雪莱《西风颂》的英文赏析 谢谢！
一个秋日的午后，诗人雪莱在意大利佛罗伦萨近郊的树林里漫步。突然狂风大作，乌云翻滚。到了傍晚，暴风雨夹带着冰雹雷电倾盆而下，荡涤着大地，震撼着人间。大自然威武雄壮的交响乐，触发了诗人的灵感，他奋笔疾书，谱写了不朽的抒情短诗《西风颂》。这是1819年的事情。
当时，欧洲各国的工人运动和革命运动风起云涌。英国工人阶级为了争取自身的生存权利，正同资产阶级展开英勇的斗争，捣毁机器和罢工事件接连不断。1819年8月，曼彻斯特八万工人举行了声势浩大的游行示威，反动当局竟出动军队野蛮镇压，制造了历史上著名的彼得卢大屠杀事件。雪莱满怀悲愤，写下了长诗《暴政的假面游行》，对资产阶级政府的血腥暴行提出严正抗议。法国自拿破仑帝制崩溃、波旁王朝复辟以后，阶级矛盾异常尖锐，广大人民正酝酿着反对封建复辟势力的革命斗争。拿破仑帝国的解体也大大促进了西班牙人民反对异族压迫和封建专制的革命运动，1819年1月，终于响起了武装起义的枪声。就在武装起义的前夕，雪莱给西班牙人民献上了《颂歌》一首，为西班牙革命吹响了进军的号角。在意大利和希腊，民族解放运动方兴未艾，雪莱的《西风颂》发表不久，这两个国家也先后爆发了轰轰烈烈的武装起义。面对着欧洲山雨欲来风满楼的革命形势，雪莱为之鼓舞，为之振奋，诗人胸中沸腾着炽热的革命激情。这时，在一场暴风骤雨的自然景象的触发下，这种难以抑制的革命激情立刻冲出胸膛，一泻千里，化作激昂慷慨的歌唱：
你怒吼咆哮的雄浑交响乐中，
将有树林和我的深沉的歌唱，
我们将唱出秋声，婉转而忧愁。
精灵呀，让我变成你，猛烈、刚强!
把我僵死的思想驱散在宇宙，
像一片片的枯叶，以鼓舞新生；
请听从我这个诗篇中的符咒，
把我的话传给全世界的人，
犹如从不灭的炉中吹出火花!
雪莱在歌唱西风。他歌唱西风以摧枯拉朽的巨大力量扫除破败的残叶，无情地把那“黑的、惨红的、铅灰的，或者蜡黄，患瘟疫而死掉的一大群”垃圾扫除干净；他歌唱西风“在动乱的太空中掀起激流”，搅动着“浓云密雾”，呼唤着“电火、冰雹和黑的雨水”，“为这将逝的残年唱起挽歌”；他歌唱西风唤醒沉睡的浩翰大海，波涛汹涌，把一丛丛躲藏在海底深处的海树海花，吓得惊恐色变，“瑟瑟地发抖，纷纷凋谢”。雪莱歌唱西风，同时也在歌唱席卷整个欧洲的革命风暴。他歌唱革命运动正以排山倒海之势，雷霆万钧之力，横扫旧世界一切黑暗反动势力。革命运动风起云涌，一顶顶皇冠随风落地，一群群妖魔鬼怪望风逃遁，这正是当时欧洲革命形势的生动写照。
雪莱在歌唱西风。他歌唱西风“是破坏者，又是保护者”。他歌唱西风不仅扫除了残枝败叶，而且“送飞翔的种籽到它们的冬床”。待到来年春天，西风的妹妹——东风驾临大地，就会“蓓蕾儿吐馨”，“漫山遍野铺上了姹紫嫣红”，出现一个春光明媚的新世界。雪莱歌唱西风，同时也在歌唱革命。他和那些资产阶级凡夫俗子不同，他没有把革命简单地看作消极的破坏力量。他看到了革命一方面在扫除腐朽，无情地摧毁旧世界，另一方面又在“鼓舞新生”，积极地在创建着美好的新世界。尽管雪莱对新世界的理解还比较空泛，还不可能突破空想社会主义的水平。
雪莱在歌唱西风。但他不是冷眼旁观的歌者，他强烈地热爱西风，向往西风，他以西风自喻，西风是他的灵魂，他的肉体，诗人和西风合而为一：
如果我是任你吹的落叶一片；
如果我是随着你飞翔的云块；
如果是波浪，在你威力下急湍，
享受你神力的推动，自由自在
几乎与你一样，啊，你难制的力!
