Bits of Life 2

F-21 Words-600

of his nightmare, when he ‘saw pale kings and princes too’ and they warn him that the Lady

‘hath thee in thrall!’

In stanza eleven, the Knight concludes that as a result he has been left ‘alone and palely loitering’ in a desolate and withered landscape, where ‘no birds sing’.

What made the knight wander in the barren countryside?

It is the power of attraction no doubt, which doesn’t seem to be infatuation from the looks of it. Another point I noted was that the knight was not alone in losing sanity over the La belle Dam Sa Merci, but he finds to his shock that there were a number of victims of her charms. He was not the first nor would he be the last either.

“The latest dream I ever dreamed
On the cold hill side.

I saw pale kings, and princes too,
Pale warriors, death-pale were they all;
Who cried—"La belle Dame sans merci
Hath thee in thrall!"

There is little, if any, literary criticism or analysis of the poem in the nineteenth century. It was, however, visually interpreted by a number of artists, in particular the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. They savoured the imagery of La Belle, its medievalism, romance, and echoes of chivalry.

The poem won critical acclaim because of the overall air of mystery and Knight’s obsession with the beauty of his dreams and of course his heart warming imagery. The aura of romantic element dominates the poem.
They say there are several ways of reading this wonderful poem. It can be read like fairy tale, or a nightmare or from the point of view of a dark theme of loss and abandonment as well.

The Eve of St. Agnes

The very first line mesmerized me and took me to the cold environment of the England.

“St. Agnes' Eve—Ah, bitter chill it was!
The owl, for all his feathers, was a-cold;
The hare limp'd trembling through the frozen grass,
And silent was the flock in woolly fold:
Numb were the Beadsman's fingers,…”

Main story-

"The Eve of St. Agnes" is a Romantic narrative poem by John Keats, written in 1819.
It tells the story of two young lovers, Madeline and Porphyro, who must overcome a hostile, feuding family to escape together.

The poem begins in a freezing, dark castle, contrasting the coldness of the Beadsman’s prayers with the opulent, noisy party happening elsewhere in the home, where Madeline is present but detached.

Madeline wishes to perform the ritual of St. Agnes (fasting and sleeping) to dream of her future lover. Her secret lover, Porphyro, dares to enter the castle, which is full of his "blood-thirsty" enemies.

A sympathetic old nurse, Angela, reluctantly agrees to help Porphyro. She hides him in a closet in Madeline's chamber.

Madeline falls asleep, dreaming of Porphyro, while he watches her. Upon waking, she sees the real Porphyro, which frightens her, as he is cold and pale compared to her dream.

The Escape: Porphyro convinces her that he is real and devoted. They flee the castle, passing sleeping, drunken guards, and escape into the stormy night.

The Ending-

The story concludes with the lovers successfully escaping together. In the final, grim twist, the elderly Angela dies, and the Beadsman passes away, "among his ashes cold," symbolizing the end of an old, cold generation.

The St. Agnes’s Eve, one finds a clear stream of poetic thought gloriously fused with feeling and sensuous expression. With thought at the core, The Eve of St. Agnes contains the gradual taking off at several levels such as the story, the character exposition, the evocative quality of the