Similarities Between Lamia And La Belle Dame Sans Merci

Destructive love, nature, beauty and truth and women are few of main themes John Keats uses in his poetry. Accordingly, these can be found in his poems, La Belle Dame Sans Merci and Lamia. La Belle Dame Sans Merci is a poem about a Femme Fatale, who manipulates men to sacrifice himself in loving her. Similarly, Lamia is a poem about a snake, who is turned to a beautiful woman, who then tricks and builds a romantic relationship with a man. Evidently, we can already see some connections between the two poems through the plots and themes. In addition, Keats uses specific literary techniques in both poems to attract the audience better and to convey his message easier. Firstly, Keats makes use of nature, season and time in both of the poems. This, then contributes to the use of metaphors and imagery. For example, in La Belle Dame Sans Merci, although it is warm season, perhaps spring or summer, when the knight is in love with la belle dame, the reality is in cold and harsh winter. In the first stanza, when the writer finds knight, hence in reality, descriptions such as “sedge has wither’d” and “no birds sing” are seen, which is also repeated at the end of the poem to emphasize the harshness of winter. Meanwhile, in stanzas

While the rhyme is set in the style ABCB, as in “loitering” in line 2 and “sing” in line 4 in La Belle Dame Sans Merci. On the other hand, the rhyme is set AA, BB, CC as “crust”, “dust”, “last”, “fast”, “land”, “understand” in lines 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, respectively in part two of Lamia. Also, alliteration such as “full beautiful, a faery’s child” in line 14 and “roots of relish” in line 26 is evident in La Belle Dame Sans Merci. Likewise, in Lamia, alliterations such as “fresh frown” in line 7 and “passion’s passing belle” in line 39 are used in Part Two. In both poems, these alliterations, draw the attention of the audiences and emphasize the points they’re