PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY

BIOGRAPHY

Shelley was born on August 4, 1792, at Field Place, near Horsham, Sussex (England). His father, Timothy Shelley, was a wealthy landowner. After some schooling at Isleworth, Shelley went to Eton College in 1804. He was of intellectual and imaginative nature. The political and social situations of that period nurtured his mind. He developed unorthodox views and attitude, his rebellious nature caused him being bullied by classmates. They called him “mad Shelley” because of his temperament. His interest in art and literature made him more intellectual and more rebellious.

Shelley proceeded to University College, Oxford, in 1810. His subjects, Metaphysics and Religious Polemics at college, developed his “passion for reforming the world”. He found a friend, Thomas Jefferson Hogg, who was also a sceptic and both published an anonymous pamplet entitled, “The Necessity of Atheism (1811)”. At that time, when criticism of Church and God was considered as a sin, they both questioned the supremacy of the Church, challenging for open debate. Therefore both, Shelley and Hogg were expelled from Oxford in March 1811.

After leaving Oxford, Shelley eloped to Scotland with a sixteen years old schoolgirl, Miss Harriet Westbrook, in August, 1811. Harriet was beautiful and intelligent, and tried her best to understand Shelley’s philosophy and political ideology, but she couldn’t and despite of having a child (Ianthe Eliza,) they separated. During this time Shelley visited Ireland and his supporting the Irish Nationalism, highlighted him to the British Authorities.

He was impressed by an utilitarian philosopher William Godwin, and in 1814, Shelley met his daughter, Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin, both fell in love and eloped to Europe. Though Godwin held bold opinions but he didn’t approve of the conduct of Shelley and Mary. Shelley’s first wife committed suicide in 1816. In 1818, he was in Rome when he wrote his classic Prometheus Unbound. Later, Shelley acquainted with Leigh Hunt, the poet and essayist, who helped him to uphold the reputation as a poet. He died on 8th July 1822, at the age of 29, when capsized in a sudden storm off the coast of the Gulf of Spezia.

Some descriptions of Shelley are : “windy phenomenon” (Carlyle); “sun-treader” (Browning); “a beautiful and ineffectual angel, beating in the void his luminous wings in vain” (Matthew Arnold); “elfin spirit in man’s form” (Hervegh, a German poet); “mild and amiable, but full of life and fun” (Edward Williams); “a mad viper” (his father’s solicitor); “at times almost a blackguard” (TS Eliot).

FEATURES IN HIS WORKS

LYRICISM

Shelley’s lyrics represent the highest achievement of romantic poetry. The beauty and charm of his lyrics are hardly surpassed by the poems of any other English writer. He is the most outstanding figure of younger generation romantic poets. Spontaneity is one of the most striking features of his lyrics. There is a great intensity of feelings, deep passion and emotions. He is always longing and craving for the impossible. In the poem, To Skylark, he contrasts the ecstasy and rapture of the bird’s songs with the sadness of human life. There is a feeling of melancholy in the poem, “To Night” in which the speaker longs for the swift coming of the Night.

His lyrics are surprisingly musical and sweet. We can understand it in his own line addressed to a Skylark,”Our sweetest songs are those that tell us of saddest thoughts.” The picture of “the locks of the approaching storm” spread on the blue surface of the aery surge of the West wind , and the West wind as a “dirge of the dying year” to which “this ending night will be the dome of a vast sepulcher” shows his abstract quality.

The similes in To Skylark poem, Skylark is compared to a “poet hideen in the light of thought”, “a high born maiden soothing her love laden soul with music sweet as love” are wonderful. In his poem Mutability, he says that virtue, friendship are all as short lived as a flower and human delight is as brief as a flash of lightning. Thus we may say, “His romantic and revolutionary lyrics explored the human spirit, nature and the connection between the world and the individual and he is the most lyrical poet.”

