What is the meaning of “Beauty is truth, truth beauty”

     After reading the poem “Ode on a Grecian Urn” written by John Keats, I did not really understand the meaning of “Beauty is truth, truth beauty” (Keats ll. 49) in the last stanza. I have seen various explanations, but they seemed abstract to me and none of them satisfactorily answered my question. Therefore, I try to find the answer by knowing the background of this poem, responding the criticism of T. S. Eliot, and analyzing this poem by myself.

     At first, I want to talk about the background of this poem briefly. "Ode on a Grecian Urn" is a poem written by the English Romantic poet John Keats in May 1819. It was in the peak of the Romantic era which was approximately from 1800 to 1850. In the Romantic era, people felt a deepened concern for the metaphysical problems of existence, death, and eternity. At that time, romanticists paid attention to the value of eternity and perpetual. Hence, everything on the urn is eternity. The urn is apparently decorated with a picture of a youth playing a flute in a pastoral setting and a young man chasing a young woman around the urn. She may well wish him to catch her, but it is impossible. The important thing is that on the urn, the music is silent and the chase, perpetual. The meaning of this poem conveys the “speechlessness of the true language of art” (Klaus 251). In doing so, it demonstrates “the most universal power [of all nineteenth-century poets] to move readers in our own time” (Bloom & Trilling 494).

       Now, contemporary art is an art produced at the present period of time. Some define contemporary art as art that continues to be created during our lifetimes, recognizing that lifetimes and life spans vary. It focuses on the beauty of a moment such as taking a picture and the beauty of a state of flow such as installation art. Installation art is designed to provoke emotions and reactions from its audience. Under the different circumstances, we have different states of mind; hence, our reactions and feelings are various. We cannot replicate the emotions or feelings at that moment, but we can represent it.

       Campbell argues that modern consumerism creates a distinctive form of desire: the day-dream, in which one imagines a plausible future pleasure that would arise from purchasing or consuming a particular commodity. Such a day-dream is not satisfied by the commodity itself, which can never quite match the imagined pleasure it is meant to bring.

     There are some debates on this line: “Beauty is truth, truth beauty.” Poet and critic T. S. Eliot, in his 1929 "Dante" essay, responded: “I am at first inclined to agree ... But on re-reading the whole Ode, this line strikes me as a serious blemish on a beautiful poem, and the reason must be either that I fail to understand it, or that it is a statement which is untrue. And I suppose that Keats meant something by it, however remote his truth and his beauty may have been from these words in ordinary use. And I am sure that he would have repudiated any explanation of the line which called it a pseudo-statement ... The statement of Keats seems to me meaningless: or perhaps the fact that it is grammatically meaningless conceals another meaning from me.”(Slater 2)

I agree with her response to the line: “Beauty is truth, truth beauty.” At first, I saw this line as reading the whole poem. I thought that this line really made sense. But after re-reading this poem and searching some information, I began to feel that this line is very vague. It is the Keats canon. Many people use this line as a quotation to support their arguments or points of view. But they do not understand its meaning actually. Furthermore, the definition of “beauty and “truth” is different from person to person. This line has proved among the most difficult to interpret in the Keats canon. The following is the definition of “beauty” and “truth” in my own opinion.  

Firstly, what is “beauty”? Linker said that the urn’s beauty is conveyed through its “slow time” (Keats l. 2) and stillness. Take an example from “Ode on a Grecian Urn,” starting ninth line of the second stanza: “She cannot fade, though thou hast not thy bliss/ Forever wilt thou love, and she be fair!”(ll. 19-20) The beautiful woman on the urn will be eternal beauty. She is forever young and beautiful because she does not age with time. Nevertheless, the beauty that woman on the urn have is just appearance; actually, the real beauty comes from heart. Even though human will age with time, inner beauty will not fade out with time.

People on the urn do not go through birth, age, illness, and death. Some people believe that it is a kind of beauty because they do not have to suffer from illness and the physical or psychic pain. However, I think that getting older with people we love is the most wonderful thing in the world. We can go through every stage with them and knowing one day we will lose them. Thus, we cherish our beloved and every moment we get together. Besides, because we know that one day we will die, we seize the day and try to take chances and take risks when we are young.

