It is important to note how the Grecian urn that Keats
contemplates acts symbolically in the poem. Throughout, it is regarded as a symbol of
eternity or what is beyond time. Note how the speaker addresses the urn at the beginning
of the poem:
Thou still unravished bride of
quietness,
Thou foster child of silence and slow
time,
Sylvan historian, who canst thus
express
A flowery tale more sweetly than our
rhyme...
It is worth
analysing these images carefully to see how the urn operates in the poem. It is compared
by a metaphor to an "unravished bride of quietness," indicating the way that, although
it is so ancient, it is still pure and unsullied by the corrupting influence of time. It
is described as a "foster child" of "slow time" and a "Sylvan historian." Clearly what
the speaker admires and is seduced by is the way that it represents the eternal through
the way that it has not been damaged by time and how it preserves
history.
After the descriptions of the pictures of the urn,
the final stanza cements the importance of it to the mind of the
reaader:
Thou, silent form, dost tease us out of
thought
As doth eternity: Cold
Pastoral!
When old age shall this generation
waste,
Thou shalt remain, in midst of other
woe
Than ours, a friend to
man...
I love the phrase
"dost tease us out of thought / As doth eternity." It is as if viewing the urn is
contemplating eternity, which in turn leads to peace or sadness as that causes us to
think about the brevity of our lives. Thus ironically, the contemplation of the urn or
of art can lead to an experience of the timeless or and at the same time the ephemeral
nature of our own earthly existence. The poem can be thus said to have a bittersweet
tone as these two contrary reactions are balanced together. Thus the longing for the
permanent is expressed alongside the sombre recognition of our transient
state.
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