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Type
of Work and Year of Publication.......“Ode
to the West Wind" is a lyric poem that addresses the west wind as a powerful
force and asks it to scatter the poet's words throughout the world. (A
lyric poem presents the deep feelings and emotions of the poet rather than
telling a story or presenting a witty observation. An ode is a lyric poem
that uses lofty, dignified language to address a person or thing.) Charles
and Edmund Ollier published the poem in London in 1820 in a volume entitled
Prometheus
Unbound: a Lyrical Drama in Four Acts With Other Poems. Prometheus
Unbound is a four-act play (intended to be read but not performed)
that was the featured work in the volume.
Setting
and Background Information
.......The
time is autumn of 1819. The place is western Italy, from the Mediterranean
coast inland to Florence. Shelley makes a specific reference  in
the poem to the city of Baiae (Italian, Baia), called Aqua Cumanae
by ancient Romans. Its favorable climate attracted vacationing Roman dignitaries
to the city, including Julius Caesar and Nero, who constructed villas there.
Volcanic eruptions plunged part of the ancient site into the sea, as alluded
to in the poem in lines 32 and 33. Shelley wrote the poem inland, in a
forest on the Arno River near Florence. His notes on the the poem explain
that he received the inspiration for it one fall day when the strong west
wind swept down from the Atlantic and through the Tuscan landscape of west-central
Italy:
This
poem was conceived and chiefly written in a wood that skirts the Arno,
near Florence, on a day when that tempestuous wind, whose temperature is
at once mild and animating, was collecting the vapors which pour down the
autumnal rains. They begin, as I foresaw, at sunset, with a violent tempest
of hail and rain, attended by that magnificent thunder and lightning peculiar
to the Cisalpine regions. (Shelley 239)
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Ode to the West Wind
By Percy Bysshe Shelley
Text, Summaries, and
Notes
1
O wild West Wind, thou breath
of Autumn's being,
Thou from whose unseen
presence the leaves dead
Are driven like ghosts from
an enchanter fleeing,
Yellow, and black,
and pale, and hectic red,
Pestilence-stricken multitudes!
O thou 5
Who chariotest to
their dark wintry bed
The wingèd1
seeds, where they lie cold and low,
Each like a corpse
within its grave, until
Thine azure sister of the
Spring shall blow
Her clarion2
o'er the dreaming earth, and fill 10
(Driving sweet buds like
flocks to feed in air)
With living hues
and odours plain and hill;
Wild Spirit, which art moving
everywhere;
Destroyer and preserver;
hear, O hear!
Summary, Stanza 1
Addressing the west wind
as a human, the poet describes its activities: It drives dead leaves away
as if they were ghosts fleeing a wizard. The leaves are yellow and black,
pale and red, as if they had died of an infectious disease. The west wind
carries seeds in its chariot and deposits them in the earth, where they
lie until the spring wind awakens them by blowing on a trumpet (clarion).
When they form buds, the spring wind spreads them over plains and on hills.
In a paradox, the poet addresses the west wind as a destroyer and a preserver,
then asks it to listen to what he says.
Notes, Stanza 1
1. The accent over the e
in wingèd (line 7) causes the word to be pronounced in two
syllables—the first stressed ....and the second
unstressed—enabling the poet to maintain the metric scheme (iambic
pentameter).
2. clarion: Trumpet.
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2
Thou on whose stream, 'mid
the steep sky's commotion, 15
Loose clouds like
earth's decaying leaves are shed,
Shook from the tangled boughs
of heaven and ocean,
Angels of rain and
lightning! there are spread
On the blue surface of thine
airy surge,
Like the bright hair
uplifted from the head 20
Of some fierce Mænad3,
even from the dim verge
Of the horizon to
the zenith's height,
The locks of the approaching
storm. Thou dirge4
Of the dying year,
to which this closing night
Will be the dome of a vast
sepulchre, 25
Vaulted with all
thy congregated5
might
Of vapours, from whose solid
atmosphere
Black rain, and fire, and
hail, will burst: O hear!
Summary, Stanza 2
The poet says the west wind
drives clouds along just as it does dead leaves after it shakes the clouds
free of the sky and the oceans. These clouds erupt with rain and lightning.
Against the sky, the lightning appears as a bright shaft of hair from the
head of a Mænad. The poet compares the west wind to a funeral song
sung at the death of a year and says the night will become a dome erected
over the year's tomb with all of the wind's gathered might. From that dome
will come black rain, fire, and hail. Again the poet asks the west wind
to continue to listen to what he has to say.
