"On First Looking Into Chapman's Homer"

This poem is a sonnet by John Keats (1795-1821). Keats shows his astonishment and fascination faced with fantastic places and travels. This feeling was, probably, influenced by Homer and the voyages in the "Odyssey". In my opinion the poem could have two meanings: On one hand, the author writes about voyages, explorations... quite popular at that time (XIXth century). We can read about Cortez, "realms of gold", "western islands", "...wide expanse...", "...Pacific...", etc. It seems obvious that all these refer to the "New World" (America). On the other hand, if we have a look at the title of the poem, we will realise that Keats refers to Chapman’s translation of Homer's "Odyssey", and Keat's fascination after reading it. So, this poem is also about the author's feelings after read this kind of books, because he feels free, as an explorer that discover a new land or as Ulysses looking for his home.

As we said before, "On First Looking Into Chapman's Homer" is a sonnet. It has fourteen verses: an octet plus a sextet. The structure of the rhyme is: abbaacca dedede. So we can say that it is an Italian or Petrarchan sonnet. Each line contains 10 syllables. It has also a true rhyme because the sounds at the end of the verses are identical: gold-hold; seen-been; told-bold; skies-eyes, ken-men.

The title of the poem is plain and direct: "On First Looking Into Chapman's Homer". After reading the title, you already know that something of Homer's books interests the author. As we will see later on, something in the books changed Keats life. He had never read Homer before, until Chapman translated the "Odyssey" into English. We said that Keats time was the time of explorers, discoveries.... for Keats reading the "Odyssey" was also a discover for himself. He found parallelisms between Ulysses' voyages, and his voyage through life. We will explain that in a later analysis.

Reading the version of the "Odyssey" gave Keats energy, happiness... as he says in the poem: "Yet I did never breathe its pure serene/ Till I heard Chapman speak loud and bold. So, after reading this book, Keats, feels free from the real life, he could be an explorer, a hero or whatever: "Then I felt like some watcher of the skies / When a new planet swims into his ken;/ Or like stout Cortez...

Keats, probably identified his life with a voyage: "Much I travel'd in the realms of gold, / And many goodly states and kingdoms seen; / Round many western islands have I been /. But he had never enjoyed his life until he read Homer's books, that could means that he had never enjoyed life until he met literature or poetry: "Yet did I never breathe this pure serene / Till I heard Chapman speak out loud and bold: /.

The places Keats travelled in this poem might refer to the world of literature, because we can read: "Round many western islands have I been / Which bards in fealty to Apollo hold /. As Ulysses, Keats has visited Apollo's islands near Greece. Keat was not looking for his home, but for inspiration: Apollo was the God of poetry and music. So Keats travelled in order to find the inspiration he needed to write. Homer gave him this inspiration because reading his books, the author found a "new world" of fantasy, or as he says in the poem: "Then I felt like some watcher of the skies / When a new planet swims into his ken; /.

Homer opened a door to Keats, and he saw that new world as a huge amount of inspiration: "He stared at the Pacific -and all his men / Looked at each other with a wild surmise- / silent, upon a peak in Darien."

There most common literary language is the metaphor, in fact the entire poem is a metaphor, as we saw before. There are as well some comparisons: “…I felt I like some watcher of the skies…”, and ellipsis: “…I never breathe its pure serene.”

The vocabulary of the poem deals with exploration, travels and discoveries. We can see nouns referred to lands or possessions: "realms", "states", "kingdoms", "demesne", "wide expanse". Verbs that means movement or body feelings: "travel'd", "seen", "been", "been told", "breathe", "heard", "felt”, "star'd", "look'd".

We can say as well that this poem is positive, because the use of positive adjectives and adverbs: "goodly", "pure", "serene".

The poem is written en first person, that means that the author is talking about himself, his own experience or desire.

Finally, just to say that in my opinion this is a really nice sonnet. It compares his life with historic or fantastic travels and spreads positivism to the reader.

Óscar Fernández Adriá

Academic year 2005-06
© a.r.e.a./Dr.Vicente Forés López
© Óscar Fernández Adrià
Universitat de València Press
osfera@alumni.uv.es