NCHS AP English Language

ODE ON A GRECIAN AND ITS RELEVANCE TO LIGHT IN AUGUST

"Ode on a Grecian" Urn by John Keats relates to the book Light In August by William Faulkner.

"THOU still unravish'd bride of quietness,
Thou foster-child of Silence and slow Time,
Sylvan historian, who canst thus express
A flowery tale more sweetly than our rhyme:
What leaf-fringed legend haunts about thy shape 5
Of deities or mortals, or of both,
In Tempe or the dales of Arcady?
What men or gods are these? What maidens loth?
What mad pursuit? What struggle to escape?
What pipes and timbrels? What wild ecstasy
"

This quote relates to the main character of this novel, Lena Grove. Lena is almost "suspended in time". She really has no apparently no real concept of the time that has passed around her. She still lives in the same circumstances with the same idea, looking for Lucas Burch, the father of her child. Even though things have changed, and he has left her, she still thinks that he wants to be there for her. Also, by calling her an "unravished bride" it is cluing us in to her naivete (sp?) that is mentioned above.

BY Lisa Elizondo

posted by Lisa @ 11:51 AM