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Analysis of Shellys Ode to the West Wind

Analysis of Shelly's "Ode to the West Wind"


Ode to the West Wind is a poem of deep despair as well as one of vivid
imagery. The first section is fairly straightforward with constant
references to death, corpses and destruction that Shelly uses as a
metaphor for autumn. The allusion to disease and darkness describes the
West Wind in this first section. Shelly sees it as a sort of grim reaper but
seems to come back from the whole topic by also calling it the
preserver.
In the second section Shelly takes a more lofty perspective in the
beginning mentioning heaven and angels and then moves to give a
depiction of hell in the last line of the section with black rain and fire
and hail will burst. To be a little more precise, the second section is one
comparing an oncoming storm to the end of a year. Perhaps Shelly feels
that the next year will not be as good as the last and one can even
speculate that the west winds are the winds of change or even of evil.
I feel that the third section really supports the theory that Shelly did
portray the west wind as the bringer of evil. The wind is described to be
awakened from a place of peace and beauty. The line Thy voice, and
suddenly grow grey with fear seems to describe a sense of darkness and
loathing, a chilling feeling flowing through the veins. The west wind is
power.

The fourth section plays on the feeling that this wind is allpowerful and Shelly seems to give the impression of bowing down before
it. Impulses, uncontrollable, tame-less are all words used to describe the
wind in this section. In almost a begging tone the speaker of the poem
asks to be taken away from his pain as said Oh! Lift me as a wave, a
leaf, a cloud! / I fall upon the thorns of life! I bleed!. Going back in the
poem though the west wind seems to have created this and the speaker
loathes it, but here shows he also still needs it.
The final section seems to come to terms with the west wind. The
asking for music even though the leaves are gone and there is not to
celebrate shows this perspective: I will still play but it will be one of
sadness. The speaker asks for his dead thoughts to be taken away and to
scatter them for all to know. This shows also he has come to terms with
the find by again asking its help for the speaker to come to terms with
himself. In the end it is the realization to the speaker that spring follows
the dismal winter the west wind brings that seems to end the fairly dark
poem on a lighter note.
A first-person persona addresses the west wind in five stanzas. It is strong
and fearsome. In the first stanza, the wind blows the leaves of autumn. In
the second stanza, the wind blows the clouds in the sky. In the third
stanza, the wind blows across an island and the waves of the sea. In the
fourth stanza, the persona imagines being the leaf, cloud, or wave,
sharing in the winds strength. He desires to be lifted up rather than
caught low on the thorns of life, for he sees himself as like the wind:
tameless, and swift, and proud. In the final stanza, he asks the wind to
play upon him like a lyre; he wants to share the winds fierce spirit. In

turn, he would have the power to spread his verse throughout the world,
reawakening it.
Analysis
The poet is directing his speech to the wind and all that it has the power
to do as it takes charge of the rest of nature and blows across the earth
and through the seasons, able both to preserve and to destroy all in its
path. The wind takes control over clouds, seas, weather, and more. The
poet offers that the wind over the Mediterranean Sea was an inspiration
for the poem. Recognizing its power, the wind becomes a metaphor for
natures awe-inspiring spirit. By the final stanza, the speaker has come to
terms with the winds power over him, and he requests inspiration and
subjectivity. He looks to natures power to assist him in his work of
poetry and prays that the wind will deliver his words across the land and
through time as it does with all other objects in nature.
The form of the poem is consistent in pattern. Each stanza is fourteen
lines in length, using the rhyming pattern of aba bcb cdc ded ee. This is
called terza rima, the form used by Dante in his Divine Comedy.
Keeping in mind that this is an ode, a choral celebration, the tone of the
speaker understandably includes excitement, pleasure, joy, and hope.
Shelley draws a parallel between the seasonal cycles of the wind and that
of his ever-changing spirit. Here, nature, in the form of the wind, is
presented, according to Abrams as the outer correspondent to an inner
change from apathy to spiritual vitality, and from imaginative sterility to a
burst of creative power.
Thematically, then, this poem is about the inspiration Shelley draws from
nature. The breath of autumn being is Shelleys atheistic version of the
Christian Holy Spirit. Instead of relying on traditional religion, Shelley
focuses his praise around the winds role in the various cycles in nature
death, regeneration, preservation, and destruction. The speaker

begins by praising the wind, using anthropomorphic techniques (wintry


bed, chariots, corpses, and clarions) to personalize the great natural spirit
in hopes that it will somehow heed his plea. The speaker is aware of his
own mortality and the immortality of his subject. This drives him to beg
that he too can be inspired (make me thy lyre) and carried (be through
my lips to unawakened earth) through land and time.
The first two stanzas are mere praise for the winds power, covered in
simile and allusion to all that which the wind has the power to do:
loosen, spread, shed, and burst. In the fourth and fifth stanzas,
the speaker enters into the poem, seeking (hoping) for equal treatment
along with all other objects in nature, at least on the productive side. The
poet offers humility in the hope that the wind will assist him in achieving
his quest to drive [his] dead thoughts over the universe. Ultimately, the
poet is thankful for the inspiration he is able to draw from natures spirit,
and he hopes that it will also be the same spirit that carries his words
across the land where he also can be a source of inspiration.

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