TREATMENT OF NATURE

Like the other romantic poets, Shelley had a deep and passionate love of nature. Allmost all of his poems abound in natural imagery. The description of paradisal Island, “It is an Isle under Ionian skies, Beautiful as a wreck of of Paradise” in poem Epipsychidion, is richly sensuous. In The Invitation, the concluding lines,”And all things seem only one/In the universal sun” the reference ‘the existence of a divine spirit in all objects of nature’ is made. ” …A spirit interfused around/a thrilling silent life/To momentary peace it bound…”, lines from The Recollection poem illustrate his belief in the power of nature to soothe the human heart. Ode to the West Wind presents Shellesy’s love for the changing phenomenon of Nature.

The wind, the sun, the moon, the stars, the oceans, etc are all treated as separate entities. This capacity for individualising the forces of Nature is called Shelley’s myth making power, because in Greek mythology too the the moon becomes Cynthia, Sun is called Apollo. He personifies the nature, but still the attributed qualities have scientific existence in the objects he use, i.e The West Wind has all the effects that are described iin the poem. Thus we can say that Shelley’s attitude to Nature is scientific.

Compton Rickett observes: “Whereas Wordsworth spiritualises and Shelley intellectualises Nature, Keats is content to express her (nature) through the senses.”

GODWIN’S THEORY

Godwin was an anarchist, who believed that man is capable of moral improvement. Character and intelligence depend on environment, not on heredity. He said that, after some suitable amendments in existing institutions, men could live happily, rationally and peacefully without government or class distinctions. He opposed religious tyranny, government and social institution. He even deplored the marriage customs advocating “free love” untill Shelley eloped with his own daughter.

Shelley, under Godwin’s effect attacks the Tyrants and dictator, saying that they make an emotional use of such catchwords, i.e. God, Heaven, Hell, etc, in order to keep the people under their own control. In Queen Mab, he criticises the power seeking priests. Prometheus Unbound is completely akin to Godwinian anarchy.

THEORY OF LIFE

In Mary Shelley’s words, “The prominent feature of Shelley’s theory of the destiny of the human species was that evil is not inherent in the system of creation, but an accident that might be expelled. Shelley believed that mankind had only to will that there would be no evil, and there would be none. That man could be so perfectionized as to be able to expel evil from his own nature, and from the greater part of the creation, was the cardinal point of his system.”

CHIEF WORKS

ZASTROZZI (1810)

A Gothic Novel, which was written in 1810, when he was at Eton. It was first published in 1810 in London by George Wilkie and John Robinson anonymously, with only the initials of the author’s name, as ‘by P.B.S’. It was his first published prose work. Zastrozzi, an illegitimate son sought revenge against Verezzi because Verezzi’s father had deserted his mother, Olivia, who died young, destitute, and in poverty. By murdering his own father, Zastrozzi only killed his corporeal body. By manipulating Verezzi into committing suicide, however, Zastrozzi confessed that his objective was to achieve the eternal damnation of Verezzi’s soul based on the proscription of the Christian religion against suicide. Zastrozzi, an outspoken atheist, goes to his death on the rack rejecting and renouncing religion and morality “with a wild convulsive laugh of exulting revenge”.

FRANKENSTEIN (1818)

It is not PB Shelley’s work. It was written by Mary Godwin (Marry Shelley). It is a combination of Gothic horror story and science fiction. Victor Frankenstein, a Swiss student of natural science who creates an artificial man from pieces of corpses and brings his creature to life. Though it initially seeks affection, the monster inspires loathing in everyone who meets it. Lonely and miserable, the monster turns upon its creator, who eventually loses his life. The first Frankenstein film was produced by Thomas Edison in 1910.

THE CENCI (1819)

Tragedy in Five Acts, is a verse drama (closet drama) in five acts. The horrific tragedy, set in 1599 in Rome, of a young woman, Beatrice Cenci, executed for the premeditated murder of her tyrannical father, was a well-known true story handed down orally.

PROMETHEUS UNBOUND (1820)

The ancient Greek dramatist, Aeschylus, had written Prometheus Bound. Zeus, the chief god, who had been tricked by Prometheus, a Titan, into accepting the bones and fat of sacrifice instead of the meat, hid fire from mortals. Prometheus stole it and returned it to Earth once again. As the price of fire, and as punishment, Zeus had him nailed to a mountain in the Caucasus and sent an eagle to eat his immortal liver. Shelley, in his Prometheus Unbound, frees the real hero, Prometheus who was chained by tyrant Zeus.