再不然，如果能回返童年时代，
常陪伴着你在太空任意飘飞，
以为要比你更神速也非幻想；
那我就不致处此窘迫的境地，
向你苦苦求告：啊，快使我高扬，
像一片树叶、一朵云、一阵浪涛!
我碰上人生的荆棘，鲜血直淌!
时光的重负困住我，把我压倒，
我太像你了：难驯、迅速而骄傲。
这是雪莱在歌唱西风，同时在激励和鞭策自己。雪莱是一个热情的浪漫主义诗人，同时又是一个勇敢的革命战士，他以诗歌作武器，积极投身革命运动，经受过失败和挫折，但始终保持着高昂的战斗精神。他早年就赴爱尔兰参加民族解放斗争，回到英国后继续抨击暴政，鼓吹革命，同情和支持工人运动。因而受到资产阶级反动政府的迫害，不得不愤然离开自己的祖国。在旅居意大利期间，他与意大利“烧炭党”人和希腊革命志士来往密切，同情和支持他们的革命活动。在《西风颂》里，熔铸着雪莱坎坷的人生道路，倾注着雪莱对反动统治者的满腔愤恨，洋溢着雪莱不屈不挠的战斗精神，表达了雪莱献身革命的强烈愿望。
《西风颂》是秋天的歌，是时代的声音。19世纪初叶，科学社会主义还没有诞生，欧洲各国的工人运动还处在自发阶段，封建贵族和资产阶级的反动势力还很强大，“神圣同盟”的魔影正在到处游荡着。大地还没有苏醒，寒冬还在后头。所以，《西风颂》不免带有“婉转而忧愁”的调子。但作为社会主义思想的先驱，雪莱对革命前途和人类命运始终保持着乐观主义的坚定信念，他坚信正义必定战胜邪恶，光明必定代替黑暗。从总的倾向来看，《西风颂》的旋律又是“猛烈、刚强”的。诗人以“天才的预言家”的姿态向全世界大声宣告：
如果冬天来了，春天还会远吗?
《西风颂》是欧洲诗歌史上的艺术珍品。全诗共五节，由五首十四行诗组成。从形式上看，五个小节格律完整，可以独立成篇。从内容来看，它们又熔为一体，贯穿着一个中心思想。第一节描写西风扫除林中残叶，吹送生命的种籽。第二节描写西风搅动天上的浓云密雾，呼唤着暴雨雷电的到来。第三节描写西风掀起大海的汹涌波涛，摧毁海底花树。三节诗三个意境，诗人幻想的翅膀飞翔在树林、天空和大海之间，飞翔在现实和理想之间，形象鲜明，想象丰富，但中心思想只有一个，就是歌唱西风扫除腐朽、鼓舞新生的强大威力。从第四节开始，由写景转向抒情，由描写西风的气势转向直抒诗人的胸臆，抒发诗人对西风的热爱和向往，达到情景交融的境界，而中心思想仍然是歌唱西风。因此，结构严谨，层次清晰，主题集中，是《西风颂》一个突出的艺术特点。
其次，《西风颂》采用的是象征手法，整首诗从头至尾环绕着秋天的西风作文章，无论是写景还是抒情，都没有脱离这个特定的描写对象，没有使用过一句政治术语和革命口号。然而读了这首短诗以后，我们却深深感受到，雪莱在歌唱西风，又不完全是歌唱西风，诗人实质上是通过歌唱西风来歌唱革命。诗中的西风、残叶、种籽、流云、暴雨雷电、大海波涛、海底花树等等，都不过是象征性的东西，它们包含着深刻的寓意，大自然风云激荡的动人景色，乃是人间蓬勃发展的革命斗争的象征性反映。从这个意义上说，《西风颂》不是风景诗，而是政治抒情诗，它虽然没有一句直接描写革命，但整首诗都是在反映革命。尤其是结尾脍炙人口的诗句，既概括了自然现象，也深刻地揭示了人类社会的历史规律，指出了革命斗争经过艰难曲折走向胜利的光明前景，寓意深远，余味无穷，一百多年来成了人们广泛传诵的名言警句
Ode to the West Wind
- Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792-1822)
I
1 O wild West Wind, thou breath of Autumn's being,
2 Thou, from whose unseen presence the leaves dead
3 Are driven, like ghosts from an enchanter fleeing,
4 Yellow, and black, and pale, and hectic red,
5 Pestilence-stricken multitudes: O thou,
6 Who chariotest to their dark wintry bed
7 The winged seeds, where they lie cold and low,
8 Each like a corpse within its grave, until
9 Thine azure sister of the Spring shall blow
10 Her clarion o'er the dreaming earth, and fill
11 (Driving sweet buds like flocks to feed in air)
