11 S. V. JAN. 6, 1912.]
NOTES AND QUERIES.
11
KEATS'S ' ODE TO A NIGHTINGALE ' (11 S.
iv. 507). Mr. A. R. Weekes's edition of
- The Odes of John Keats,' in " The Uni-
versity Tutorial Series," says in the Notes (p. 95) :
" Faery lanls are not so much countries where the fairies live for that matter they used to live in England but rather ' legendary countries of romance,' with probably an underlying thought of the realm of faery in which befel the adventures of Spenser's Faery Queen and her knights.
" Critics trace in this famous |stanza an allu- sion to Claude's picture of the ' Enchanted Castle,' of which Keats had already written a detailed study in his Epistle to Reynolds."
Mr. Buxton Forman, in his small edition of ' The Complete Works of Keats ' (Gowans & Gray, 1901), vol. ii. p. 102, notes, says :
" It seems, to me unlikely that any particular story is referred to, though there are doubtless many stories that will answer more or less nearly to the passage."
He adds that the spelling " faery " is to be preferred to "fairy," as "eliminating all possible connexion of fairy-land with Christ- mas trees, tinsel, and Santa Claus, and carry- ing the imagination safely back to the Middle Ages to ' Amadis of Gaul,' to ' Palmerin of England,' and above all to the East, to the
- Thousand and one Nights.' '
I note that Tennyson's ' Recollections of the Arabian Nights ' include the " bulbul," and surely there is no need to put the poet on his oath (if that were possible in the Elysian fields) as to whether he ever heard a nightingale on the edge of the sea. Fairy country of any sort has its own architecture, geology, and natural history. Poets im- prove on Nature. Why shouldn't they, if they can ? The way in which annotators of the classics leave out the imagination is astonishing.
" Forlorn " is surely a suitable word to associate with enchantment. On fairy ground one easily gets lost.
PENNIAIJNTJS.
It would be pleasant to think that Keats was inspired by the ' CEdipus Coloneus ' when he introduced the voice
that ofttimes hath
Oharm'd magic casements, opening on the foam Of perilous seas, in faery lands forlorn.
The " magic casements " might well be those of the temple of the Eumenides, adjoining which was the grove with its warbling nightingales. These were " faery lands " of the first order, sadly " forlorn," however, in the view of a modern poet, since Greece is living Greece no more.
The difficulty presented by the " perilous seas " loses some of its formidable character
if we bear in mind that Attica specially
favoured the worship of Poseidon, and
that a poet may take liberties when he
uses topography for illustrative purposes.
Thomas Franc klin's version of a celebrated
chorus in the ' CEdipus Coloneus ' might be
the source whence Keats derived his idea
of the region :
Where* beneath the ivy shade, In the dew-besprinkled glade, Many a love-lorn nightingale Warbles sweet her plaintive tale.
Here first obedient to command, Formed by Neptune's skilful hand, The steed was taught to know the vein, And bear the chariot o'er the plain ; Here first along the rapid tide The stately vessels learned to ride, And swifter down the currents flow Than Nereids cut the waves below.
THOMAS BAY'NE.
Mr. H. Buxton Forman' s note on this passage in 1889 was as follows :
" In the last line of this stanza the word fairy instead of faery stands in the MS. and in the Annals ; but the Lamia volume reads faery, which enhances the poetic value of the line in the subtlest manner."
A. R. BAYLEY.
I beg to move the previous question. Why did the nightingale's song make Keats think of fairyland at all ? Can it have been for the same reason that made the cuckoo's " shout " make " the earth we pace " seem to Wordsworth " an unsubstantial fairy place " ? Can it have been because he was a poet ? Surely such literalism as your correspondents' queries imply is fatal to the charm of poetry. And why are these particular points chosen for inquiry ? We might as well ask what particular reason Keats had for associating the nightingale with Ruth or why the full-throated song of summer in the first stanza turns into a " plaintive anthem " in the last or why the eglantine should be pastoral any more than the hawthorn " or any other reason why." What would the stanza gain in beauty what would it not lose in signifi- cance if we could " hook it to " some legend or bit of folk-lore ? C. C. B.
Is not the tradition of " forlornness " in fairies- and fairyland derived, in the first instance, from the old belief that though longer-lived and more powerful than human beings fairies have not immortal souls, and are outside the scheme of Redemption ?
F. H.