Notes, Stanza 2
3. Mænad: Wildly emotional
woman who took part in the orgies of ....Dionysus,
the Greek god of wine and revelry.
4. dirge: Funeral song.
5. congregated: Gathered,
mustered.
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3
Thou who didst waken from
his summer dreams
The blue Mediterranean,
where he lay, 30
Lull'd by the coil of his
crystàlline6
streams,
Beside a pumice isle
in Baiæ's bay,
And saw in sleep old palaces
and towers
Quivering within
the wave's intenser day,
All overgrown with azure
moss, and flowers 35
So sweet, the sense
faints picturing them! Thou
For whose path the Atlantic's
level powers
Cleave themselves
into chasms, while far below
The sea-blooms and the oozy
woods which wear
The sapless foliage
of the ocean, know 40
Thy voice, and suddenly grow
gray with fear,
And tremble and despoil
themselves:7
O hear!
Summary, Stanza 3
At the beginning of autumn,
the poet says, the the west wind awakened the Mediterranean Sea—lulled
by the sound of the clear streams flowing into it—from summer slumber near
an island formed from pumice (hardened lava). The island is in a bay at
Baiae, a city in western Italy about ten miles west of Naples. While sleeping
at this locale, the Mediterranean saw old palaces and towers that had collapsed
into the sea during an earthquake and became overgrown with moss and flowers.
To create a path for the west wind, the powers of the mighty Atlantic Ocean
divide (cleave) themselves and flow through chasms. Deep beneath the ocean
surface, flowers and foliage, upon hearing the west wind, quake in fear
and despoil themselves. (In autumn, ocean plants decay like land plants.
See Shelley's note on this subject.) Once more, the
poet asks the west wind to continue to listen to what he has to say.
Notes, Stanza 3
6. The accent over the a
in crystàlline shifts the stress to the second syllable,
making crystàl an iamb.
7. In his notes, Shelley
commented on lines 38-42:
The phenomenon alluded
to at the end of the third stanza is well known to naturalists. The vegetation
at the bottom of the sea, of rivers, and of lakes, sympathizes with that
of the land in the change of seasons, and is consequently influenced by
the winds announce it.(Shelley 239)
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4
If I were a dead leaf thou
mightest bear;
If I were a swift
cloud to fly with thee;
A wave to pant beneath thy
power, and share 45
The impulse of thy
strength, only less free
Than thou, O uncontrollable!
if even
I were as in my boyhood,
and could be
The comrade of thy wanderings
over heaven,
As then, when to
outstrip thy skiey8
speed 50
Scarce seem'd a vision—I
would ne'er have striven
As thus with thee
in prayer in my sore need.
O! lift me as a wave, a
leaf, a cloud!
I fall upon the thorns
of life! I bleed!
A heavy weight of hours has
chain'd and bow'd 55
One too like thee—tameless,
and swift, and proud.
Summary, Stanza 4
The poet says that if he
were a dead leaf (like the ones in the first stanza) or a cloud (like
the ones in the second stanza) or an ocean wave that rides the power of
the Atlantic but is less free than the uncontrollable west wind—or if even
he were as strong and vigorous as he was when he was a boy and could accompany
the wandering wind in the heavens and could only dream of traveling faster—well,
then, he would never have prayed to the west wind as he is doing now in
his hour of need.
.......Referring
again to imagery in the first three stanzas, the poet asks the wind to
lift him as it would a wave, a leaf, or a cloud; for here on earth he is
experiencing troubles that prick him like thorns and cause him to bleed.
He is now carrying a heavy burden that—though he is proud and tameless
and swift like the west wind—has immobilized him in chains and bowed him
down.
Notes, Stanza 4
8. Skiey is a neologism
(coined word) whose two syllables maintain iambic
pentameter. The s in skiey alliterates with the s
in speed, ....scarce, seem'd,
and striven.
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5
Make me thy lyre, even as
the forest is:
What if my leaves
are falling like its own?
The tumult of thy mighty
harmonies
Will take from both
a deep autumnal tone, 60
Sweet though in sadness.
Be thou, Spirit fierce,
My spirit! Be thou
me, impetuous one!
Drive my dead thoughts over
the universe,
Like wither'd leaves,
to quicken a new birth;
And, by the incantation
of this verse, 65
Scatter, as from an
unextinguish'd hearth
Ashes and sparks, my words
among mankind!
