Monday 16 February 2009

Simple Beauty, Simple Truth

I had a thought. There are so many questions asked in the "Ode on a Grecian Urn"; I began to think of questions I've had throughout my life and questions others I know have had. And most deal with these: What is beautiful and where can I find it? And, what is truth and where can I find it? During this poem I felt tense; the questions were provoking and difficult ("Who are these coming to the sacrafice?"). But when those lines "'Beauty is truth, truth beauty,'"--that is all/ Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know" came in, I felt simplicity come; I also felt a measuring stick revealed, something I could use in my judgement. I felt that Keats was saying, "You don't need anyone to tell you what is beautiful or not. You don't need anyone guessing what is true for you. It's simple, just know that Truth is beautiful and Beauty is truthful and you can be on your way.
Posted by at

1 comment:

  1. Andy15 March 2009 at 23:36

    I think you're definitely on to something.

    I also feel like Keats is giving us a sort of frustrated, throw-your-hands-up-in-the-air declaration of the importance of the aforementioned "truth and beauty" above perhaps all else. I'm thinking of a line from a movie, but I can't remember the movie (or the line, for that matter), but it has something to do with nothing mattering but beauty in the world (no, it's not American Beauty, although that was my first instinct), so we have to find that as best we can, however we can.

    And if Keats found it on a really old jar, who knows where we'll be able to find it.

    ReplyDelete

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)