12 With living hues and odours plain and hill:
13 Wild Spirit, which art moving everywhere;
14 Destroyer and preserver; hear, oh hear!
II
15 Thou on whose stream, mid the steep sky's commotion,
16 Loose clouds like earth's decaying leaves are shed,
17 Shook from the tangled boughs of Heaven and Ocean,
18 Angels of rain and lightning: there are spread
19 On the blue surface of thine a{:e}ry surge,
20 Like the bright hair uplifted from the head
21 Of some fierce Maenad, even from the dim verge
22 Of the horizon to the zenith's height,
23 The locks of the approaching storm. Thou dirge
24 Of the dying year, to which this closing night
25 Will be the dome of a vast sepulchre,
26 Vaulted with all thy congregated might
27 Of vapours, from whose solid atmosphere
28 Black rain, and fire, and hail will burst: oh hear!
III
29 Thou who didst waken from his summer dreams
30 The blue Mediterranean, where he lay,
31 Lull'd by the coil of his cryst{`a}lline streams,
32 Beside a pumice isle in Baiae's bay,
33 And saw in sleep old palaces and towers
34 Quivering within the wave's intenser day,
35 All overgrown with azure moss and flowers
36 So sweet, the sense faints picturing them! Thou
37 For whose path the Atlantic's level powers
38 Cleave themselves into chasms, while far below
39 The sea-blooms and the oozy woods which wear
40 The sapless foliage of the ocean, know
41 Thy voice, and suddenly grow gray with fear,
42 And tremble and despoil themselves: oh hear!
IV
43 If I were a dead leaf thou mightest bear;
44 If I were a swift cloud to fly with thee;
45 A wave to pant beneath thy power, and share
46 The impulse of thy strength, only less free
47 Than thou, O uncontrollable! If even
48 I were as in my boyhood, and could be
49 The comrade of thy wanderings over Heaven,
50 As then, when to outstrip thy skiey speed
51 Scarce seem'd a vision; I would ne'er have striven
52 As thus with thee in prayer in my sore need.
53 Oh, lift me as a wave, a leaf, a cloud!
54 I fall upon the thorns of life! I bleed!
55 A heavy weight of hours has chain'd and bow'd
56 One too like thee: tameless, and swift, and proud.
V
57 Make me thy lyre, even as the forest is:
58 What if my leaves are falling like its own!
59 The tumult of thy mighty harmonies
60 Will take from both a deep, autumnal tone,
61 Sweet though in sadness. Be thou, Spirit fierce,
62 My spirit! Be thou me, impetuous one!
63 Drive my dead thoughts over the universe
64 Like wither'd leaves to quicken a new birth!
65 And, by the incantation of this verse,
66 Scatter, as from an unextinguish'd hearth
67 Ashes and sparks, my words among mankind!
68 Be through my lips to unawaken'd earth
69 The trumpet of a prophecy! O Wind,
70 If Winter comes, can Spring be far behind?
The poem Ode to the West Wind can be divided in two parts: the first three stanzas are about the qualities of the ‘Wind’; the fact that these three stanzas belong together can visually be seen by the phrase ‘Oh hear!’ at the end of each of the three stanzas. Whereas the first three stanzas give a relation between the ‘Wind’ and the speaker, there is a turn at the beginning of the fourth stanza; the focus is now on the speaker, or better the hearer, and what he is going to hear.
