On First Looking into Chapman’s Homer (1816) 

BY JOHN KEATS

Keats’ poem, “On First Looking into Chapman’s Homer” is essentially a love poem about Chapman’s translation of Homer’s “The Odyssey”. Through his poem, Keats shows his great appreciation for poetry and illustrates the beauty of finding a poem that significantly moves a reader. Keats follows the conventional form of a sonnet and uses that structure to depict the eye-opening journey he had while experiencing Chapman’s Homer. Keats’ uses the literal journey Odysseus had as a metaphor for his own figurative journey of reading literature and finding one that fascinated him in the midst of that journey. This encounter with Chapman’s Homer almost seems like a moment of stumbling upon a treasure in an adventure. The poem first part is an octet, which depicts Keat’s ‘reading journey’ before stumbling upon Chapman’s Homer. His journey reading portrayed as an unfamiliar fantastic adventure that is fascinating nevertheless. The poet has “travell’d in the realms of gold” and seen “kingdoms”, which displays the grandness and attractiveness of reading works of poetry in general. On his journey, he had “been told (of) Homer”, which is similar to being told of a treasure yet undiscovered. The octet shows Keats admiration for poetry, and at the same time, that there was an unclearness in his devotion for poetry before he read Chapman’s Homer—“did I never breathe its pure serene”. This line basically says: I never properly understood and cherished poetry before Chapman. The second part of the poem, which is a sextet, depicts Chapman’s fascinating journey while reading Chapman’s Homer. His journey is described metaphorically again with the journey of Odysseus, the character he is reading about. Ultimately, reading “The Odyssey” for Keats, was like “The Odyssey”—an adventure, seeing things he hadn’t seen before. This time, he seems to be clearer of his sight; he now understands poetry like he never did before. the turning point if the word “Then” in the ninth line, which is the point at which he finally understood. Keats’ states that reading Chapman was similar to how “ a new planet swims into his ken”. “The Odysseus”, being a great work of poetry, was like a “new planet” for Keats’ who couldn’t ‘see’ it prior to the first translation by Chapman. Now with Chapman’s translation, the “planet” (or the poem) can “swim[s] into his ken”. This shows the literal fact that he can understand it now without the language barrier and that he can ‘understand’ the greater beauty of poetry.