FREE ESSAY ON JOHN KEATS' "LA BELLE DAME SANS MERCI"

JOHN KEATS' "LA BELLE DAME SANS MERCI"

SPeech is where you make speeches. "La Belle Dame sans Merci" In "La Belle Dame sans
Merci," John Keats' stresses the idea that beauty is only skin deep and also lies in the
eye of the beholder. Through the use of two speakers, Keats' is able to portray his theme
by means of a story. As the poem begins, the reader meets the first speaker. As we read
on, we come to find out that this is a passer-by. We also find out the state of the other
speaker, "wretched Wight." Sounds so full of life. We also find out the setting. "The
sedge is wither'd from the lake, /And no birds sing." Again, the reader sees the lack of
life in the setting. As the first speaker continues, he starts to interrogate the other
man. "…what can ail thee…?" He describes the man as "a lily on thy brow, with
anguish moist and fever dew." This translated more than likely indicates that the man is
sad. He has also lost the color in his cheeks by stating, "on thy cheek a fading rose."
Now, it is time for the other speaker to respond. His first remark is the route of his
problem…"I met a lady." Wow, cut, print, we have ourselves the beginning of the
majority of problems men face. He has met a woman. He then starts to describe her as if
in a trance "Full beautiful, a faery's child." The woman is made out to be a goddess. He
furthers his description with "Her hair was long, her foot was light, /And her eyes were
wild." Through stating her attributes in past tense, the second speaker is relaying that
she is no longer there. Now the second speaker (for the sake of understanding, we shall
call him Sark), Sark is describing what they did together. "[Sark] set her on [his]
pacing steed." And she sat like a true lady and they were merry. She took him into "her
elfin grot" and the laid together. She "look'd at [Sark] as she did love him." By this
saying, it can be presumed that she did not really love him, but only acted like it
because of the gifts he was bestowing upon her. As he fell asleep, Sark had a dream. He
dreamt that "[he] saw pale kings, and princes too, /Pale warriors, death-pale were they
all." These men can be presumed as others who had fallen for this woman and had come to
the same misery as him. Sark wakes up and finds himself alone "On the cold hillside." He
then continues to explain that is why the passer-by found him where he is, where "the
sedge is wither'd from the lake, /And no bird sings." This is a true story of falling in
love with the beauty and not the person. The man fell for her like a rock in water. He
gave up everything for her and she left him. But in retrospect, when the title of the
poem is translated, it turns out she is the "beautiful woman without pity." 
Bibliography
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