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Endymion is a poem by John Keats first published in 1818. Beginning famously with the line "A thing of beauty is a joy for ever", Endymion like many epic poems in English (including John Dryden's translations from Virgil and Alexander Pope's translations from Homer) is written in rhyming, or 'heroic' couplets. Keats based the poem on the Greek myth of Endymion, the shepherd who falls in love with the moon goddess Selene. The poem elaborates on the original story and renames Selene "Cynthia" (an alternate name for Artemis). John Keats John Keats (31 October 1795 – February 23, 1821) was one of the principal poets of the English Romantic movement. ...
// John Keats falls in love with Fanny Brawne (1800-65) and writes some of his finest poetry — the period from September of this year to September 1819 is often referred to among Keats scholars as the Great Year, or the Living Year (see 1819 in poetry) March 12 — Percy Bysshe...
A couplet is a pair of lines of verse that form a unit. ...
The bust of Zeus found at Otricoli (Sala Rotonda, Museo Pio-Clementino, Vatican) Greek mythology is the telling of stories created by the ancient Greeks, concerning their gods and heroes, the nature of the world and their own cult and ritual practices. ...
In Greek mythology, Endymion was a handsome shepherd (or, more rarely, a king or a hunter) from Asia Minor. ...
Roman sculpture of the torch-bearing moon goddess Luna, or Diana Lucifera (Diana Bringer of Light), who was equated with the Greek Selene (Vatican Museums) In Greek mythology, Selene (Σελήνη, moon; Modern Greek pronunciation IPA: ) was an archaic lunar deity and the daughter of the titans Hyperion and Theia. ...
The Diana of Versailles, a Roman copy of a sculpture by Leochares (Louvre Museum) Artemis (Greek: nominative , genitive ) in Greek mythology the daughter of Zeus and of Leto and the twin sister of Apollo was one of the most widely venerated of the gods and manifestly one of the oldest...
Narrative It starts by painting a rustic scene of trees, rivers, herders, and sheep. They gather around an altar and pray to Pan, god of shepherds and flocks. As the youths sing and dance, the elder men sit and talk about how life would be like in the shades of Elysium. However, Endymion is trancelike, participating in none of their discourse. His sister, Peona, takes him away and brings him to her resting place where he sleeps. After he wakes, he tells Peona of his encounter with Cynthia, and how much he loved her. Pan (Greek , genitive ) is the Greek god of nature who watches over shepherds and their flocks: paein means to pasture. ...
The poem is divided into four books, each approximately 1,000 lines long. Book I gives Endymion's account of his dreams and experiences, as related to Peona, and give the background for the rest of the poem. In Book II, Endymion ventures into the underworld in search of his love. He encounters Adonis and Venus — a pairing of mortal and immortal — apparently foreshadowing a similar destiny for the mortal Endymion and his immortal paramour. Book III reveals Endymion's enduring love, and he begs the Moon not to torment him any longer. Book IV, "And so he groan'd, as one by beauty slain." He is miserable, till quite suddenly he comes upon her. She then tells him of how she tried to forget him, to move on, but that in the end, "'There is not one,/ No, no, not one/ But thee to comfort a poor lonely maid;'" Adonis is an archetypal life-death-rebirth deity in Greek mythology, and a central cult figure in various mystery religions. ...
Marble Venus of the Capitoline Venus type, Roman (British Museum) Venus was a major Roman goddess principally associated with love and beauty, the rough equivalent of the Greek goddess Aphrodite. ...
Critical reception Endymion received scathing criticism after its release, and Keats himself noted its diffuse and unappealing style (see, for example, The Quarterly Review April 1818 pp. 204-208). However, he did not regret writing it, as he likened the process to leaping into the ocean to become more acquainted with his surroundings; in a poem to Haydon, he expressed that "I would sooner fail than not be among the greatest." Quarterly Review was a review journal started by John Murray, the celebrated London publisher, in March 1809 (though it bore a title page date of February), in rivalry with the Edinburgh Review, which had been seven years in possession of the field, and was exerting, as he judged, an evil...
Not all critics disliked the work. The poet Thomas Hood wrote 'Written in Keats' Endymion', in which the "Muse..charming the air to music...gave back Endymion in a dreamlike tale". Henry Morley said, "The song of Endymion throbs throughout with a noble poet's sense of all that his art means for him. What mechanical defects there are in it may even serve to quicken our sense of the youth and freshness of of this voice of aspiration."
See also // John Keats falls in love with Fanny Brawne (1800-65) and writes some of his finest poetry — the period from September of this year to September 1819 is often referred to among Keats scholars as the Great Year, or the Living Year (see 1819 in poetry) March 12 — Percy Bysshe...
See also: 1817 in literature, other events of 1818, 1819 in literature, list of years in literature. ...
External links Wikisource has original text related to this article: Endymion Text of Endymion Image File history File links Wikisource-logo. ...
The original Wikisource logo. ...
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