Be through my lips
to unawaken'd earth
The trumpet of a prophecy!
O Wind,
If Winter comes, can Spring
be far behind? 70
Summary, Stanza 5
The poet asks the west wind
to turn him into a lyre (a stringed instrument) in the same way that the
west wind's mighty currents turn the forest into a lyre. And if the poet's
leaves blow in the wind like those from the forest trees, there will be
heard a deep autumnal tone that is both sweet and sad. Be "my spirit,"
the poet implores the wind. "Be thou me" and drive my dead thoughts (like
the dead leaves) across the universe in order to prepare the way for new
birth in the spring. The poet asks the wind to scatter his words around
the world, as if they were ashes from a burning fire. To the unawakened
earth, they will become blasts from a trumpet of prophecy. In other words,
the poet wants the wind to help him disseminate his views on politics,
philosophy, literature, and so on. The poet is encouraged that, although
winter will soon arrive, spring and rebirth will follow it.
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Examples
of Figures of Speech and Rhetorical DevicesStanza 1
Alliteration: wild
West
Wind
(line 1).
Apostrophe, Personification:
Throughout the poem, the poet addresses the west wind as if it were a person.
Metaphor: Comparison of
the west wind to breath of Autumn's being (line 1).
Metaphor: Comparison of
autumn to a living, breathing creature (line 1).
Anastrophe: leaves dead
(line
2). Anastrophe is inversion of the normal word order, as in a man forgotten
(instead of a forgotten man) or as in the opening lines of Samuel
Taylor Coleridge's "Kubla Kahn": In Xanada did Kubla Kahn / A stately
pleasure dome decree (instead of
In Xanadu, Kubla Kahn decreed a
stately pleasure dome). Here is another example, made up to demonstrate
the inverted word order of anastrophe:
In the garden green and
dewy
A rose I plucked for Huey
Simile: Comparison of dead leaves
to ghosts.
Anastrophe: enchanter
fleeing (line 3).
Alliteration: Pestilence-stricken
multitudes (line 5).
Alliteration: Pestilence-stricken
multitudes
(line 5).
Alliteration: chariotest
to (line 6).
Alliteration: The
wingèd
seeds, where
they
(line 7).
Metaphor: Comparison of
seeds to flying creatures (line 7).
Simile: Comparison of each
seed to a corpse (lines 7-8).
Alliteration: sister
of the Spring (line 9).
Personification: Comparison
of spring wind to a person (lines 9-10).
Metaphor, Personification:
Comparison of earth to a dreamer (line 10).
Alliteration: flocks
to feed
Simile: Comparison of buds
to flocks (line 11).
Anastrophe: fill
/ . . . With living hues and odours plain and hill (lines 10, 12).
Alliteration: Wild
Spirit, which (line 13).
Paradox: Destroyer and preserver
(line 14).
Alliteration: hear,
O hear (line 14). Stanza 8
Apostrophe, Personification:
The poet addresses the west wind as if it were a person.
Metaphor: Comparison of
the poet and the forest to a lyre, a stringed musical instrument (line
57).
Metaphor: Comparison of
the poet to a forest (line 58).
Alliteration: The
tumult of thy
mighty
harmonies (line 59).
Alliteration: Sweet
though
in sadness.
Be thou, Spirit
fierce, (line 61).
Metaphor: Comparison of
the poet to the wind (line 62).
Alliteration: Drive
my dead thoughts over the universe
(line 63).
Simile: Comparison of thoughts
to withered leaves (lines 63-64).
Alliteration: the
incantation of this (line 65).
Simile: Comparison of words
to ashes and sparks (66-67).
Alliteration: my
words among mankind
(67).
Metaphor: Comparison of
the poet's voice to the wind as a trumpet of a prophecy (lines 68-69).
Alliteration: trumpet
of a prophecy (lines 68-69).
Alliteration: O Wind,
/ If Winter comes,
can
Spring be far behind?
.......
Structure
and Rhyme Scheme
.......The
poem contains five stanzas of fourteen lines each. Each stanza has three
tercets and a closing couplet. In poetry, a tercet is a unit of three lines
that usually contain end rhyme; a couplet is a two-line unit that usually
contains end rhyme. Shelley wrote the tercets in a verse form called terza
rima, invented by Dante Alighieri. In
this format, line 2 of one tercet rhymes with lines 1 and 3 of the next
tercet. In regard to the latter, consider the first three tercets of the
second stanza of "Ode to the West Wind." Notice that
shed (second
line, first tercet) rhymes with
spread and head (first and
third lines, second tercet) and that surge (second line, second
tercet) rhymes with
verge and dirge (first and third lines,
third tercet).