a.) first stanza
The first stanza begins with the alliteration ‘wild West Wind’. This makes the ‘wind’ “sound invigorating”. The reader gets the impression that the wind is something that lives, because he is ‘wild’ – it is at that point a personification of the ‘wind’. Even after reading the headline and the alliteration, one might have the feeling that the ‘Ode’ might somehow be positive. But it is not, as the beginning of the poem destroys the feeling that associated the wind with the spring. The first few lines consist of a lot of sinister elements, such as ‘dead leaves’. The inversion of ‘leaves dead’ (l. 2) in the first stanza underlines the fatality by putting the word ‘dead’ (l. 2) at the end of the line so that it rhymes with the next lines. The sentence goes on and makes these ‘dead’ (l. 2) leaves live again as ‘ghosts’ (l. 3) that flee from something that panics them. The sentence does not end at that point but goes on with a polysyndeton. The colourful context makes it easier for the reader to visualise what is going on – even if it is in an uncomfortable manner. ‘Yellow’ can be seen as “the ugly hue of ‘pestilence-stricken’ skin; and ‘hectic red’, though evoking the pase of the poem itself, could also highlight the pace of death brought to multitudes.” There is also a contradiction in the colour ‘black’ (l. 4) and the adjective ‘pale’(l. 4). In the word ‘chariotest’ (l. 6) the ‘est’ is added to the verb stem ‘chariot’, probably to indicate the second person singular, after the subject ‘thou’ (l. 5). The ‘corpse within its grave’ (l. 8) in the next line is in contrast to the ‘azure sister of the Spring’ (l. 9) – a reference to the east wind - whose ‘living hues and odours plain’ (l.12) evoke a strong contrast to the colours of the fourth line of the poem that evoke death. The last line of this stanza (‘Destroyer and Preserver’, l. 14) refers to the west wind. The west wind is considered the ‘Destroyer’ (l. 14) because it drives the last sings of life from the trees. He is also considered the ‘Preserver’ (l.14) for scattering the seeds which will come to life in the spring.
b.) second stanza
The second stanza of the poem is much more fluid than the first one. The sky’s ‘clouds’ (l.16) are ‘like earth’s decaying leaves’ (l. 16). They are a reference to the second line of the first stanza (‘leaves dead’, l. 2). Through this reference the landscape is recalled again. The ‘clouds’(l. 16) are ‘Shook from the tangled boughs of Heaven and Ocean’ (l. 17). This probably refers to the fact that the line between the sky and the stormy sea is indistinguishable and the whole space from the horizon to the zenith being is covered with trialing storm clouds. The ‘clouds’ can also be seen as ‘Angels of rain’ (l. 18). In a biblical way, they may be messengers that bring a message from heaven down to earth through rain and lightning. These two natural phenomenons with their “fertilizing and illuminating power” bring a change. Line 21 begins with ‘Of some fierce Maenad ...’ (l. 21) and again the west wind is part of the second stanza of the poem; here he is two things at once: first he is ‘dirge/Of the dying year’ (l. 23f) and second he is “a prophet of tumult whose prediction is decisive”; a prophet who does not only bring ‘black rain, and fire, and hail’ (l. 28), but who ‘will burst’ (l. 28) it. The ‘locks of the approaching storm’ (l. 23) are the messengers of this bursting: the ‘clouds’. Shelley in this stanza “expands his vision from the earthly scene with the leaves before him to take in the vaster commotion of the skies”. This means that the wind is now no longer at the horizon and therefore far away, but he is exactly above us. The clouds now reflect the image of the swirling leaves; this is a parallelism that gives evidence that we lifted “our attention from the finite world into the macrocosm”. The ‘clouds’ can also be compared with the leaves; but the clouds are more unstable and bigger than the leaves and they can be seen as messengers of rain and lightning as it was mentioned above.