On the contrary, the eternal beauty on the urn is in opposition with the experiences of life, which is subjected to time, delusion and death, like I just mentioned. The urn has not been disfigured by time. For me, the experiences of life are more attractive than eternal beauty. I remember that I have ever heard a word said by William Faulkner: “Given a choice between grief and nothing, I’d choose grief.” I want to taste various feelings and emotions even though it is pain or grief which is hard to go through or recover. It is what makes me feel totally alive.

On the urn, leaf never fall, music never stop, and people who go to the green altar will never return to their little town. Piping songs are forever new. However, in real world, we must face many difficulties. Lovers may break up. Couples may divorce.

There are many things once in a lifetime. Music in real world can also become forever new because we have different states of mind as listening to the same music. When we do the same thing twice, or third, the feelings are totally different. Even though we are suffering, the feelings are still worth to be cherished because it will not happened again. And after the suffering, we become stronger than before. If it happens again, we will know how to handle it. Hence, the feelings and emotions we have will not be the same as the first time.

 Love is also an important topic in this poem and it is related to my definition of “beauty.” In the third stanza, start at the fifth line “More happy love! More happy, happy love! / Forever warm and still to be enjoyed, Forever panting, and forever young; / All breathing human passion far above, that leaves a heart high-sorrowful and cloyed, A burning forehead, and a parching tongue.” (ll. 25-30) Love is eternal on the urn but that is not a real love. The young man chase the young woman around the urn, but the man will never fall in love with the woman, never kiss her and make love with her. They cannot quarrel fiercely and then make up with each other. Quarrel is very important in a relationship. It is a kind of communication. We can understand each other further by quarrel. Moreover, she will never marry him, never become the most beautiful bride in the world, and never have a child. Keats thought that human passion will fade out, only love will remain. But I believe that human passion is not easy to die out. After a period of time, human passion will gradually become love. Passion still exists. It is easy to say love, but it is not easy to present it. Love is passion, respect, tolerance, and responsibility.

     Then, what is “truth”? Although the picture on the urn is unreal, it captured the moment in real world. The urn itself is supposed to be realistic. An urn does serve as one component in describing the relationship between art and humanity. The second stanza of the poem, describing the piper and the lovers, meditates on the possibility that the role of art is not to describe specifics but universal characters, which falls under the term "truth".

     Is that “Beauty is truth, truth beauty” an universal value? It is not exactly. I do not think that eternity is a symbol of beauty. I also do not think eternity is the universal value. The reason why we always pursue eternity is that eternity is impossible and unknown. People are curious about things which are unknown. Human beings will die. We will never be immortal. Therefore, we desire to achieve the goal which is hard to reach. Sometimes we forget that if we pay attention to the process, we will get more. Instead of trying to control the outcome, just enjoy the journey. In the process of pursuing, we can accumulate our experiences.

In the second stanza, “Heard melodies are sweet, but those unheard are sweeter.” (ll. 11-12) The real joy exists in the desire, not in fulfillment of it. In fact, the poem celebrates the desired but not consumed passion, the love of dreams and expectations, rather than the boredom which follows the fulfillment of one's desires. Most important thing is that we should cherish every moment and seize the day; therefore, we will not feel regret one day.

Works Cited:

Bloom, Harold, and Lionel Trilling. Romantic Poetry and Prose. New York: Oxford University Prose, 1973. Print.

Campbell, Colin. The Romantic Ethic and the Spirit of Modern Consumerism. Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1987.

Hofman, Klaus. “Keats’s ‘Ode on a Grecian Urn.’” Studies in Romanticism 45. (2006): 251.

Keats, John. “Ode on a Grecian Urn.” The Norton Anthology of English Literature. 7^th ed. Ed. M.H. Abrams. New York: W.W. Norton, 2000. 851.

Linker, Laura. The Beauty of Stasis: Silence and Slow Time in Keats's Ode on a Grecian Urn. Transverse: A Comparative Literature Journal 13.1 (2013). Print and Web.

Slater, Gary. Truth, Beauty, and the “Neglected Argument for the Reality of God”: The Theosemiotics of Ode on a Grecian Urn. SST Conference- Manchester, 2010. Print.