OTHER WORKS

1. ALASTOR (1816) : a blank-verse poem, that warns idealists not to abandon “sweet human love” and social improvement for the vain pursuit of fading dreams.
2. Ode to the West Wind (1819)
3. The Cloud ( autobiography of cloud )
4. Ode to Skylark : the poet contrasts the sorrow and suffering of mankind with the unspeakable joy of the bird.
5. To Night
6. Ozymandias : He was a great king who made lively statue of self to immortalise. But now, the statue lies broken in desert.
7. The Revolt of Islam (1817-1818): Famous line, Cynthia asks,”Can man be free if women be a slave.”
8. The Mask of Anarchy (1819) : revolutionary song, written by the news of “massacre of peterloo”.
9. Ode to Liberty (1820) : This poem was inspired by the Spanish revolution.
10. ADONAIS (1821): Elegy on the death of John Keats. Keats died of TB, in February, 1821.
11. Hellas (1821-1822) : lyrical drama, inspired by the Greek declaration of independence from Turkish yoke.

Ode to the West Wind

TEXT

I
O wild West Wind, thou breath of Autumn's being,
Thou, from whose unseen presence the leaves dead
Are driven, like ghosts from an enchanter fleeing,

Yellow, and black, and pale, and hectic red,
Pestilence-stricken multitudes: O thou,
Who chariotest to their dark wintry bed

The winged seeds, where they lie cold and low,
Each like a corpse within its grave, until
Thine azure sister of the Spring shall blow

Her clarion o'er the dreaming earth, and fill
(Driving sweet buds like flocks to feed in air)
With living hues and odours plain and hill:

Wild Spirit, which art moving everywhere;
Destroyer and preserver; hear, oh hear!

II
Thou on whose stream, mid the steep sky's commotion,
Loose clouds like earth's decaying leaves are shed,
Shook from the tangled boughs of Heaven and Ocean,

Angels of rain and lightning: there are spread
On the blue surface of thine aëry surge,
Like the bright hair uplifted from the head

Of some fierce Maenad, even from the dim verge
Of the horizon to the zenith's height,
The locks of the approaching storm.Thou dirge

Of the dying year, to which this closing night
Will be the dome of a vast sepulchre,
Vaulted with all thy congregated might

Of vapours, from whose solid atmosphere
Black rain, and fire, and hail will burst: oh hear!

III
Thou who didst waken from his summer dreams
The blue Mediterranean, where he lay,
Lull'd by the coil of his crystalline streams,

Beside a pumice isle in Baiae's bay,
And saw in sleep old palaces and towers
Quivering within the wave's intenser day,

All overgrown with azure moss and flowers
So sweet, the sense faints picturing them! Thou
For whose path the Atlantic's level powers

Cleave themselves into chasms, while far below
The sea-blooms and the oozy woods which wear
The sapless foliage of the ocean, know

Thy voice, and suddenly grow gray with fear,
And tremble and despoil themselves: oh hear!

IV
If I were a dead leaf thou mightest bear;
If I were a swift cloud to fly with thee;
A wave to pant beneath thy power, and share

The impulse of thy strength, only less free
Than thou, O uncontrollable! If even
I were as in my boyhood, and could be

The comrade of thy wanderings over Heaven,
As then, when to outstrip thy skiey speed
Scarce seem'd a vision; I would ne'er have striven

As thus with thee in prayer in my sore need.
Oh, lift me as a wave, a leaf, a cloud!
I fall upon the thorns of life! I bleed!

A heavy weight of hours has chain'd and bow'd
One too like thee: tameless, and swift, and proud.

V
Make me thy lyre, even as the forest is:
What if my leaves are falling like its own!
The tumult of thy mighty harmonies

Will take from both a deep, autumnal tone,
Sweet though in sadness. Be thou, Spirit fierce,
My spirit! Be thou me, impetuous one!

Drive my dead thoughts over the universe
Like wither'd leaves to quicken a new birth!
And, by the incantation of this verse,

Scatter, as from an unextinguish'd hearth
Ashes and sparks, my words among mankind!
Be through my lips to unawaken'd earth

The trumpet of a prophecy! O Wind,
If Winter comes, can Spring be far behind?

