Thursday, April 5, 2012
Divine Obligation in Adonais
As Carly mentioned in the previous post, there is a good bit of religious imagery throughout Adonais. The 41st stanza is especially noteworthy, as it claims Keats "wakes--'tis Death is dead, not he" (361). Just as Christ's crucifixion defied death and allowed Christians to never fear death, Shelley suggests that poetry's death is also no more. Similarly, Shelley instructs his readers to cease their mourning since Keats, like Christ, is not actually dead but lives on through eternity. This takes a turn, though, in the 54th stanza where the poet claims, "That light...now beams on me" (478-485). The responsibility is now on him to continue Keats' legacy and, like some loyal disciple of Christ, spread the 'good news' of his work. Thus, after 50 stanzas of praising Keats, Shelley now becomes the center of attention, revealing the greater purpose of the poem.
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This is an excellent comparison, especially since today's Good Friday. I think the fact that Shelley says that we're the ones actually dead instead of the deceased further adds to his "disciple" status.
ReplyDeleteI think your conclusion that Shelley becomes the center of attention is quite accurate. However, I am unsure if this operates in a discipleship sense so much as an arrogant one. If you see my comments under Carly K.'s post on Mother/Son imagery, Linus (Keats) was the inspirer of Orpheus (Shelley), who would go on to outshine his predecessor immensely. While that is not to say your suggestion is incorrect, it does offer an interesting alternate interpretation.
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