Meandering Maundering
Posted: Fri May 26, 2023 7:17 pm
I came across an image* which brought Keats to mind:
A thing of beauty is a joy for ever
and wondered if splitting ‘forever’ was an artistic choice. It was in common usage both ways in his time. It seems to me - possibly because ‘for ever’ is now uncommon - that, as written, it’s much more powerful. Just as, explaining to a friend some extraordinary phenomenon in natural history, I found myself writing ‘astonishing’ in lieu of a more everyday choice.
* And, why not . . . ?
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File ... terror.jpg
Given the subject, ‘beauty’ and ‘joy are hardly apropos, but it is a striking image.
I’ll add this: there’s a Keats concordance online, but it’s no help as to his usage elsewhere.
Another idea - should have been there from the first - I’ll venture to suggest that words like ‘forever’ and ‘amazing’ are diluted by common figurative use. So in Keats’s time, it might have read the same either way. To me, as it is, it has a spark of the divine.
And, of course, is wonderfully self-referential.
A thing of beauty is a joy for ever
and wondered if splitting ‘forever’ was an artistic choice. It was in common usage both ways in his time. It seems to me - possibly because ‘for ever’ is now uncommon - that, as written, it’s much more powerful. Just as, explaining to a friend some extraordinary phenomenon in natural history, I found myself writing ‘astonishing’ in lieu of a more everyday choice.
* And, why not . . . ?
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File ... terror.jpg
Given the subject, ‘beauty’ and ‘joy are hardly apropos, but it is a striking image.
I’ll add this: there’s a Keats concordance online, but it’s no help as to his usage elsewhere.
Another idea - should have been there from the first - I’ll venture to suggest that words like ‘forever’ and ‘amazing’ are diluted by common figurative use. So in Keats’s time, it might have read the same either way. To me, as it is, it has a spark of the divine.
And, of course, is wonderfully self-referential.