INTRODUCTION

Ode to the West Wind was written in 1819, in Cascine Wood, near Florence, Italy. It was published by Charles and Edmund Ollier, in 1820, as a part of the collection, ‘Prometheus Unbound: A Lyrical Drama in Four Acts, With Other Poems’. Some believe that the poem was written in response to the loss of his son, William (born to Mary Shelley) in 1819. The ensuing pain influenced Shelley to write this Ode.

At the time of the composition of this poem, Shelley without doubt had the “Peterloo Massacre” of August, 1819 in his mind. The poem is divided in two parts. The First Part (Stanza 1 to Stanza 3) introduces the power of the West Wind on the Earth, in the Sky and in the Ocean. The Second Part (Stanza 4 & 5) are subjective and autobiographical, that deal with the personal dilemma and helplessness of the poet, who is kneen to bring revolution through West Wind.

THEME OF THE POEM

The poem allegorises the role of the poet as ‘the voice of change and revolution’. Shelley wanted his message of “reform and revolution” spread, and the wind becomes the hope/metaphor for spreading the words of change through the poet-prophet figure.

According to Harold Bloom, “Ode to the West Wind” reflects two types of ode traditions, The Pindaric Ode and The Horatian Ode. Generally, Ode in England was more of a “vehicle of expressing the sublime, lofty thoughts of intellectual and spritual concerns.”

VOCABULARY

• Enchanter : a person who uses magic or sorcery, especially to put someone or something under a spell.
• Hectic : very busy with a lot of things that you have to do quickly.
• Pestilence : any fatal disease that spreads quickly and kills a large number of people.
• Azure : blue (cloudless sky)
• Clarion : a musical instrument
• Hue : a shad of color
• Zenith : peak point, highest point
• Sepulcher: chamber over graves
• Impetuous : marked with violent force
• Incantation : chanting ritual recitation

EXPLANATION

STANZA I

The opening stanza describes the activities of the West Wind on land. West wind is addressed as the ‘breath of autumn’s being’ (metaphor). No doubt that the West Wind blows during autumn. The West wind drives the dead leaves before it just as a magician drives away ghosts by his approach (simile). The wind is compared (metaphorically) with the epidemic or pestilence, who lead’st the people to run away from the diseased area, in the same way the wind drive away the dead leaves. The wind finds a parallel with the “pestilence” and the leaves with “multitudes”.

The leaves are yellow, black, pale and red, as if they had died of some infectious disease. The imagery is highly appealing. The West Wind scatters the seeds far and near, and covers them with dust so that they are buried underground (in their dark and wintry bed) and lie there like corpses in their graves (simile) for a long time till the coming of spring.

As the Earth is facing autumn, it seems that it is sleeping and dreaming. ‘Thine azure-sister’, spring’ wind will awaken the dreaming earth by blowing it’s trumpet. The seeds which were buried by the the West wind will sprout into plants. As the shepherd brings his flocks in open air to feed, or the flocks of the birds feed in air, the spring will sprout the seeds and the flowers grown will fill the plains and hills with their sweet smells and attractive colours.

In the couplet, the poet addresses the West Wind as a “wild spirit” who not only destroyes the dead leaves, but also preserves “the seeds”. In this way the poet calls the West Wind both, destroyer and preserver. Finally, with the refrain, ‘Oh hear!’ the poet urges the wind to liten to him.

NOTE : 1. West Wind…’breath of autumn’s being’..’enchanter’..’pestilence’..’Chariot’..’wild spirit’..’destroyer & preserver’. 2. Leaves…’ghosts’..’multitudes’. 3. Seeds…’corpse’. 4. East Wind…’azure sister of West wind’..’shephard’. 5. Sweet buds…’flocks’.

