[R. Nemo Hill]

It does seem to be striking a blow for romanticism, asserting the nightingale to be as real as all those banal details we have come, in our time, to believe in as the only reality. Of course it is embracing the nightingale through the unavoidable veil of our ironic post-modern sensibility. Yet the conclusion is still: imagination rules even the filthy roost.

Nemo

[Pedro Poitevin]

What the heck, why not share what I wrote? TL;dr I didn't love the poem.

The poem Romantic Poet, recently highlighted by A. O. Scott, a New York Times critic, in his essay "Will You Fall in Love With This Poem? I Did," invites attention and interpretation. It contains moments of cleverness and an irreverent tone that aligns with contemporary sensibilities. However, upon closer examination, it also reveals layers of ambiguity and tension that merit a deeper reading. My intention here is to recognize how the poem works, explore the moving reading it appears to invite, and then articulate an alternative reading—one that highlights certain limitations and invites further consideration of its engagement with Romanticism, and more specifically, the poetry of John Keats.

A. O. Scott’s reading of the poem provides a useful starting point. He frames it as a debate about love, or more precisely, about the nature of attachment—to poets, their work, and the figures they become in our imagination. The speaker’s scholar friend critiques the "crushworthiness" of John Keats by listing his biographical flaws: his poor hygiene, dishonesty, and short stature. Scott highlights the poem’s irreverent humor and blunt language, noting how it demystifies Keats as a romantic figure. At the same time, he argues that the poem’s final line, "But the nightingale, I said," acts as a rebuttal to this critique, elevating Keats’s poetry above the “grubby, fact-based scholarship” of his friend. This, Scott suggests, is where the real romance lies: not in Keats the man, but in the art he created. By invoking the nightingale, Seuss draws attention to the enduring power of Keats’s Ode to a Nightingale, a poem that, as Scott puts it, explores the “intoxicating power of beauty” and the strange, uncanny effect that art can have on us.

Scott’s interpretation is compelling, especially in its recognition of the poem’s jagged rhythm and scattered rhymes, which lend it a syncopated, subtly musical quality. He argues that these elements give the poem its own kind of romanticism, sneaking up on the reader and resolving in a tidy, clever conclusion. Yet, while this reading illuminates the poem’s charm and technical playfulness, it invites further consideration of additional layers and tensions that can complicate its reception.

For example, consider an alternative (and benign) reading in which the scholar’s voice represents the contemporary ethos of "romantic attachments." In this interpretation, the scholar’s critique of Keats—emphasizing his lack of hygiene, honesty, and conventional attractiveness—is not merely a takedown of Keats as a potential mate but an articulation of what "romantic" means in today’s world. Romantic attachments, in this view, are preoccupied with the functional and pragmatic aspects of relationships. In this context, Keats does not merely fail to meet modern standards; his flaws place him below the already disappointing pool of men available in contemporary dating, whose inadequacies are exaggerated in the scholar’s speech.

In this reading, "But the nightingale" becomes an intriguing and lovely expression of nostalgia for a different meaning of the word "romantic." Two forms of romanticism are placed in tension here: the romantic love of contemporary attachments between individuals and the lyrical romanticism embodied by Keats. This tension suggests that the poem is not merely about Keats’s poetry but also about the relationship between love and poetry.

But there is another tension that deserves attention. By contrasting the blunt, plainspoken critique of the scholar with the lyrical and evocative final line, the poem reflects on how poetry itself has changed since Keats’s time. It suggests that while contemporary poetry, unencumbered by the strictures of meter, is plainspoken, raw, and unromanticized, there remains a lingering nostalgia for the beauty and depth of that lost romanticism. In this way, the poem captures a longing for some redemptive quality of a bygone era.

However, in my reading of the poem, the line "But the nightingale" is not merely nostalgic but also a tacit and blank concession to the scholar’s critique. The speaker offers no counterpoint to the scholar’s list of Keats’s flaws; there is no "but was he a liar, really?" or similar defense. Instead, the speaker’s response pivots entirely on the nightingale, a gesture that shifts the focus from Keats’s character to his poetic images. Within the world of the poem, the phrase "he lied" gains significance in the tension between two contrasting approaches to poetry. The scholar’s speech embodies contemporary poetry’s values: directness, avoidance of adornment, and an emphasis on truth-telling. This perspective implicitly critiques Keats’s use of meter, rhyme, and lyricism as artifice, as lies.