c.) third stanza
The question that comes up when reading the third stanza at first is what the subject of the verb ‘saw’ (l. 33) could be. On the one hand there is the ‘blue Mediterranean’ (l. 30). With the ‘Mediterranean’ as subject of the stanza, the “syntactical movement” is continued and there is no break in the fluency of the poem; it is said that ‘he lay, / Lull’d by the coil of this crystalline streams,/Beside a pumice isle in Baiae’s bay, / And saw in sleep old palaces and towers’ (l. 30-33). On the other hand it is also possible that the lines of this stanza refer to the ‘wind’ again. Then the verb that belongs to the ‘wind’ as subject is not ‘lay’, but the previous line of this stanza, that says ‘Thou who didst waken ... And saw’ (l. 29, 33). But whoever – the ‘Mediterranean’ or the ‘wind’ - ‘saw’ (l. 33) the question remains whether the city one of them saw, is real and therefore a reflection on the water of a city that really exists on the coast; or the city is just an illusion. Pirie is not sure of that either. He says that it might be “a creative interpretation of the billowing seaweed; or of the glimmering sky reflected on the heaving surface”. Both possibilities seem to be logical. To explain the appearance of an underwater world, it might be easier to explain it by something that is realistic; and that might be that the wind is able to produce illusions on the water. With its pressure, the wind “would waken the appearance of a city”. From what is known of the ‘wind’ from the last two stanzas, it became clear that the ‘wind’ is something that plays the role of a Creator. Whether the wind creates real things or illusions does not seem to be that important. It appears as if the third stanza shows - in comparison with the previous stanzas – a turning-point. Whereas Shelley had accepted death and changes in life in the first and second stanza, he now turns to “wistful reminiscence [, recalls] an alternative possibility of transcendence”. From line 26 to line 36 he gives an image of nature Line 36 begins with the sentence ‘So sweet, the sense faints picturing them’. And indeed, the picture Shelley gives us here seems to be ‘sweet’ (l. 36). ‘The sea-blooms’ (l. 39) are probably the plants at the bottom of the ocean and give a peaceful picture of what is under water. But if we look closer at line 36, we realise that the sentence is not what it appears to be at first sight, because it obviously means ‘so sweet that one feels faint in describing them’. This shows that the idyllic picture is not what it seems to be and that the harmony will certainly soon be destroyed. A few lines later, Shelley suddenly talks about ‘fear’ (l. 41). This again shows the influence of the west wind which announces the change of the season.
d.) fourth stanza
Whereas the stanzas one to three began with ‘O wild West Wind’ (l. 1) and ‘Thou...’ (l. 15, 29) and were clearly directed to the wind, there is a change in the fourth stanza. The focus is no more on the ‘wind’, but on the speaker who says ‘If I...’ (l. 43f). Until this part, the poem has appeared very anonymous and was only concentrated on the ‘wind’ and its forces so that the author of the poem was more or less forgotten. Pirie calls this “the suppression of personality” which finally vanishes at that part of the poem. It becomes more and more clear that what the author talks about now is himself. That this must be true, shows the frequency of the author’s use of the first-person pronouns ‘I’ (l. 43, 44, 48, 51, 54), ‘my’ (l. 48, 52) and ‘me’ (l. 53). These pronouns appear nine times in the fourth stanza. Certainly the author wants to dramatise the atmosphere so that the reader recalls the situation of stanza one to three. He achieves this by using the same pictures of the previous stanzas in this one. Whereas these pictures, such as ‘leaf’, ‘cloud’ and ‘wave’ have existed only together with the ‘wind’, they are now existing with the author. The author thinks about being one of them and says ‘If I were a ...’ (l. 43ff). Shelley here identifies himself with the wind, although he knows that he can not do that, because it is impossible for someone to put all the things he has learnt from life aside and enter a “world of innocence”. That Shelley is deeply aware of his closedness in life and his identity shows his command in line 53. There he says ‘Oh, lift me up as a wave, a leaf, a cloud’ (l. 53). He knows that this is something impossible to achieve, but he does not stop praying for it. The only chance Shelley sees to make his prayer and wish for a new identity with the Wind come true is by pain or death, as death leads to rebirth. So, he wants to ‘fall upon the thorns of life’ and ‘bleed’ (l. 54). At the end of the stanza the poet tells us that ‘a heavy weight of hours has chain’d and bow’d’ (l. 55). This may be a reference to the years that have passed and ‘chained and bowed’ (l. 55) the hope of the people who fought for freedom and were literally imprisoned. With this knowledge, the West Wind becomes a different meaning. The wind is the ‘uncontrollable’ (l. 47) who is ‘tameless’ (l. 56). One more thing that one should mention is that this stanza sounds like a kind of prayer or confession of the poet. This confession does not address God and therefore sounds very impersonal. Shelley also changes his use of metaphors in this stanza. In the first stanzas the wind was a metaphor explained at full length. Now the metaphors are only weakly presented – ‘the thorns of life’ (l. 54). Shelley also leaves out the fourth element: the fire. In the previous stanzas he wrote about the earth, the air and the water. The reader now expects the fire – but it is not there. This leads to a break in the symmetry of the poem because the reader does not meet the fire until the fifth stanza.