• Apostrophe: throughout the poem the poet addresses the West Wind.
• Personification: “West wind, spring, autumn, earth are personified”.
• Metaphor: “breath of autumn’s being”…”pestilence stricken multitudes”…”chariotest”…”dark wintry bed”…”Clarion”.
• Simile: “dead leaves like ghosts”…”winged seeds like a corpse”…”sweet buds like flocks”.
• Transfer Epithet: “azure sister”.
• Paradox: “destroyer and preserver”.
• Hypallage: syntactic relationship between two terms is interchanged or inversion of normal order…”leaves dead”…”enchanter fleeing”
• Symbols: “seeds” symbolise the possibility of rebirth and renewal. “Flocked” symbolise the innocence and beauty of life. Preserver, Lord Vishnu and Destroyer, Lord Shiva strengthen the theme of “Death and Rebirth”.

STANZA II

The second stanza shows the turbulence and wildness of the West Wind in the air/sky. The West Wind carries on its surface loose clouds which seems to have fallen from sky just as withered leaves fall from the branches of trees in autumn. The imaginatory tree, whose roots are in the Ocean and the boughs are in the sky, presents the scientific process of the formation of clouds. The clouds floating on the surface of the West Wind are messenger of rain and lightening (angels of rain and lightening). When stormy conditions develop in the sky, the clouds are taken away like dead leaves by the West Wind.

‘The locks of the approachng storm’, spread on the aery surface (at zenith) of the West Wind look like the bright hairs uplifted from the head of a frenzied Maenad (simile). Maenads are drunken female followers of the Greek God of Wine Dionysius (Bacchus). By ‘the dirge of the dying year’, the poet compares the West Wind, with a funeral song sung at the end of the year (metaphor).

The darkness of the night which is spread over the earth will serve as the dome of the tomb which seems like vaulted by the clouds. And with the strength of the West Wind the vapours/clouds will cause a wild storm of ‘black rain, and fire and hell’, that will destroy everything. The poet believes that without destroying tha old customs, new thoughts can’t take place.

NOTE: 1. Clouds…”like decaying leaves”..”angels of reign and lightening”..”like hair of Maenad”..”locks of approaching storm”..”vault/roof of the tomb”. 2. West Wind..”dirge of dying year”. 3. Closing Night..”dome of vast sepulcher”.

• Simile: “loose clouds like earth’s decaying leaves..”…”like the bright hair…some fierce Maenad”.
• Metaphor: “stream” means surface; “earth’s decaying leaves”….earth=tree…; “shook from tangled boughs of Heaven and Ocean”…clouds=leaves, Heaven and ocean=tree…; “Angels of rain and lightening”; “dirge of dying year”; “dome of vast sepulcher”.
• Personification: “like bright hair…. fierce Maenad” clouds are personified; “locks of approaching storm”.
• Death imagery in “black rain, and fire, and hail will burst”.

STANZA III

The West Wind has by its violence and fury, disturbed the Mediterranean in his sleep.During summer the Mediterranean had been soothed by the pleasant sound of the bright rivers which fell into it. The poet specified the place, an island made of lava in Baiae’s bay, near Naples, Italy, where the palaces and towers on the coastal area submerged in the sea. The blue Mediterranean had been seeing dreams of these Old palaces and towers slightly trembling in the bright and clear light of the day. They are overgrown with ‘moss and flowers’- sea vegetations. This scenery is so beautiful that the very thought of them would make us feel drowsy.

Then we see the effect of West Wind on the Atlantic Ocean. Atlantic Ocean’s surface was in level before West Wind started blowing, the wild force of the wind cleaves the waves of the ocean and we could see the oozy plants growing at its bottom, they have no sap in them. In autumn, when these hear the West Wind, they tremble with fear and shed their leaves.

Shelley again requests the West Wind to listen to him. Both the Mediterranean and the Atlantic are here personified, just as autumn, spring, the storm, the year, and the West Wind itself, have been personified before. It show Shelley’s myth making power.

NOTE: 1. The civilizations, political and social institutions and dead customs tremble when they hear the sound of West Wind ( the rise of revolution ).

• Metaphor: “coil of his crystalline streams”…like serpents coil….; “cleaves themselves into chasms”…”suddenly grow gray with fear”.
• Personification: “waken from his summer dreams”….; “he lay/Lull’d by the coil of his crystalline streams”…; “know/Thy voice, and suddenly grow gray with fear,/ and tremble and despoil themselves”.
• Transfer epitaph: “azure moss and flowers”…blue sea.
• Symbols: “Old palaces and towers” symbolise the past/history, the decay of generations/civilizations. Theme of death and rebirth introduced again.