Thou on whose stream,
'mid the steep sky's commotion,
Loose clouds like
earth's decaying leaves are shed,
Shook from the tangled boughs
of heaven and ocean,
Angels of rain and
lightning! there are spread
On the blue surface of thine
airy surge,
Like the bright hair
uplifted from the head
20
Of some fierce Mænad,
even from the dim verge
Of the horizon to
the zenith's height,
The locks of the approaching
storm. Thou dirge
.......All
of the couplets in the poem rhyme, but the last couplet (lines 69-70) is
an imperfect rhyme called eye rhyme. Eye rhyme occurs when the pronunciation
of the last syllable of one line is different from the pronunciation of
the last syllable of another line even though both syllables are identical
in spelling except for a preceding consonant. For example, the following
end-of-line word pairs would constitute eye rhyme: cough, rough;
cow, mow; daughter, laughter; rummaging,
raging. In Shelley's poem, wind and behind form eye
rhyme.
.......Shelley
unifies the content of the poem by focusing the first three stanzas on
the powers of the wind and the last two stanzas on the poet's desire to
use these powers to spread his words throughout the world.
.......
Meter.......Most
of the lines in the poem are in iambic pentameter,
although some of the pentameter lines have an extra syllable (catalexis).
The following tercet from the first stanza demonstrates the iambic-pentameter
format, with the stressed syllables in capitals:
..........1................2..................3.................4.............5
The WING.|.èd
SEEDS,.|.where
THEY.|.lie COLD.|.and
LOW,
..........1................2..............3..............4.............5
Each LIKE.|.a
CORPSE.|.with
IN.|.its GRAVE,.|.un
TIL
.......1............2..........3..............4..................5
Thine AZ.|.ure
SIS.|.ter OF.|.the
SPRING.|.shall
BLOW
Here is a line with catalexis:
........1...............2.............3..............4.............5............
Of SOME.|.fierce
MAE.|.nad, E.|.ven
FROM.|.the DIM.|.verge
.......
And here is a line that
does not follow the format. It is in iambic
hexameter:
..........1................2..................3.................4.............5............6
Shook FROM.|.the
TANG.|.gled BOUGHS.|.of
HEA.|.ven AND.|.o
CEAN
Theme
and Historical BackgroundIrresistible Power
.......The
poet desires the irresistible power of the wind to scatter the words he
has written about his ideals and causes, one of which was opposition to
Britain’s monarchical government as a form of tyranny. Believing firmly
in democracy and individual rights, he supported movements to reform government.
In 1819, England’s nobility feared that working-class citizens—besieged
by economic problems, including high food prices—would imitate the rebels
of the French Revolution and attempt to overthrow the established order.
On August 16, agitators attracted tens of thousands of people to a rally
in St. Peter’s Field, Manchester, to urge parliamentary reform and to protest
laws designed to inflate the cost of corn and wheat. Nervous public officials
mismanaged the unarmed crowd and ended up killing 11 protesters and injuring
more than 500 others. In reaction to this incident, Shelley wrote The
Masque of Anarchy in the fall of 1819 to urge further nonviolent action
against the government. This work was not published during his lifetime.
However, "Ode to the West Wind," also written in the fall of 1819, was
published a year later. The poem obliquely refers to his desire to spread
his reformist ideas when it says, "Scatter, as from an unextinguish'd hearth
/ Ashes and sparks, my words among mankind!" Shelley believed that the
poetry he wrote had the power bring about political reform: "Poets are
the unacknowledged legislators of the World," he wrote in another work,
A
Defence of Poetry.
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 Study
Questions and Essay Topics
1. Write an essay that attempts
to answer whether Shelley succeeded in his goal to "scatter . . . my words
among mankind"? The essay will ....require
you to read other works by him and to research sources evaluating the impact
of these works.
2. Shelley's poem uses nature
imagery to convey his theme. Write a poem of your own that uses nature
imagery to convey a theme.
3. To whom does line 56
refer?
4. In line 62 (Be thou
me, impetuous one! ) is Shelley describing himself as impetuous?
5. What is an ode? In what
ways does Shelley's poem fit the definition of an ode?
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Work Cited
Shelley,
Mary, ed. The Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley. London: Edward
Moxon, 1839.
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