e.) fifth stanza
Again the wind is very important in this last stanza. The wind with his ‘mighty harmonies’ (l. 59) becomes an artist or a Creator of sounds. At the beginning of the poem the ‘wind’ was only capable of blowing the leaves from the trees. In the previous stanza the poet identified himself with the leaves. In this stanza the ‘wind’ is now capable of using both of these things mentioned before. Everything that had been said before, was part of the elements – wind, earth and water. Now the fourth element comes in: the fire. There is also a confrontation in this stanza: whereas in line 57 Shelley writes ‘me thy’, there is ‘thou me’ in line 62. This “signals a restored confidence, if not in the poet’s own abilities, at least in his capacity to communicate with [...] the Wind”. It is also necessary to mention that the first-person pronouns again appear in a great frequency; but the possessive pronoun ‘my’ predominates. Unlike the frequent use of the ‘I’ in the previous stanza that made the stanza sound self-conscious, this stanza might now sound self-possessed. The stanza is no more a request or a prayer as it had been in the fourth stanza – it is a demand. The poet becomes the wind’s instrument – his ‘lyre’ (l. 57). This is a symbol of the poet’s own passivity towards the wind; he becomes his musician and the wind’s breath becomes his breath. The poet’s attitude towards the wind has changed: in the first stanza the wind has been an ‘enchanter’ (l. 3), now the wind has become an ‘incantation’ (l. 65). And there is another contrast between the two last stanzas: in the fourth stanza the poet had articulated himself in singular: ‘a leaf’ (l. 43, 53), ‘a cloud’ (l. 44, 53), ‘A wave’ (l. 45, 53) and ‘One too like thee’ (l. 56). In this stanza, the “sense of personality as vulnerably individualised led to self-doubt” and the greatest fear was that what was ‘tameless, and swift, and proud’ (l. 56) will stay ‘chain’d and bow’d’ (l. 55). The last stanza differs from that. The poet in this stanza uses plural forms, for example, ‘my leaves’ (l. 58, 64), ‘thy harmonies’ (l. 59), ‘my thoughts’ (l. 63), ‘ashes and sparks’ (l. 67) and ‘my lips’ (l. 68). By the use of the plural, the poet is able to show that there is some kind of peace and pride in his words. It even seems as if he has redefined himself because the uncertainty of the previous stanza has been blown away. The ‘leaves’ merge with those of an entire forest and ‘Will’ become components in a whole tumult of mighty harmonies. The use of this ‘Will’ (l. 60) is certainly a reference to the future. Through the future meaning, the poem itself does not only sound as something that might have happened in the past, but it may even be a kind of ‘prophecy’ (l. 69) for what might come - the future. At last, Shelley again calls the Wind in a kind of prayer and even wants him to be ‘his’ Spirit: he says: ‘My spirit! Be thou me, impetuous one!’ (l. 62). Like the leaves of the trees in a forest, his leaves will fall and decay and will perhaps soon flourish again when the spring comes. That may be why he is looking forward to the spring and asks at the end of the last stanza ‘If Winter comes, can Spring be far behind?’ (l. 70). This is of course a rhetorical question because spring does come after winter. The question has a deeper meaning and does not only mean the change of seasons, but is a reference to death and rebirth as well.
