1a. In lines 1-4, what is the speaker afraid will not happen before he dies?
2a. In lines 5-8, what does the speaker see in the sky?
3a. In lines 9-12, what is the speaker fearing to lose?
4a. What three things does the speaker fear he will not be able to do before he dies?
5a. Evaluate the speaker's reasons for concluding that fame and love sink to "nothingness." It has been suggested by some critics that the love he refers to in line 14 is to be interpreted as approval or popularity—different from the "unreflecting love" of line 12, which is to be interpreted as romantic love. Do you agree with his thoughts on fame and approval? Why, or why not?
1b. What is "gleaning"? What does "teeming" mean? What might it mean to glean a teeming brain?
2b. In lines 5–8, what does the speaker fear he will not be able to do?
3b. What qualities would something that is "fairy-like" have? How might "unreflecting love" differ from feelings based on a critical examination of someone else? What is the speaker saying about his feelings when he refers to "the fairy power / Of unreflecting love"?
4b. How does reflecting on death change the speaker's desires for fame as a writer and for continuation of his "unreflecting love"?
5b. Consider the way in which both "When I Have Fears" by Keats and "Ozymandias" by Shelley deal with the nature of fame and earthly glory. What is the speaker of each poem saying about this subject?
Sonnet. What is the subject of each of the three quatrains and of the final couplet?
Theme. Why does the speaker call the person to whom this poem is addressed the "fair creature of an hour"? What is the speaker saying about love and life? How does this statement fit with the theme of the poem as a whole?
1a. Which, according to the speaker, is "sweeter," an actual melody or an imagined one?
2a. What is true of the boughs from the first line of stanza 3 that is not true of boughs in the real world?
3a. What question does the speaker ask about the town in stanza 4?
4a. Consider lines 45–47. What will be true when "this generation" is old? What is special about the people, trees, melodies, and other things pictured on the urn?
5a. In what sense might beauty be truth and truth beauty? Do you agree? Is this aphorism consistent with or contradictory of another familiar one, "beauty is only skin deep"?
1b. Why might this be so?
2b. What similarity do the boughs, the melody, and the love that are described in stanza 3 have?
3b. What speculations does the speaker make about the town in stanza 4? Why might the people have left the town? Why will it be silent forever more?
4b. Keats presents life as an enigma of unresolved opposites: joy and pain, permanence and transience, detachment and wild passion. He once said in a letter that the ideal state is "being in uncertainties, Mysteries and doubts without any irritable reaching after fact and reason." How is "Ode on a Grecian Urn" a reflection of this sentiment?
5b. Compare Keats's "Ode on a Grecian Urn" with "When I Have Fears." Is there a common theme in these selections? Explain.
Apostrophe. What objects or figures are addressed by the speaker in this poem? How does Keats use the technique of apostrophe to express his thoughts about the urn and about art?
Paradox. The well-known critic Harold Bloom has said, "Fulfillment, for Keats, is a betrayal of potential. The ideal for Keats is to be poised before experience." How do you interpret this comment in light of the paradoxes in "Ode on a Grecian Urn"?
1. Keats died at the age of 25, realizing the fear he described in "When I Have Fears." Write an appropriate epitaph for Keats, expressing some thoughts you have about him, his work, or the significance of his life.
2. Metaphors are important literary tools that give a simple description a color, taste, smell, or feeling that the reader recognizes. They bring the reader into the experience of the poem or story. What metaphors would you use to describe death, mortality, or immortality? Write several metaphors on this theme. First, write the tenor, the actual subject; then write the vehicle, the thing to which the subject will be likened. For example, if the tenor were "death," the vehicle could be "sleep" or "darkness."
3. A myth is a story that explains objects or events in the natural world as resulting from the action of some supernatural force or entity, most often a god. Write your own myth about the origins of art. In your myth, tell why some art form, such as music, painting, pottery-making, poetry, drama, or storytelling, was given to human beings. In other words, explain the importance of that art form to people. Tell what function or functions it serves. To prepare for writing your myth, you might want to read a few Greek or Native American myths in books from your school or community library.
Subject-Verb Agreement. Rewrite the following sentences to make subjects and verbs agree.
1. Each of the figures on the urn have a story to tell.
2. The maiden and her lover stands forever still.
3. Neither the melodies of the piper nor the song of the lover are heard.
4. One of the maidens are playing a harp.
5. Neither the poet nor his contemporaries was in favor of using reason to overrule emotion.
Researching Art. Research the vase art of classical Greece. Using, if possible, the library and art history texts as well as museums in your area, determine the various forms and uses of vases and urns in classical Greece. What sorts of scenes were typically depicted on them? How were they made? Can you find a vase or urn with scenes similar to those described in "Ode on a Grecian Urn"?
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