John Keats' When I Have Fears as a representation of his balance of creative manifestation

A detailed Summary of John Keats' When I Have Fears as a representation of his balance of creative manifestation

In his brilliant poem, When I Have Fears, John Keats uses several metaphors to explain the three principal things that he will miss when he "cease(s) to be". The third quatrain deals with his lover, whom he fears he will not live long enough to love completely, which ironically was the case in his real life. In the last two lines of the poem, Keats reveals another love of his, which is fame, but he also resolves his fears of losing the things that are dear to him. In the first two quatrains he reveals that writing poetry is also one of his principle loves, and that he fears that his death will come before he can manifest all of his ideas or write and publish all of the poems that he could. Strangely, Keats uses two metaphors to express his love of poetry; a metaphor of "gleaning a teeming brain," and one of tracing cloudy shadows with "the magic hand of chance." Keats' metaphors represent two methods of approaching creative writing, which he feels are necessary for creative balance.

His first use of metaphor is in the first quatrain where he fears that he may die

"Before (his) pen has gleaned (his) teeming brain,

Before high-piled books, in charact'ry,

Clearly Keats is stating that he is afraid to die before he can write and publish all of the poetic ideas in his head. Grain goes to waste if a farmer can not harvest it before the winter comes, much like Keats ideas will go to waste if he can not manifest them before his death. The metaphor is also significant, however, because it represents one school of thought about writing poetry. The grain metaphor assumes that all of the ideas for Keats' poems are inside his head, and that writing poetry is just the art of getting that "grain" out of your brain and onto paper. This suggests that writing poetry be based not on inspiration, but on perspiration.

The second metaphor is of Keats tracing shadows, "with the magic hand of chance." He still is expressing his passion for poetry, but now he introduces an entirely different method to creative writing. In this quatrain he refers to poetic ideas as, "huge cloudy symbols of a high romance," and fears that he will not live long enough to "trace their shadows." This metaphor suggests that ideas are not "gleaned" out of teeming brains, but instead are pulled out of the "nights stared face", and at the will of random inspiration. Keats uses night as a me

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Approximate Word count = 814
Approximate Pages = 3 (250 words per page double spaced)

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