The purpose of this paper is to examine how Keats’s political consciousness was actualized in Hyperion in connection with his poetic theory, Negative Capability. Keats supported the progressive and optimistic development of history and Hyperion clearly mirrors his historical view. Keats sympathizes with fallen titans such as Saturn and Hyperion throughout the work. In the speech of Oceanus he announces that the change of generations is an inevitable rule of nature and an eternal truth. However this work was left unfinished, I think, due to the inner conflict between his political consciousness (focused on the progressive development of history) and deep sympathy for the historical victims of progress. Nevertheless, it is clear that he displays his political awareness in Hyperion. Until very recently, Keats has been regarded as an apolitical romanticist who is remarkably disengaged from social and political issues and the historical anxieties of his own times. Many critics agree that this image of an escapist and aestheticist originated in malicious campaigns by Tory journalists including Z. While Keats’s early poems like “On Peace” and “To Hope” show his radical political awareness explicitly, his later poems—with their propensity for Greek myth, medieval romance, and beauty—do not appear to show any political opinions. However his strong faith in the possibility of progress is expressed metaphorically in his later poetry which is filled with his Negative Capability poetic theory. He discarded his own self in sympathy for other things and wrote poems using this poetic theory. This paper examines Keats’s political awareness as described in Hyperion. It also evaluates the reasons postulated for why the work remained incomplete in relation to his Negative Capability poetic theory.
한국중앙영어영문학회 [The Jungang English Language And Literature Association Of Korea]
설립연도
1968
분야
인문학>영어와문학
소개
본 학회는 영미어문학의 학술연구와 이에 부합하는 아래의 사업을 기획 수행하며,
또한 회원 상호간의 친목을 도모함을 목적으로 한다.
1. 학회지 발간
2. 연구 발표회, 강연회, 공동연구
3. 영미어문학 관련 도서출판
4. 영미어문학 관계 도서 및 자료의 모집 및 비치
5. 기타 본회의 목적 달성에 필요한 사업
간행물
간행물명
영어영문학연구 [The Jungang Journal of English Language and Literature]