In this reading, Keats "lied" not because he was dishonest in life but because his poetry prioritized craft over plain truth. He said what fit the lines, not necessarily what was most direct or literal. The nightingale, then, becomes a precise emblem of what the speaker loves about Keats—not only his gift for image but also his attention to sound. While meter appears to have been entirely abandoned, the poem retains a love for the musicality of rhyme. The final rhyme, in particular, is crucial: it bridges Romanticism and contemporary poetry, tying “deathbed” and “said” across stanzas and eras. Yet it is an off-rhyme, with the stress in “deathbed” falling on the first syllable, subtly unsettling the harmony and signaling the impossibility of fully reconciling these two poetic worlds.

And yet, I do not love the poem. I love Keats. Romantic Poet nods at his enduring resonance but cannot quite reach his depths. It gestures at nostalgia and admiration but falls short of embodying the fullness of what it seeks to evoke. Keats’s nightingale soars, while this poem, charming as it is, only glances upward.

[Roger Slater]

It's also worth noting that the knocks on Keats's hygiene are also unfair, since the description may be true but was also true of 99% of people back then. There's no reason to think Keats was any smellier, or brushed his teeth differently, than anyone else back then. So the poem is misleading in suggesting that Keats's hygiene habits were at all noteworthy in his day.

[R. Nemo Hill]

I got the impression, Roger, that the poem was saying that everyone stank in those days; Keats' exception was his nightingale.

I am not really defending the poem. I agree with Pedro's closing remark: "Keats’s nightingale soars, while this poem, charming as it is, only glances upward."

Nemo

[Matt Q]

I don't really understand what would be wrong with one of the two characters in the poem being unfair to Keats -- if, in fact, that's what's happening.

[Rick Mullin]

In my reading, the poem is not necessarily about Keats, the last line chosen randomly as if from an anonymous Romantic poet (despite Keats "owning" the nightingale). It's the juxtaposition of the closing nonsequitur that makes it work. If you insist on it being about Keats, I don't really see what the problem is, as long as you give yourself over to the conceit with some sympathy for the poet (ie writer of this poem). It's not a knock out poem, verging on lite through most of the description, but it's very good.

My problem with the article is similar to my problem with the plaques next to paintings at museums. To most readers of the Times (millions of non-poetry readers) it assigns meaning to the poem and instructs on how to read it. Fmeh. And as a former journalist, I despise the online interactive machinations, which characterize the demise of all things written and otherwise civilized. Yuck.

[Jim Moonan]

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Originally Posted by Rick Mullin

My problem with the article is similar to my problem with the plaques next to paintings at museums. To most readers of the Times (millions of non-poetry readers) it assigns meaning to the poem and instructs on how to read it. Fmeh. And as a former journalist, I despise the online interactive machinations, which characterize the demise of all things written and otherwise civilized. Yuck.

Rick, This is hard for me to swallow. You’ve shaken my faith in museum plaques that describe what the observer is looking at! Plaques provide the basic facts and are helpful to the average museum goer like myself. I rely on them. They hardly begin to tell the whole story, but do give something of an orientation. Btw, those plaques that accompany works of art in museums are a form of journalism in their own right. They aren’t simply dashed off without going through rigorous editing. Museum curators are increasingly looking outward for people to write those plaques with knowledge of the art being depicted

When I was at the Hermitage in St. Petersburg and found myself lost and exhausted in the maze of exhibit rooms (my wife and I always split up when we go to museums and compare notes afterward) A man came over to me and asked if I would like to know what I was looking at. I typically would have politely declined, but I didn’t this time. (I remember I was in the room where the Matisse’s Dancers hangs). He breezily led me through the endless hallways, alcoves, wings and rooms I would have otherwise missed and told me what I was looking at. His narration animated the art I was looking at. I had no reason not to believe him. I have only a relatively rudimental knowledge of art, like most people, but also have a ferocious curiosity to encounter other people’s perspectives. He was generous with his time and in many ways still populates my memories of what is the most beautiful museum I’ve ever witnessed. Before he left, he suggested I go to the ballet at the Hermitage Theater that evening to see Swan Lake. We did exactly that and I had one of the most profound experiences in my life. (It had to do with our serendipitous seating at the railing hanging over the orchestra pit and with the timpani drummer therein. I wrote a children’s story about it.) I felt the music and movement coalesce on the stage and leave me dumbfounded. It was quite a day.

