Ode tp the West Wind by P.B. Shelley

Introduction - “Ode the West Wind” is Shelley’s Ode in five sections in terza rima. It is written in the autumn season of 1819 and published in 1820. The poet presents its appearance, its action and message. Its appearance is wild and tempestuous. Its action reveals itself as a preserver and a destroyer. It drives the dead leaves. It carries the seeds and deposits them so that they may sprout again into life when spring comes. The wind is the trumpet of prophecy. 

“If winter comes, can spring be far behind?”

The west wind has the power to change whatever it touches. The leaf, he cloud and the wave feel the Impulse of its strength

. “Oh,  life me as a wave, a leaf, a cloud!

I fall upon the thorns of life!

I bleed!

Some facts about P.B. Shelley

Birth

4^th August 1792 ( at Field place near Horsham in Sussex)

Death

Shelley died in Italy by drawing, in 8^th July 1822

Shelley was the eldest son of Timothy and Elizabeth. He was educated at Eton where he was known as “Mad Shelley”. He was expelled from the University in 1811 for writing a pamphlet “The Necessity of Atheism”. He married Harriet Westbrook. She committed suicide in 1816. After the death of Harriet, Shelley passed the some time with Leigh Hunt at Hampstead and on December 1816, married Mary Godwin, the daughter of Godwin. Shelley was drowned while sailing in a boat off the Italian Coast across the Bay of Spezzzia . The name of the boat was Ariel. Byron, Leigh and Trelawney lit his pyre.

 

Text of the poem with explanation “ode to the West wind”

I canto

O Wild West Wind, thou breathe 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’ 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!

 

In the first canto of this poem the poet describes natural phenomena, journey of life from birth to death. The poet talks about the capabilities of wind, the wind is invisible. Yet it can scatter the leaves. he describes the colour of leaf as yellow, white, and red. The wind moves them like sick people. He uses this example in this ode  for the purpose to explanation of the role at the west wind, leaves cannot moves spontaneously ,therefore it is the wind that helps its to move from one place to another.

Poet again says that it is the wind that spread the seed in autumn and buries them . the seed is start growing in the spring season . if the west wind is melancholic then at the same it causes the growth of new plants on the earth . apart from this , west wind also spreads the fragrance of flowers while scattering them here and there.

 

II canto

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 lighting: there are spread

On the blue surface of thine airy 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 sky congregated might

Of vapours, from whose solid atmosphere

Black rain and fire, and hell will burst: O hear!

 

In second canto poet further says that we see wind as a lively objects of nature. This performs an action for the welfare of the society and humanity. Wind not only scatters the leaves but also moves the clouds in the sky. Poet again says that without wind leaves and flowers are powerless on the Earth. It seems that the poet just praises the beauty and duty f the west wind. Wind helps the clouds to move to a specific location and cause rain on Earth. now here we can observe that every romantic poet has his specific attributes similarly it is Shelley’s poetic characteristic that he blows soul in different objects of nature

 

III canto

Thou who didest waken from his summer dreams

The blue Mediterranean, where he lay,

Lulled 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 for below

The sea-blooms and the oozy woods which wear

The sapless foliage of the ocean, known

Thy voice and suddenly grow grey with fear,

And tremble and despoil themselves: O hear!

In third canto, the poet uses blue Mediterranean, crystalline streams isle of Baiae’s bay palace and tower as beautiful images in this stanza. He imagines the presence of wind on those areas of Earth and shows us the look and feels of those things. all the things in this stanza shows that sensation is the prominent feature of Shelley’s poetry. His strong imagination adds him to the list of most romantic poet  in the history of English Literature. He ends the stanza with the sentence “O hears!” It means that he is trying to talk to the wind as a lively human creature.

 

IV canto

If I were a dead leaf thou mightiest 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 will be

The comrade of thy wonderings over Heaven,

As then, when to outstrip thy skiey speed

Scares seemed a vision; I might 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 strike the thorns of life! I bleed!

A heavy weight of hours has chained and bowed

One to like thee: tameless, and swift and proud

In forth canto, we can see that Romantic poets like Wordsworth consider that it is their prime duty to escape from the realistic world. Shelley also does the same in this ode. He escapes from the harsh world and feels himself in the arms of wind which we can see in these lines-

“if I were a dead leaf thou mightiest bear;

If I were a swift cloud to fly with thee;”

In above line poet wishes to fly with west wind and wants to see each and every place, explanation of which he gives in the last stanza of the ode. He repeats the wind to take him with it. Reality is harsh and escapism is the only solution of every such problem. poet desires to fly to a far away land which is free from the pants and miseries of life is evident that he loves fantasies . Thus he prays to the west wind to left him and take him away from the stubborn miseries of life.

 

V canto

Make me thy lyre, whilst 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 witherd leaves to quicken a new birth!

And, by the incantation of this verse,

Scatter,as from an unextinguished hearth

Ashes and sparks, my words among mankind!

Be through my lips to unawakened earth

The trumpet of prophecy! O Wind,

If winter comes, can spring be far behind?

In the final or fifth canto, the poet portrays of the melancholy and decorous quality of wind. The poet knows that he can never fly like the cloud .but he re wishes to do so. However he realizes that he cannot go with the wind he becomes sad. Nature always attracts Romantic poets, hence, he insists on going with it. He requests that he wants to be part of the west wind until the spring comes and takes over the winter when he says , “the trumpet of prophecy” he is specifically referring to the end of the world as bible describes it .

Ode to the West Wind is one of the greatest and most powerful ode in English Literature. This is composed by P.B. Shelley, full name Percy Bysshe Shelley. He was one of the major English Romantic poets. Thus “Ode to the West Wind”. By Shelley is the best ode in English literature.

Themes

Shelley engages with themes of death, rebirth, and poetry in “Ode to the West Wind” from the start poet describes the wind as something powerful and destructive. It takes away the summer and brings winter, a season usually associated with death and sorrow. Without death, there is no  birth. The wind serves an important role in preserving this.

Structure and Form

 “Ode to the West Wind” by Shelly is written in Terza rima . This refers to an interlocking Rhyming scheme. The first stanza is written in the pattern of ABA while the second uses the same “B” rhyme sound and adds a “C”  . so it looks like BCB. So the rhyming scheme of this poem is “ABA BCB CDC DED EE.” This repeats throughout the next until the final two lines which rhyme as a couplet. This poem is written in Iambic pentameter. This means that most of the lines contain five sets of two beats. The first of which is unstressed and the second that is stressed. This pattern does change on some lines more than others.

 

Literary devices

The poet makes use of several literary devices in “Ode to the West Wind”. These include alliteration. Personification, apostrophe, hyperbole, simily, symbolism imagery, enjambment etc. literary devices is used in this poem.