Keats and shakespeare

Vale: farewell (Latin); false (Estonian); lie/untruth/fabrication (Finnish)

I highly recommend that everyone looks at keats's "the vale of soul making" and his other letters such as "...the chambers of human life", "the authenticity of imagination". Keats captures beauty, darkness, and imagination beyond what I ever thought was possible in his most personal letters.

Keats said of Shakespeare in a letter to his brother:
"at once it struck me, what quality went to form a man of Achievement, especially in literature, and which Shakespeare possessed so enormously- I mean negative capability, that is when man is capable of being in uncertainties, mysteries, doubts, without any irritable reaching after fact and reason."

Newell on Shakespeare:
When reading Shakespeare "the experience is sometimes laughter, sometimes tears, sometimes shame. Always it is the experience of looking into a mystery that i am part of"

I think that we can all relate to a lot of what Newell says about Shakespeare in regards to deeper human connections. We are brought into Shakespeare's works through his language and ability to express the human condition.

Keats admired Shakespeare's works for this but also for his ability to contemplate a world without desire and reconciling certain aspects. Shakespeare echos human life- we do not constantly suffer, we overcome, but always we are left with the remembrance and this in itself is a lack of conciliation.

When I read this I become nauseated with the fear and the knowledge that many things in life are left unfinished, unreconciled, and left to the tragic. It pains me to visualize this worked of human suffering that we all create for ourselves. We have to remember the suffering, the experience, and the chambers through which we travel to get to who we are so we can open up that experience to others through words. I write always whether i want to or not, remembering is one of my biggest fears. A shadow looming around me. I change and it follows. But it has led me to discover, recover and experience.

Become nothing so that you can become something.