But this article is not plaque-like. It is a bonafide analysis of the poem — aided by technology — not unlike the many lectures I attended by W.A. Hughes in Brit Lit when I attended college. Like good educators are driven to do, he imparted a thirst for learning in me that had escaped me up until that point. He gave me way to grow my imagination. Is what he told the class about Byron’s hubris, Milton’s intellect, Coleridge’s opium-filled dreams all there is to know? No. In fact, he himself would often theatrically, dramatically, step inside a pair of large parentheses he would draw on either side of him with his arms and say something like, “But here’s what I think” and by saying that gave me permission to say the same thing.

That man in the Hermitage, that Brit Lit professor I once had, this NYT journalist, are all important to me. Is this journalist’s analysis of the poem plaque-like? I don’t think so. What the online interactive machinations provide the journalist/educator is a tool to use, much like the chalkboard, the overhead projector, the powerpoint presentation were/are used to enlighten.

My guess is that a larger proportion of NYT readers read poetry than that of the general population. There were 273 comments on the article.

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[Hilary Biehl]

Sorry for bumping an old-ish thread, but I just recently happened to read the book that this poem is from - Modern Poetry by Diane Seuss - and I feel that the poem reads very differently in context than it does on its own.

Keats shows up throughout the book, always significant, with greater and greater frequency towards the end. He seems to have been a formative influence on the author. "Romantic Poet" is the concluding poem in a collection in which she overtly wrestles with her relationship to poetry (often from an autobiographical standpoint) and poetry's relation (and her own relation, I think) to truth and beauty.

I actually picked up the book at a bookstore, not knowing that it was the book the poem in this thread had come from ... "Romantic Poet" was a much more interesting read, and made more sense to me, after the journey it took to get there.

[James Midgley]

Interesting readings here. Thanks for bumping, Hilary.

I think Nemo has got to the quick of it, and rather concisely, here:

"It does seem to be striking a blow for romanticism, asserting the nightingale to be as real as all those banal details we have come, in our time, to believe in as the only reality. Of course it is embracing the nightingale through the unavoidable veil of our ironic post-modern sensibility. Yet the conclusion is still: imagination rules even the filthy roost."

Though I see the nightingale's gesture-to-the-imagination as redemption, rather than levelling it alongside the other banalities.

We may be disappointed that the consolation of the poem is, finally, gestural (unlike Keats' poem, or so we may assert (one might argue that Keats' is a different kind of gesture, but we're without doubt moving to a different level of symbolic reference)): a gesture of a gesture, in fact, and, so, we may be likewise disappointed that this is the form of much of modern poetry's consolation.

But if you're disappointed -- ah well, but the nightingale...

PS: In contrast to Björk's advice, I intend to let poets continue to 'lie' to me.

[Hilary Biehl]

Originally Posted by James Midgley

Though I see the nightingale's gesture-to-the-imagination as redemption, rather than levelling it alongside the other banalities.

I agree with this. I think the last line is a gesture, but a genuinely meaningful one, albeit in tension with a reflexive/protective irony.

Another poem from the book is about a dog from a puppy mill which she couldn't quite bring herself to adopt. Towards the end of the poem, the dog becomes a metaphor for poetry ("As I drove away, her borders dissolved. / She dispersed herself across the landscape like mist.")

It ends:

"At age ten, I turned away from tenderness.
I remember the moment. A flipping of a switch.
My house is a cold mess except for that thing in the corner.
Poetry, that snarling, flaming bitch."

So poetry is the dog she has turned away from, rejected - yet it lives with her anyway and aggressively illuminates and warms her house.