The task now is to shore up the gains of every approach, building on an understanding of how poetry works so as to enter the alien yet somehow familiar world of the Renaissance past with fresh eyes, open minds, and lively expectations. Older academic criticism has produced many fine analyses of form and meaning still worth learning from, and most of the recent studies in this bibliography continue to refer to them. Occasionally, this approach forfeits the subtlety and powerful nuance of poetry whose formal features might complicate rather than clarify difficult themes. In some cases, critics have approached individual poems as documentary evidence to support their interpretations of history. Scholarship and critical reading have approached European Renaissance texts with an urgency that speaks even to the crises and divisions of our own troubled times, whether in terms of gender, social class, religion, language, or racial difference. Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.Over the past two decades, critical emphases on social, cultural, and political topics in literary studies have greatly enriched our understanding and appreciation of poetic texts. 'Beauty is truth, truth beauty,-that is all Than ours, a friend to man, to whom thou say'st, When old age shall this generation waste, Thou, silent form, dost tease us out of thought With forest branches and the trodden weed Is emptied of this folk, this pious morn?Īnd, little town, thy streets for evermore Lead'st thou that heifer lowing at the skies,Īnd all her silken flanks with garlands drest? To what green altar, O mysterious priest, That leaves a heart high-sorrowful and cloy'd,Ī burning forehead, and a parching tongue. Your leaves, nor ever bid the Spring adieu She cannot fade, though thou hast not thy bliss,įor ever wilt thou love, and she be fair!Īh, happy, happy boughs! that cannot shed Though winning near the goal yet, do not grieve Thy song, nor ever can those trees be bare īold Lover, never, never canst thou kiss,

Not to the sensual ear, but, more endear'd,įair youth, beneath the trees, thou canst not leave Heard melodies are sweet, but those unheardĪre sweeter therefore, ye soft pipes, play on What pipes and timbrels? What wild ecstasy? What mad pursuit? What struggle to escape? What men or gods are these? What maidens loth? What leaf-fring'd legend haunts about thy shape Thou foster-child of silence and slow time,Ī flowery tale more sweetly than our rhyme:

Thou still unravish'd bride of quietness, On the slabs, a wing chipped here, an arm there:įinally, here is an Irregular ode from “Ode on a Grecian Urn” by John Keats: Staining the uncomfortable angels that rot Think of the autumns that have come and gone!-Īmbitious November with the humors of the year, Of a thousand acres where these memories growįrom the inexhaustible bodies that are notĭead, but feed the grass row after rich row. Of heaven to their election in the vast breath, The headstones yield their names to the element, They usually reflect upon ideas related to friendship, love, and writing poetry. Horace preferred writing odes that were gentle and serene with subtle irony and gentle humor.Ĭontent: Horatian odes detail a tone of tranquility and contemplation used for meditative purposes. Origin: Developed by the Latin poet Horace around the 1st century BCE, Horatian odes were developed as a response to Pindaric odes. The epode has a different length and metrical pattern than the strophe and antistrophe. Antistrophe means “to turn back” and serves as a response to the strophe.Įpode: The chorus moves to the middle of the stage. The antistrophe has the same length and metrical pattern as the strophe.

Strophe: Meaning “turn,” the chorus moved from the right to the left of the stage while reciting the strophe.Īntistrophe: The chorus moved from the left to the right of the stage. Instead, they have three parts that correspond with the movement of the chorus in a Greek play. Structure: Pindaric odes have no set length, meter, or rhyme. They would pay tribute to the young men who were successful in the games, often praising them as heroes. Content: Pindaric odes were typically composed in connection with important events in ancient Greece, such as the Greek classical games.

Lyrical poetry examples