Emotions and Interpretations

The poem “Isabella or; the Pot of Basil” is analyzed in the article Keats, Ideals, and Isabella, by Evan Radcliffe. The article states that any poem, specifically “Isabella or; the Pot of Basil,” can be interpreted based off of the readers emotions. Radcliffe’s ideals displayed in his article connect to the poem “Isabella or; the Pot of Basil” because of the fact that there are multiple themes throughout the course of the poem.  Keats’ poem “Isabella or; the Pot of Basil uses love as a main theme but depending on how you feel while reading it depends on the outcome of your interpretation. “…call into question the authenticity of all emotions, making them seem part of a disturbingly mechanical process of stimulus and response” (Radcliffe 259). What Radcliffe is trying to get across is that how you feel while reading a poem will determine how you see the interpretation. Radcliffe summarizes by saying that Isabella or; the Pot of Basil is especially mandible because of the theme. The theme of love can be read in many different ways depending how you feel. While reading Isabella or; the Pot of Basil if you have just suffered a break up you might sympathize with how Isabella feels about losing Lorenzo. On the other hand if you have a sister dating a person you don’t like, it can be assumed that sympathy would be placed with the brothers. In essence no matter what the author was trying to convey through their writing, interpretations will always come from the emotions felt by the reader.

While reading the article I felt that Radcliffe was on the right path in describing exactly how romantic poems function. While reading both “Isabella or; the Pot of Basil” and “Rime of the Ancient Mariner” my interpretations were completely wrong. I couldn’t figure out the correct interpretation because I didn’t want to read the poem, by feeling angry about the poem, and as if it was not needed my mind in itself decided that the themes of the poems had nothing to do with the correct theme. Keats often associated love and pain both in his life and in his poetry.  He wrote of a young woman he found attractive, "When she comes into a room she makes an impression the same as the Beauty of a Leopardess.... I should like her to ruin me..."  Love and death are coupled in "Isabella; or, the Pot of Basil," and "La Belle Dame sans Merci."  The Fatal Woman (the woman whom it is destructive to love, like Salome, Lilith, and Cleopatra) appears in “La Belle Dame sans Merci" and "Lamia."  Although what Radcliffe described in his article was accurate, I feel as if in some way it is inaccurate. Poetry is written to be blatantly obvious, to the extent where poets aren’t going to mask the main theme in the poem itself. The poet will make it stand out, so even if the subtle messages are never truly discovered, the main theme will stand alone and make for an understanding of the poem.

III. He knew whose gentle hand was at the latch,
Before the door had given her to his eyes;
And from her chamber-window he would catch
Her beauty farther than the falcon spies;	20
And constant as her vespers would he watch,
Because her face was turn’d to the same skies;
And with sick longing all the night outwear,
To hear her morning-step upon the stair.

The above stanza gives way to the fact that multiple outcomes can be achieved regarding interpretations. When it says “…And with sick longing all the night outwear,” the words can be interpreted in many different ways; for example it could be that Lorenzo is so madly in love with Isabella that he wastes all his energy fretting over her. However it could also be interpreted as the amount of time Lorenzo spends thinking about Isabella makes him sick because of how much he worries. This just adds depth to the point that Radcliffe is trying to make by saying “… their source may not be his own perversity, but the idealized vision of the poem itself.”