AQA-A A2 English Literature Unit 4

Yeah, I've spent today basically planning loadsa essay questions (haven't done a single timed one though) trying to get quicker and quicker. How long do you think the planning time should be? I'm aiming for 10 mins to pick question and start writing.

anyone come up with any light/dark imagery? (keats)

also....can anyone quote endymion? I basically know about it and can say its full of imagery and sensuous language but as far as quotes go i'm stuck...anyone want to share some quick one liners that help present different themes?

I'll go first...erm....

"why were they proud? why in the name of glory were they proud?" (Isabella)

Shows Keats' feelings toward the "monkey mongering" capitalist brothers, and is one of very few political statements made in his poetry. Use if for context..e.g. "power to the people" atmosphere of the french revolution.

now you go!

(sorry, that was an easy one, but important none the less!)

If I were u I wouldn't interpret the question as literal light v dark: i'd use it as an excuse to talk about the contrast that Keats buids up. Some ideas I came up with:
- Contrast between joy and pain throughout collection. Ode to Melancholy: says you cannot separate the two (link to context and negative capability). The two need to be balanced out: when a "melancholy fit" occurs, "glut thy sorrow on a morning rose": i.e. balance it out with pleasure. Says that those who experience joy will eventually be susceptible to melancholy: those who can "burst Joy's grape" against their "fine palate" will eventually become one of melancholy's "cloudy trophies". So here light, in this case joy, is juxtaposed against the dark imagery of melancholy to convey typically Romantic idea that melancholy occurs with bliss in life.
- This idea extended to Lamia: Keats's cynical view of their relationship is enforced when we learn that she claims their relationship will "unperplex bliss from its neighbour pain". We know from Ode on Melancholy that Keats believes this cannot happen, so it enforces the idea that the two are part and parcel of life. This also links to idea of femmes fatales which Keats was concerned with (context).
- Also, contrast between movement and static within his poetry: Hyperion (fragment) says that one must be "content to stoop" - this is "nature's law", and we are presented with the idea that change is beautiful - "fresh perfection treads". The way in which the titans are being phased out and replaced with the new order, the Olympian Gods, reflects this - the Titans become "grey-haired", "nerveless" and "listless" in comparison to the "Infant thunderers" who replace them. Contrast built up here.
- This links to Ode on a Grecian Urn - idea that something which remains static lacks beauty. Urn is personified as "still unravished bride", and Keats ponders over whether or not the image of an unravished bride frozen on the urn would embody virginal perfection or the torture of unconsummated passion - will she be "warm" and "still to be enjoyed" or "forever panting" and "high-sorrowful"? This is another contrast that Keats builds up, and he concludes that something which remains static ends up as "cold pastoral" compared to the beauty of life, which changes constantly. "Beauty is truth..." reflects this - there is beauty in times changing. This poem also reflects Romantic poets' interest in art.
- erm.... other contrasts: dream v reality: 'Eve of St. Agnes'. Madeline pre-occupied with dream: she has "vague regardless eyes", implying the extent to which this fantasy has become an obsession. Strength of this also implied through "poppied warmth" - narcotic connotations (reflects Romantics' interest in drugs). Porphyro penetrates her dreams by "taking her hollow lute" - he has sex with her.
- Dream v reality: 'Ode to a nightingale' - wants to escape real world via nightingale's "viewless wings of poesy". "dull opiate" - narcotic again - strength of experience. Difficult to return to reality: has to be "tolled" to reality: cf St Agnes' Eve: "painful change", Hyperion: "pain of truth".

These contrasts could all be linked back to the light/dark thing, there are some more literal contrasts of light and dark, like the old man v the lovers in St Agnes' Eve: "snarling trumpets" v "tender chords of hollow lute" etc. hope that helps!

WOW! ok...so, do you wanna come and help me in the exam tomorrow?

If I could give rep then I would...it won't let me! (do you know how to?)

seriously though, thanks for your help.Did you answer this without the books cos your quotes are really good. I think tomorrow morning I'm gonna reread all the poems (well, most of them) and then scan through my Othello. I have it on CD so I'm hoping it'll all sink in to my brain tonight whilst I'm asleep...a likely story!

What time is everyone stopping revision? I've revised none stop all day for this exam, sort of ignoring the fact I have TWO the next day...hohum x

Does anybody know what Keats means in Fall of Hyperion when he says "a poet is a sage, humanist, physician to all men", apart from that a poet is wise (a sage is a wise man apparently!)? I'm at a loss about the humanist and physician part!!

could it be the influence of his medicinal career? Perhaps Keats is explaining how he is a healer for the soul as well as the physical body...for example his cure for meloncholy, well, more advice really! The humanist part is perhaps the fact that he reaches out for people and their individual feelings? Keats, as a romantic was very interested in people and their emotions...?

but to be quite honest...I haven't got the foggiest!

so???? how was it for everyone? i thought it was ok!

which questions did you all do? i did q2 on othello (emilia and desdemona) and i did q20 on keats (rejects wordliness)

i'm so glad it's over, but i have to say i will miss english lit-that was my last exam ever for englit so i'm feeling a bit nostalgic!

I thought the exam went really well actually! I did question 1, about Othello being a barbarian, and question 20, the rejection of worldliness one. Just hope I talked about relevant stuff for question 20: i saw it as meaning he rejects knowledge of the world, so said that some of his poems did not meet this: e.g. 'Ode on Melancholy' accepts the mixed nature of world blah blah blah!.

The only thing which I am worried about: I had an additional sheet and I attached it to my answer book, wrote that I'd used one sheet on the front of the answer book, but forgot to put my name on the extra sheet! Will it matter, i'm worried now?!!!