artistic illustration of a Grecian urn set against a backdrop of hills and columns

Ode on a Grecian Urn

by John Keats

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Ode on a Grecian Urn

Keats refers to the urn as a "Cold Pastoral" to because it illustrates an image of life in the Ancient Greek farmlands. The pastoral is cold because it is literally made of stone and because it...

3 educator answers

Ode on a Grecian Urn

In John Keats's "Ode on a Grecian Urn," the line "Beauty is truth, truth beauty" encapsulates a key Romantic ideal that beauty and truth are interconnected and can be intuitively understood through...

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Ode on a Grecian Urn

The figures on the urn in Keats' "Ode on a Grecian Urn" are called a "leaf fringed legend" because the urn's story is depicted within a decorative border of leaves. The word "legend" refers to both...

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Ode on a Grecian Urn

The urn in Keats' "Ode on a Grecian Urn" depicts several scenes: a Dionysian celebration, lovers about to kiss, a pastoral piper, and a religious procession with a sacrificial heifer. The speaker...

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Ode on a Grecian Urn

John Keats focuses on human relations in "Ode on a Grecian Urn" by depicting scenes of happiness and eternal youth. He describes young people at a festival, a piper eternally playing, and lovers...

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Ode on a Grecian Urn

The urn is a “foster child of silence and slow time” because silence and time both contribute to the value of the urn and the development of its meaning as it conveys a remote past.

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Ode on a Grecian Urn

The state of being teased out of thought by the urn in "Ode on a Grecian Urn" refers to the way the urn's timeless and static beauty provokes deep contemplation. The urn's images, frozen in time,...

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Ode on a Grecian Urn

Keats's "Ode on a Grecian Urn" is an apostrophic poem. An apostrophe is used in the second stanza by the poet addressing the urn directly. The first stanza mentions that the scene depicted on the urn...

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Ode on a Grecian Urn

In stanza 4, the speaker describes a sacrificial procession on the urn, pondering the silent, empty town left behind, symbolizing the eternal nature of the depicted scene. Stanza 5 reveals the urn's...

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Ode on a Grecian Urn

In "Ode on a Grecian Urn," the speaker does not change their opinion about the urn but rather transitions from an emotional response to a philosophical reflection. Throughout the poem, the urn is...

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Ode on a Grecian Urn

The poet juxtaposes the sacred and the profane by exploring the timelessness of art against the transience of earthly experiences. The urn represents immortality, with its figures frozen in time,...

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