A number of things caused Keats to abandon this attempt at The Fall of Hyperion at the sixty-first line of the second canto. (A fragment was published, against his wishes, in his 1820 volume of poems.) He wrote to Reynolds on September 21, 1819:
1 have given up Hyperion. . . . Miltonic verse cannot be written but in an artful or rather artist's humour. I wish to give myself up to other sensations. English ought to be kept up. It may be interesting to you to pick out some lines from Hyperion and put a mark X to the false beauty proceeding from art, and one || to the true voice of feeling.
The two Hyperion fragments are impressive achievements, but as Keats with his acumen in self-criticism recognized, they have the air of artistic tours de force, written in an age in which the high artifice of the epic matter and style had ceased to be the natural voice of the poet. In the same letter Keats mentions having composed two days earlier the ode 'To Autumn.' In this, his last major poem, the poet had envisaged the circumstance of the cycle of life and death, and had articulated his experience in his own poetic voice.
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92 8 / JOH N KEAT S The Fall of Hyperion: A Dream Canto 1 Fanatics have their dreams, wherewith they weave A paradise for a sect; the savage too From forth the loftiest fashion of his sleep Guesses at heaven: pity these have not s Trac'd upon vellum0 or wild Indian leaf parchment The shadows of melodious utterance. But bare of laurel1 they live, dream, and die; For Poesy alone can tell her dreams, With the fine spell of words alone can save 10 Imagination from the sable charm And dumb0 enchantment. Who alive can say mute 'Thou art no poet; may'st not tell thy dreams'? Since every man whose soul is not a clod Hath visions, and would speak, if he had lov'd 15 And been well nurtured in his mother tongue. Whether the dream now purposed to rehearse Be poet's or fanatic's will be known When this warm scribe my hand is in the grave. Methought I stood where trees of every clime, 20 Palm, myrtle, oak, and sycamore, and beech, With plantane, and spice blossoms, made a screen; In neighbourhood of fountains, by the noise Soft showering in mine ears, and, by the touch Of scent, not far from roses. Turning round, 25 I saw an arbour with a drooping roof Of trellis vines, and bells, and larger blooms, Like floral-censers swinging light in air; Before its wreathed doorway, on a mound Of moss, was spread a feast of summer fruits, 30 Which, nearer seen, seem'd refuse of a meal By angel tasted, or our mother Eve;2 For empty shells were scattered on the grass, And grape stalks but half bare, and remnants more, Sweet smelling, whose pure kinds I could not know. 35 Still was more plenty than the fabled horn3 Thrice emptied could pour forth, at banqueting For Proserpine return'd to her own fields,4 Where the white heifers low. And appetite More yearning than on earth I ever felt 40 Growing within, I ate deliciously; And, after not long, thirsted, for thereby Stood a cool vessel of transparent juice, Sipp'd by the wander'd bee, the which I took, And, pledging all the mortals of the world,
1. The laurel, associated with Apollo, is the 3. The cornucopia, or horn of plenty. emblem of poetic fame. 4. When Proserpine each year is released by her 2. In Paradise Lost 5.321ff. Eve serves the visiting husband, Pluto, god of the underworld, for a angel Raphael with a meal of fruits and fruit juices. sojourn on Earth, it is the beginning of spring.
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THE FALL OF HYPERION / 93 1
45 And all the dead whose names are in our lips,
Drank. That full draught is parent of my theme.5
No Asian poppy,0 nor elixir fine opium
Of the soon fading jealous caliphat;6
No poison gender'd in close monkish cell
50 To thin the scarlet conclave of old men,7
Could so have rapt unwilling life away.
Among the fragrant husks and berries crush'd,
Upon the grass I struggled hard against
The domineering potion; but in vain:
55 The cloudy swoon came on, and down I sunk
Like a Silenus8 on an antique vase.
How long I slumber'd 'tis a chance to guess.
When sense of life return'd, I started up
As if with wings; but the fair trees were gone,
60 The mossy mound and arbour were no more;
I look'd around upon the carved sides
Of an old sanctuary with roof august,
Builded so high, it seem'd that filmed clouds
Might spread beneath, as o'er the stars of heaven;
65 So old the place was, I remembered none
The like upon the earth; what I had seen
Of grey cathedrals, buttress'd walls, rent towers,
The superannuations0 of sunk realms, ruins
Or nature's rocks toil'd hard in waves and winds,
70 Seem'd but the faulture0 of decrepit things
defects
