Love & Beauty

John Keats:
Keats is called the poet of beauty or some critics address him as ‘the worshiper of beauty’. Keats’s notion of beauty and truth is highly inclusive. That is, it blends all life’s experiences or apprehensions, negative or positive, into a holistic vision. Art and nature, therefore, are seen as therapeutic in function. Keats was considerably influenced by Spenser and was, like the latter, a passionate lover of beauty in all its forms and manifestation. This passion for beauty constitutes his aestheticism. Beauty, indeed, was his pole-star, beauty in Nature, in woman, and in art. He writes and defines beauty:
“A think of beauty is joy for ever”
In John Keats, we have a remarkable contrast both with Byron and Shelley. He knows nothing of Byron’s stormy spirit of antagonism to the existing order of things and he had no sympathy with Shelley’s humanitarian real and passion for reforming the world. But Keats likes and worships beauty. In his Ode on a Grecian Urn, he expresses some powerful lines about his thoughts of beauty. This ode contains the most discussed two lines in all of Keats's poetry:
“Beauty is truth, truth beauty," - that is all
Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.”
The exact meaning of those lines is disputed by everyone; no less a critic than TS Eliot considered them a blight upon an otherwise beautiful poem. Scholars have been unable to agree to whom the last thirteen lines of the poem are addressed. Arguments can be made for any of the four most obvious possibilities, -poet to reader, urn to reader, poet to urn, poet to figures on the urn. The issue is further confused by the change in quotation marks between the original manuscript copy of the ode and the 1820 published edition.

P. B. Shelley:
Shelley expresses love as one of the God-like phenomena in human life and beauty is the intellectual beauty to him. We find the clear idea of Shelley’s love and beauty through Hymn to the Intellectual Beauty. The poem's process is doubly figurative or associative, in that, once the poet abstracts the metaphor of the Spirit from the particulars of natural beauty, he then explains the workings of this Spirit by comparing it back to the very particulars of natural beauty from which it was abstracted in the first place: "Thy light alone, like mist o'er mountains driven"; "Love, Hope, and Self-esteem, like clouds depart..." This is an inspired technique, for it enables Shelley to illustrate the stunning experience of natural beauty time and again as the poem progresses, but to push the particulars into the background, so that the focus of the poem is always on the Spirit, the abstract intellectual ideal that the speaker claims to serve.
Of course Shelley's atheism is a famous part of his philosophical stance, so it may seem strange that he has written a hymn of any kind. He addresses that strangeness in the third stanza, when he declares that names such as "Demon, Ghost, and Heaven" are merely the record of attempts by sages to explain the effect of the Spirit of Beauty--but that the effect has never been explained by any "voice from some sublimer world." The Spirit of Beauty that the poet worships is not supernatural; it is a part of the world. It is not an independent entity; it is a responsive capability within the poet's own mind.
If the "Hymn to Intellectual Beauty" is not among Shelley's very greatest poems, it is only because its project falls short of the poet's extraordinary powers; simply drawing the abstract ideal of his own experience of beauty and declaring his fidelity to that ideal seems too simple a task for Shelley. His most important statements on natural beauty and on aesthetics will take into account a more complicated idea of his own connection to nature as an expressive artist and a poet, as we shall see in "To a Skylark" and "Ode to the West Wind." Nevertheless, the "Hymn" remains an important poem from the early period of Shelley's maturity. It shows him working to incorporate Wordsworthian ideas of nature, in some ways the most important theme of early Romanticism, into his own poetic project, and, by connecting his idea of beauty to his idea of human religion, making that theme explicitly his own.

All we need in our life is the feeling of satisfaction and in the long run most of us seem to be mourning the lack of it. Perhaps this feeling of satisfaction is the provable solution to entire human life problems. Percy Bysshe Shelley and John Keats are of this dissatisfied section and they are in quest for beauty. They believe in beauty as an abstract idea that provides with satisfaction. Beauty as a concept stands in a wholesome stand and people of every generation try to reach closure to this whole of beauty. But it is not possible to understand and to feel the whole concept of beauty. If we consider the whole concept of beauty an ocean and everyone in search of it, the findings will be of course contrasting. Few may find it in the tide, few in the sea-beach, and some others may find it uninteresting. Yet, beauty is beauty and it is felt by heart. There's no logic behind it that 'why is that beautiful'. It is such an abstract that can be both constructive and destructive at the same time.
Context: The major poets of the Romantic era are ardent followers of beauty and through their poetry they try to figure that out. The concept of beauty can be identified as the most important feature of poetry. Thus in every poet's mind there's a fact, so vital and so influential to ensue the spontaneous overflow, that no one can even pen down a poem without the feeling of beauty. But the Romantic poets are more sensational in this aspect; they are more than associated with beauty as they are more close to nature. Here comes the question of their concept of beauty, 'What is beauty to them?' In "Ode on a Grecian Urn" John Keats defined beauty as truth telling, "Truth is beauty, beauty truth". As far other poets are in our concern, they have been trying to find out beauty. But the Romantic Poets interpret beauty as a way to resolve the day to day problems.
Focus: Poetry is nothing but the worshiping of beauty. The title itself represents that the concept of beauty of two major romantic poets; Percy Bysshe Shelley and John Keats. But in a broader sense, it can be realized that poetry is an endless quest to resolve societal problems and the above mentioned poets tried to approach it in the most sensational way that is through beauty. It refers to the way they treat beauty, their concept of beauty and thus how it really does imply changes in human nature and in a broader sense to human civilization. Although the poets hold the same thirst for beauty and that is to rectify society, it implies that they must have some approaches to this and these approaches confirm their dissimilarities from each other. Thus the main focus of the paper is to determine their approaches and define beauty in their poems to find out a new truth about their concept of societal changes, is it beauty that plays the vital role or anything else?
Analysis: Concept of beauty among two major romantic poets, if taken as the major concern it can be iterated that their goal is beauty and they try to attain this through their own approaches. As an abstract idea, beauty has been the prior concern for every poet of the world. Yet, everyone holds one's own notion to reach beauty. In this aspect, we can separately discuss about the concept of beauty among two major poets.

