When I have fears that I may cease to be
by John Keats
When I have fears that I may cease to be
Before my pen has glean’d my teeming brain,
Before high-piled books, in charactery,
Hold like rich garners the full ripen’d grain;
When I behold, upon the night’s starr’d face,
Huge cloudy symbols of a high romance,
And think that I may never live to trace
Their shadows, with the magic hand of chance;
And when I feel, fair creature of an hour,
That I shall never look upon thee more,
Never have relish in the faery power
Of unreflecting love; – then on the shore
Of the wide world I stand alone, and think
Till love and fame to nothingness do sink.
Glossary:
Cease – stop.
Glean – the process of gathering stray grain that reapers leave behind after harvest.
Teeming – full of; in abundance.
Charactery – words.
Garner – a granary (storehouse for grain).
Behold – take notice; look at.
Thee – you.
Relish – enjoy, appreciate.
Faery – old form of ‘fairy’.
Summary:
John Keats died at a young age from tuberculosis. The speaker, aware of his approaching
death, expresses his fear that he will be deprived of the three things he most greatly values.
1. To write poetry of his many ideas.
2. To experience the wondrous mystery of nature and gain inspiration from it.
3. To experience the magical power of passionate love.
Each of the three quatrains in this Shakespearean sonnet deal with one of his fears.
Repetition:
The repetition of ‘when’ and ‘before’ suggests the passing of time and makes us aware that
the speaker is aware of his own lack of time (his threatening death).
Interpretation:
Key:
Green – important connotation.
Blue – old fashioned word usage.
Line:
1. The speaker feels that he will die...
2. before he has used his great many ideas to write poetry. ‘Pen’ suggests that his ideas
will be used to write. ‘Teeming’ suggests that the speaker is still full of life and ideas,
which contrasts with his approaching death. Emotion is stirred by the potential
greatness of the speaker being cut short by his death.
3. The speaker’s potential written works would full up many books. That the books are
piled up like a tower mirrors the shape of a grain silo. The use of the old-fashioned
word ‘charactery’ suggests that the speaker’s works are timeless and unique.
4. The books are again compared to silos (‘garners’), which will hold all of his written
work. The speaker’s work is compared to ‘full ripened grain’. That they are ripened
suggests the time it took to write them and that his writing is mature in content.
5. ‘Night’ suggests mystery and reminds us of the speaker’s approaching death. The
night is personified as having a face.
6. The speaker wishes to unravel the mysteries of nature which are cloaked in mystery
(‘cloudy’). These mysteries all point to a hidden spiritual realm, which is suggested by
‘high’. ‘Romance’ suggests that the speakers is a romanticist which,
characteristically, put great emphasis on the power of imagination and emotion.
7. The speaker feels that he will not get the opportunity to define or make sense of...
8. nature’s mysteries (‘shadows’). ‘Magic’ suggests something unexplainable or divine.
‘Chance’ has the dual meaning of luck/coincidence or opportunity.
9. The speaker now mentions his encounter with a beautiful stranger. ‘Creature’
suggests that the women was almost inhuman and a product of nature, and hence
mysterious. ‘Hour’ may suggest that beauty is temporary or it may refer to the
speaker only seeing the women briefly.
10. The speaker fears that he may never see her again. ‘Thee’ is old-fashioned which
may suggest that the women is unordinary.
11. The speaker also fears that he may never experience passionate love. ‘Faery’
suggests the magical and unexplainable quality of love, it is also an old-fashioned
word, suggesting that love is timeless.
12. ‘Unreflecting’ suggests that the speakers love is either not returned by the women or
is extremely shallow, being based purely on her physical appearance. ‘–‘ suggests
that his fantasies and hopes for the future are now cut off by his approaching death.
It may also suggest that he has accepted that these things are now unachievable and
that he now looks to his death instead of the things that could have been. The shore
is often representative of a boundary or cross roads.
13. The repetition of the ‘w’ in ‘wide world’ suggests the vastness of the world and the
many things he will never live to experience. The speaker will reflect on his short
life...
14. until his ability to love and his short lived fame as a poet end in nothingness (he
dies).
Compiled by B. S. Seegers