Poems like this one really have a prophecy for all of us and this prophecy helps us to think about the term ‘poetry’ itself. The Ode shows us that rebirth is something that can be fulfilled through spiritual growing. The last few lines of the poem underline this thought and bring the topic of regeneration and decline to the heart in a very explicit way.
参考资料http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ode_to_the_West_Wind
西风颂 波西.比希.雪莱
雪莱（1792-1822），生于英国萨塞克斯郡。1816年往瑞士，与拜伦结为好友。1822年与友人驾帆船出海，遇暴风，舟沉身亡。作品包括长诗《仙后麦布》（Queen Mab）、《阿多尼斯》（Adonais）等。《西风颂》，全诗五节，每节的韵脚安排是：aba，bcb，cdc，ded，ee。
1
O wild West Wind, thou breath of Autumn's being
Thou, from whose unseen presence the leaves dead
Are driven, like ghosts from an enchanter fleeing,
Yellow, and black, and pale, and hectic red,
Pestilence-stricken multitudes thou
Who chariltest to their dark wintry bed
The winged seeds, where they lie cold and low,
Each like a corpse within its grave, until
Thine azure sister of the Spring shall blow
Her clarion o'er the dreaming earth, and fill
(Driving sweet buds like flocks to feed in air)
With living hues and odors plain and hill:
Wild Spirit, which art moving everywhere;
Destroyer and presserver; hear, oh, hear!
2
Thou on whose stream, 'mid the steep sky's commotion,
Loose clouds like earth's decaying leaves are shedd,
Shook from the tangled boughs of Heaven and Ocean,
angels of rain and lightning:there are spread
On the blue surface of thine airy surge,
Like the bright hair uplifted from the head
Of some fierce Maenad, even from the dim verge
Of the horizon to the Zenith's height,
The locks of the approaching storm.Thou dirge
Of the dying year, to which this closing night
Will be the dome of a vast sepulchre,
Vaulted with all thy congregated might
Of vapoursr, from whose solid atmosphere
Black rain, and fire , and hail will burst h, hear!
3
Thou who didst waken from his summer dreams
The blue Mediterranean, where he lay,
Lulled by the coil of his crystalline streams
Beside a pumice isle in Baiae's bay,
And saw in sleep old palaces and fowers
Quivering within the eave's intenser day,
All overgrown with azure moss and flowers
So sweet, the sense faints picturing them!Thou
For whose path the Atlantic's level powers
Cleave themselves into chasms, while far below
The sea-blooms and the oozy woods which wear
The sapless foliage of the ocean, know
Thy voice, and suddenly grow gray with fear,
And tremble and esepoil themselvesh, hear!
4
If I were a dead leaf thou mightest bear;
If I were a swift cloud to fly with thee:
A wave to pant beneath thy power , and share
The impulse of thy strength, only less free
Than thou, O uncontrollable! If even
I were as im my boyhood, and could be
The comrade of thy wanderigs over Heaven,
As then, when to outstrip thy skiey speed
Scarce seem'd a vision; I would ne'er have striven
As thus with thee in prayer in my sore need.
Oh, lift me as a wave , a leaf, a cloud!
I fall upon the thorns of life! I bleed!
A heavy weight of hours has chained and bowed
One too lke thee: tameless, and swift, and proud.
5
Make me thy lyre, even as the forest is:
What if my leavers are falling like its own!
The tmult of thy mighty harmonies
Will take from both a deep, autumnal tone,
Sweet though in sadness. Be thou, Spirit fierce,
My spirit! Be thou me, impetuous one!
Drive my dead thoughts over the universe
Like witheered leaves to quicken a new birth!
And , by the incantation of this verse,
Scatter, is from an unextinguished hearth
Ashes and sparks, my words among mankind!
Be through my lips to unawakened earth
The trumpet of a prophecy! O Wind,
If Winter comes , can Spring be far behind?
