Showing posts with label "On first looking into Chapman's Homer". Show all posts
Showing posts with label "On first looking into Chapman's Homer". Show all posts

Monday, July 8, 2013

John Keats, "On first looking into Chapman's Homer"

MUCH have I travell'd in the realms of gold,
  And many goodly states and kingdoms seen;
  Round many western islands have I been
Which bards in fealty to Apollo hold.
Oft of one wide expanse had I been told         5
  That deep-brow'd Homer ruled as his demesne:
  Yet did I never breathe its pure serene
Till I heard Chapman speak out loud and bold:
Then felt I like some watcher of the skies
  When a new planet swims into his ken;  10
Or like stout Cortez, when with eagle eyes
  He stared at the Pacific—and all his men
Look'd at each other with a wild surmise—
  Silent, upon a peak in Darien.

--John Keats, "On first looking into Chapman's Homer"