Keats: On First Looking Into Chapman’s Homer

On this page, you will find the poem itself, a link to a brief biography and this link to the blogpage by Carol Rumens which gives some background to and discusion of the poem.

On First Looking into Chapman’s Homer

BY JOHN KEATS

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
   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;
Or like stout Cortez when with eagle eyes
   He star’d at the Pacific—and all his men
Look’d at each other with a wild surmise—
   Silent, upon a peak in Darien.
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See my other pages on Keats:
—oOo—
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