ODE TO THE WEST WIND

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.

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.

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)

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.

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 Devices

Stanza 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?
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Theme and Historical Background

Irresistible 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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