The purpose of this study is to explore the relationship of poetic imagination and beauty in Keats's poetry. As one of the romantic poets who turned his back to an often unsympathetic audience and sing to himself, it was natural for Keats to concentra...
The purpose of this study is to explore the relationship of poetic imagination and beauty in Keats's poetry. As one of the romantic poets who turned his back to an often unsympathetic audience and sing to himself, it was natural for Keats to concentrate on the world of imagination as a means of introspection and of escape from the unhappy reality. The alienated poet, Keats seemed to be forced to justify and defend himself by speaking of sanctity of the poetic imagination, for himself as an artist and his audience. The concept of beauty caught by imagination, which Keats named "Essential Beauty", is characterized by being subjective but with universal validity.
The power of imagination to Keats, seems to be intensely creative and dynamic. The imagination is not the mirror of empyrean realm but rather create beauty that is truth, "whether it existed before or not." As Adam's dream brought Eve, whom he found real on his awakening, the active imagination adumbrates that beauty will come true in reality. Keats's equation, "Beauty is truth, truth beauty, can be extablished through this dynamic activity of imagination. It can be reasonded that Keats had suffered enough to know how to feel idea through unified sensibility.