Ode to a Nightingale
UNDERSTANDING THE POEM
1. How does the nightingale’s song plunge the poet into a state of
ecstasy?
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2. What are the unpleasant aspects of the human condition that
the poet wants to escape from?
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3. What quality of ‘beauty’ and ‘love’ does the poem highlight?
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4. How does the poet bring out the immortality of the bird?
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5. How is the poet tossed back from ecstasy into despair?
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6. How does the poem bring out the elusive nature of happiness in
human existence?
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TRY THIS OUT
1. The poet has juxtaposed sets of opposites like numbness pains,
waking dream. How does this contribute to the poetic effect?
What is this figure of speech called? List other such pairs from
poems that you have read.
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2. The poet has evoked the image of wine—why has this image
been chosen?
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3. The senses of sound, sight and taste are evoked in the poem.
Locate instances of these.
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4. The poet addresses the nightingale and talks to the bird
throughout the poem. What is this kind of poem called?
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5. Make a list of all the adjectives in the poem along with the nouns
they describe. List the phrases that impressed you most in the
poem.
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6. Find out the other odes written by Keats and read them.
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7. Find out the odes written by Shelley and read them.
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