Shelley's Concept of Beauty: Beauty means revolution, revolution means change and change means beauty, that is Shelley's beauty concept in brief. This beauty is not constant and is always changing. It does well to the human civilization even if it takes away the best out of us. All that are conjured by time are returned with double interest. The world is a nest of changes. In his "Ode to the West Wind" he finds beauty in the wind as it changes by taking away the dirt. It changes because it carriages away all that it gets in its way and renders place for the new. Thus he says in his "Ode to the West Wind"- "Wild Spirit, which art moving everywhere; Destroyer and preserver; hear, O hear!" All good deeds are done for beauty in constructive and destructive ways! But here, west wind stands for revolution and we can take it as a symbol of beauty as Shelley's beauty is one kind of abstract that changes. By taking this symbol, we can go for the quest to find out beauty. Seemingly this beauty causes destruction, yet it pacifies speed too. The west wind takes away the seeds of trees from one place to another and thus paves the growth of trees and makes the world greener and prettier. Seemingly this form of beauty is ugly, yet it is mobile and dynamic. It reveals that beauty is always destructive and it goes through reformation. So, to him beauty is what that brings a collective development. It is not and never philosophical because, spiritual or philosophical beauty doesn't bring collective or visible change and development. Beauty has a power and that is to change. Where there is power in nature, there's beauty.
Keats's Concept of beauty:
Keats's beauty is derived from pessimism as he finds the world being intoxicated for the industrial revolution. He believes there's no way to dissolve from these problems but to escape and sink in an imaginary world of one's own desire. In "Ode to a Nightingale" he wants to escape from the world in pain and cherishes to get relieved by travelling to the land of the Nightingale. In one sense he's an escapist, yet wherever he goes, tries to recollect beauty by finding out trees, flowers, birds. But his beauty turns out to be bit lower and co-related to feelings only. Actually he finds truth in beauty and beauty in truth. Everything that is beautiful is true and everything that is true is beautiful to him. "Beauty is truth, truth beauty, -that is all Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know." Those who adore beauty tell beauty as beauty, it is neither ugly nor a source of beauty can be gotten. No matter where the beauty comes from the heaven or hell, beauty is always beauty. To Wordsworth, beauty is heavenly and comes from heaven as a representative of God! As an individual, one may have faith in religion. But as a poet he/she is an institution and should be a freethinker. As a matter of fact, it can be said that beauty is beauty and in their approach they are right. It's completely personal and can be interpreted in either of the ways. It means the concept of beauty of any person shouldn't be questioned. Beauty is always beauty but we view and interpret beauty in our own ways. Romantic poetry is subjective. Keats's beauty is found in one kind of escapism. But, this does not connote to save himself only; rather this escapism might be a way to sort out problems for the mankind. It is perhaps true that if people begin to worship beauty, there might not be any chaos at all. In this sense, beauty of Keats is one kind of creating an imaginary world of one's own. But, this is not the ultimate solution to the human life problems; rather it's a short time solution. In this point we can figure out Keats as an escapist. But in a wider sense, he is recovered from that escapist point of view. Before going to make a thorough decision, we need to think deeply about this. In any point of time, any human beings may think like Keats and prefer to escape brutal realities. This is why Keats's concept of beauty is more complete. Beauty to Keats is relief, to Shelley revolution and change, to Wordsworth is a spiritual journey through personal experiences. The poets before the Romantic era were trying to attain and pave the way to mechanical perfection of humankind. But the Romantic poets found out that Industrial revolution and the French revolution have held people in chain at the cost of their freedom. In order to free people from that chain of the tyrants, they took beauty as a final aim. In this respect, we can say that beauty is nothing attainable rather it is an aim for which everyone should work together. Nobody can attain it as a whole. It can be felt or seen as a part of the whole by many in different ways and in different shapes. Actually beauty is the way to assure equality and in total human liberation from all vices and viciousness.
Conclusion:
Shelley and Keats as a part of the whole humankind are getting more than one particular sides of the whole concept of beauty. In the sense of perfection, the ultimate beauty can be taken as is Keats's beauty for it covers his personal concept of beauty and also the concept of beauty of the whole world. Yet the whole concept of beauty is quite more than human sensibility can feel. So, we can say that these two poets are in their quest for ultimate beauty. And the whole of their concept of beauty is an attempt to define it. Even in modern age poets tried to define beauty and till date poets are trying to define that term. So far the most accepted definition of beauty came from Baudelaire. He defined beauty in his 'Hymn to Beauty'. Beauty is whatever one feels beautiful, there's no logic behind and whatever it is good or bad; nobody should seek the source of beauty at all. In that poem he compared beauty with stone. The stone is hard, permanent; it is the witness of the time and the medium of construction, even it is the reason of destruction too. At last, it can be said that whatever the concepts of beauty are, beneath these entire lie the fact that all of them have taken beauty as a mean to human liberation. After attaining this level, people may get relieved from robotic life and problems. So, here beauty is not just an abstract idea, it's a goal, attainment of which may bring equality, peace and freedom for mankind. This isn't an easily attainable; it must be gained through hardships. Yet it is no scientific truth and a spiritual concept gotten from the subjective point of view of the poets, it may be right or wrong in practical life.