STANZA IV

In this stanza, the poet becomes personal. He establishes a connection between himself and the West Wind. He wishes that if he were a leaf, a cloud, or a wave of the ocean so that the West Wind could carry him on its wings. He feels a keen desire to taste the fierce strength of the West Wind. The West Wind is uncontrollable. The West Wind enjoys unlimited freedom.

The poet recalls his boyhood when he could surpass the West Wind in speed and when he could easily accompany it in its upward flight. If he had still that energy and vitality which he possessed in his youth, he would not have felt the need of seeking the help of the West Wind. But he is the victim of time now, he is helpless, the circumstances have chained and bent him down. He is not tameless and swift like his boyhood. He needs the help of the West Wind.

He appeals to the West Wind to lift him as a leaf, a cloud, or a wave because he has greatly suffered in life and under the weight of his misfortunes, he feels almost crushed and is helpless now. He is not powerful as he used to be in his boyhood. The stanza reflects the personal conflict and dilemma of the poet.

NOTE : Poet wants to be a dead leaf, a swift cloud or a wave, so that the wind might take him as her companion. “The thorns of life” symbolise the sufferings and misfortunes of life. He is feeling like Bhishm Pitamah, of Mahabharat, sleeping on the bed of arrows, bleeding. He might be remembering the early death of his son William.

• Simile: “I would ne’er have striven/as thus with thee in prayer in my sore need”…; “lift me as a wave, a leaf, a cloud”..; “one too like thee: tameless, and swift, and proud”.
• Metaphor: “A wave to pant beneath thy power”…; “thy wandering over heaven”…; “the thorns of life”..; “heavy weight of hours”.
• Personification: “a wave to pant”…; “thy wandering over heaven”.
• Synaesthesia: interchange of sensory impressions. i.e. “azure moss and flowers/So sweet, the sense faints picturing them”.
• I bleed… symbolises poets disappointment and diminshment.

STANZA V

The final stanza includes the whole universe in its sweep. The poet appeals to the West Wind to treat him as it’s lyre just as it treats the forest. The poet regards the forest as a stringed musical instrument on which the West Wind blows, producing harmonious sounds. The poet too is passing through the autumn of his life, just as the forest is passing through its autumn. The poets abilities and strength are falling like the dead leaves of the forest. The poet asks the wind to take away the gloom of his life as it does with the barren trees of forest.

He seeks a union with the forceful or fierce spirit of the West Wind. He asks the West Wind to drive and scatter his dead thoughts over the universe so that they may stimulate the forces of progress and bring about a new era in human history. As the ashes and sparks fly in all directions from a hearth where the fire has not completely gone, the poet wants the wind to scatter his words/thoughts that are not much powerful but still have the strength to change.

He wishes the West Wind to act as his mouthpiece for the utterance of his prophecy regarding the arrival of the Golden Age. Just as the winter is surely followed in natural course by spring, similarly this era of misery and evil will surely be followed by an era of perfect happiness, love and beauty. Beauty and Love will reign over the Earth. There will neither be evil nor injustice nor suffering among human beings.

NOTE : The poem ends with this optimistic thought, “if winter comes, can spring be far behind”..if there are evils, sufferings, griefs, one day their will be a healthy life of happiness. “Dead thoughts”…”dead leaves”..”ashes and sparks”.

• Personification: “unawaken’d earth”.
• Metaphor: “my leaves”…poet compares himself as the Cassine woods.
• Simile: “what if my leaves are falling like its own”..; “..dead thoughts like wither’d leaves…”…; “as from an unextinguish’d hearth / Ashes and sparks, my words among mankind!”.

STRUCTURE OF THE POEM

This is an Ode, mainly having two parts. Part one (stanza 1 to 3) discusses the West Wind’s strength and Part two (stanza 4 & 5) are autobiographical. There are total five cantos of fourteen lines each. Shelley manages this ode in Terza Rima. The fourteen lines of each cantos are divided into four tercets and a couplet. Rhyme scheme of the poem is ABA BCB CDC DED EE. The metre is Iambic pentameter with some variation.