Analysis of Percy Shelley’s “Ode to the West Wind”
In 'Ode to the West Wind,' Percy Bysshe Shelley tries to show his desire for transcendence, by explaining that his thoughts and ideas, like the 'winged seeds' are trapped. The West Wind acts as a force for change and forward movement in the human and natural world.
Shelley sees winter not just as the last season of vegetation but as the last phase of life. Shelley observes the changing of the weather from autumn to winter and its effects on the environment. Shelley is trying to show that a man’s ideas can spread and live on beyond his lifetime by having the wind carry his 'dead thoughts' which through destruction, will lead to a rebirth in the imagination, and in the natural world. Shelley begins his poem by addressing the 'Wild West Wind'. He then introduces the theme of death and compares the dead leaves to 'ghosts'. The imagery of 'Pestilence-stricken multitudes' makes the reader aware that Shelley is addressing more than a pile of leaves. His claustrophobic mood is shown when he talks about the 'wintry bed' and 'The winged seeds, where they lie cold and low/ Each like a corpse within its grave, until/ Thine azure sister of the Spring shall blow'. In the first line, Shelley used the phrase 'winged seeds' which presents i
. . .
The 'closing night' is used also to mean the final night. The 'pumice' shows destruction and creation because when the volcano erupts it destroys. This acts as an introduction and a foreshadow of what is to come later. ' also helps the reader prepare for the climax which Shelley intended. It seems that it is only in his death that the 'Wild Spirit' could be lifted 'as a wave, a leaf, a cloud' to blow free in the 'Wild West Wind'. The 'pumice' is probably Shelley's best example of rebirth. As the rising action continues, Shelley talks about the 'Mediterranean' and its 'summer dreams'. Again, he uses soft sounding words to calm the reader into the same dream-like state of the Mediterranean. He then writes like a mourning song 'Of the dying year, to which this closing night/ Will be the dome of a vast sepulchre/ Vaulted with all they congregated might'. Percy sees his ‘dome’ as a volcano and when the 'dome' does 'burst,' it will act as a 'Destroyer and Preserver' and creator. In 'Ode to the West Wind,' Shelley uses the wind to represent driving change and a carrier for his ideas.
[Commentary]
Of the many revolutionary poems of Shelley, "Ode to the West Wind" is one of his best. It is not only a political poem but also a very lyrical one, in form or content. According to the poet, when he met the storm near the River Arno in Florence, Italy, he was deeply moved by this vehement（猛烈的） natural force, which he associated with the revolutionary storms of the human world.
In the first part of this poem, Shelley describes the wind's power and its role as both "destroyer and preserver." As a destroyer, the west wind sweeps away the dead leaves; as the preserver, it plows the seeds deep into the earth to bloom when spring comes.
In the second part, with images of clouds, rain, lightening, etc., the poet delineates（描绘） the power of the west wind to its extreme when it drives the clouds in the sky.
The third part of the poem finds the poet showing the power of the wind in controlling the waves of the sea, from the tranquil Mediterranean to the turbulent Atlantic.
In the fourth part, the poet expresses his keenly felt feelings and awakened thoughts toward the wind.
The final part of the poem tells how the poet asks of the wind to drive away his dead thoughts, spread his lines to all corners of the world and awaken people who are still in a slumber.
In a word, this poem is a passionate calling to the spirit of the personified west wind. The symbolism in this poem is rich and diverse. The wind is the natural force of regeneration; it is regarded as the force that leads to self-sacrifice, even self destruction, in man's personal life; it represents the invincible（不能征服的） political hopes that drive continually over the unawakened earth; and it is also the very passion of idealism, the aspiration and creativity itself. Shelley's craft in minute images like wind, water, sky, wood, etc., is both mythic（神话，虚构的） and biblical (in that it reveals to us the last scenes of the world like that recorded in the Revelation of the Bible). The total effect is "one of transcendental hope and energy, achieved through suffering and despair." As we see, while the first generation of Romantic poets like Wordsworth, Coleridge and Southey regarded nature as the embodiment of truth, the younger generation of Shelley, Byron and Keats largely viewed nature as a source of beauty and aesthetic experience. In this poem, Shelley relates nature to art by working out powerful metaphors based on natural images, and expresses his views on the aesthetic quality in poetry.
