in April 1818 – before he met his dear Fanny Brawne – and he later revised it for her.[2] Colvin believed information technology to have been in the last calendar week of Feb 1819, immediately after their informal engagement.
The final version of the sonnet was copied into a book of The Poetical Works of William Shakespeare, contrary Shakespeare'due south poem, A Lover'south Complaint. The volume had been given to Keats in 1819 by John Hamilton Reynolds. Joseph Severn maintained that the terminal typhoon was transcribed into the book in late September 1820 while they were aboard the ship Maria Crowther, travelling to Rome, from where the very sick Keats would never return. The volume besides contains one sonnet past his friend Reynolds and one past Severn. Keats probably gave the volume to Joseph Severn in January 1821 before his death in February, aged 25.[three] [4] Severn believed that it was Keats's last verse form and that it had been composed especially for him.
The verse form came to be forever associated with the "Bright Star" Fanny Brawne – with whom Keats became infatuated. Gittings says it was given as "a annunciation of his honey."[v]
It was officially published in 1838 in The Plymouth and Devonport Weekly Journal, 17 years subsequently Keats's decease.
The text [edit]
Brilliant star! would I were stedfast equally thou art—
Non in lonely splendour hung aloft the night,
And watching, with eternal lids apart,
Like Nature's patient, sleepless Eremite,
The moving waters at their priestlike task
Of pure ablution round earth'due south human shores,
Or gazing on the new soft fallen mask
Of snow upon the mountains and the moors—
No—withal nevertheless stedfast, all the same unchangeable,
Pillow'd upon my fair honey'southward ripening chest,
To feel for ever its soft fall and swell,
Awake for ever in a sugariness unrest,
Still, nonetheless to hear her tender-taken breath,
And and so live always—or else swoon to death.[6]
Addressed to a star (possibly Polaris, effectually which the heavens appear to bicycle), the sonnet expresses the poet'south wish to exist as constant equally the star while he presses confronting his sleeping dear. The utilise of the star imagery is unusual in that Keats dismisses many of its more apparent qualities, focusing on the star's steadfast and passively watchful nature. In the offset recorded draft (copied by Charles Brown and dated to early on 1819), the poet loves unto death; by the final version, death is an alternative to (imperceptible) love.
The poem is punctuated equally a single sentence and uses the rhyme form of the Shakespearean sonnet (ABABCDCDEFEFGG) with the customary volta, or turn in the train of thought, occurring after the octave.
In popular civilisation [edit]
In Alexander Theroux'due south 1981 novel Darconville's Cat the verse form is discussed by the protagonist when teaching his English class.
The 2009 biopic on Keats's life starring Ben Whishaw and Abbie Cornish, focused on the final iii years of his life and his relationship with Fanny Brawne. It was named Vivid Star after this verse form, which is recited multiple times in the film.
In the Covert Diplomacy episode "Speed of Life" (Flavor three, Episode 4) the graphic symbol Simon Fischer admits to Annie Walker that the tattoo on his upper left shoulder blade of Ursa Pocket-sized was inspired by John Keats's verse form. Although she asks him, Simon doesn't tell her who in his life was his bright star or the reason backside getting the tattoo. This tattoo is the symbol used by Jai Wilcox to mark Simon Fischer'south dossier within the CIA.
In the DC Comics event series Heroes in Crisis result #6 by author Tom King and creative person Clay Mann, Gnarrk recites the poem on a full page showing him lying over his mammoth nether a articulate beautiful sky.
References [edit]
- ^ Motion (1997) p472
- ^ Gittings (1969) p 415
- ^ Notes and Queries Article, Oxford Journals, 2006. Notes and Queries article
- ^ "See the volume at the Keats House archive". Archived from the original on 2010-12-03. Retrieved 2010-06-08 .
- ^ Gittings (1968), p293-8
- ^ Keats, John (1905). Sélincourt, Ernest De (ed.). The Poems of John Keats. New York: Dodd, Mead & Visitor. p. 288. OCLC 11128824.
Bibliography [edit]
- Colvin, Sidney. John Keats: His Life and Poetry, His Friends, Critics and After-Fame (London: Macmillan, 1917)
- Lancashire, Ian. 'John Keats: Bright Star', Representative Poetry Online (Toronto: University, 2003). Retrieved July 27, 2005.
External links [edit]
- An jitney drove of Keats' poetry at Standard Ebooks
Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bright_star,_would_I_were_stedfast_as_thou_art
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