Quotation 1

‘We call thee fruitful, and that very while,

 A desert fills out seeing’s inward span;’

The poet juxtaposes the two images of ‘fruitful’ and ‘desert’. This highlights the opposites between what is said and imagined in the western imagination. Egyptology was on the rise in the west at the time of John Keats, and this may be the reason that they have an understanding of Egypt as a rich culture with a rich civilization. On the other hand, in the Christian imagination that was prevalent Britain (because it has been a Christian nation for so long), Egypt is known as the land where the Israelites were in slavery for about 400 years. This four century stay in Egypt is followed by the exodus, where Moses led the Israelites out of slavery and into the promised land. They travelled in the thick desert, the wilderness. Their journey to the ’promised land’ took about 40 years. The Old Testament in the bible devotes a large part to recount the escape of Moses and the Israelites in the desert. This might be one major reason that Egypt was considered to be a desert land in the western imagination.

In these lines, the writer refers to the imagination as ‘seeing’s inward span.’ It is interesting to note how the writer observes the contradictory nature of what we see and what we imagine instinctively. Even though they may have read about Egypt being prosperous and the Nile being the beginning of many civilizations, the first impressions on the mind are very powerful. The constant exposure that you are subjected to for certain ideas will remain for a long time, even after you are given evidence to the contrary. This is why we sometimes might have to fight our gut reaction – the ideologies / beliefs we have learnt from our childhood are pretty strong and difficult to get rid of, just like the imagination of a desert.

Quotation 2

‘Nurse of swart nations since the world began’

The Nile is addressed as ‘Nurse’, which is another personification. The word nurse contains many connotations. For one, to nurse someone means to care for somebody, or to sustain somebody. This is what a nurse does as well. It has the connotation of guardian, provider and protector. The Nile is what sustains several major and early civilizations. The line ‘since the world began’ reflects the history of the nations that have emerged around the river Nile. These nations are some of the oldest cultures in the world. This idea is captured here.

The word ‘swart’ means black, relating to the skin colour of an individual. The poet identifies and categorizes the nations around the Nile as dark nations. This, in effect, separates the orient from the occident (east from the west). He establishes a boundary between ‘us’ and ‘them’ (British and others). This may be one way of asserting the identity of the nation as a white nation.

Quotation 3

‘O may dark fancies err! They surely do;’

This line is quite ironic because, while the poet is asserting that the myths and gods of Egypt are merely ‘dark fancies,’ he does not justify or seem to take into consideration the Christian doctrine (the popular religion at the time in Britain), which is also based on faith. Here, we see that the prejudice of the white, British identity comes to the fore, as it seems that it is the poet who might be ignorant about the irony of his statement. It is of course understood that this may not be the time nor place to deconstruct that idea, but it is undeniable that the white prejudice in the poem exists.

However, the poet states that the rich culture around the civilizations in Egypt are merely ‘dark fancies’, or ignorant imaginations.

The phrase ‘they surely do’ further asserts this statement as the undeniable truth, attempting to establish the cultural and epistemological superiority associated (inaccurately, obviously), with the British (by themselves).

Quotation 4

‘Tis ignorance that makes a barren waste

Of all beyond itself, thou dost bedew

In these two lines, Keats once again notes how erroneous the western imagination is regarding the geography of the Nile, and the surrounding regions. Unlike most of his contemporaries, such as Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Keats is more critical, or at least ambivalent about the colonial ideology. He seems to have tapped into the concept of Orientalism theorized by Edward Said much later (in 19??). This theory exposes how the western imagination about the orient (east and other non-western nations) is flawed, biased and constructed by the writings of white men which invariably infantilize and denigrate non-European cultures. British people, during colonization, was under the misguided interpretation that their civilization is much better than others; therefore, they believed that every place ‘beyond itself’ was nothing more than ‘a barren waste.’ Keats questions this belief.

Quotation 5

Green rushes like our rivers, and dost taste,

The pleasant sun-rise, green isles hast thou too,

And to the sea as happily dost haste.’

In the last three lines of the ode Keats uses synesthesia which is a notable feature of his writing, appearing often in his poetry, such as Ode to a Nightingale. Synesthesia is when two or more types of imagery is mixed with one another – here, the phrase ‘dost taste the pleasant sun-rise’ mixes visual imagery with taste (gustatory imagery). Because, sun-rise is visual – it is a visual image created in the poem. The visual image of the sun-rise is associated with taste, which is a gustatory imagery. The effect it creates is quite spectacular, and evocative, touching the sense of taste and sight in the reader. Imagine what it would be to taste the sun-rise. Imagine tasting the champagne skies of a sun-set evening. So, SYNESTHESIA is a powerful literary device, famously used by John Keats, and used here to amplify the sense-based explosion in the last lines of the poem.

Rushes are flowering plants commonly growing in river banks and seem like long blades of grass. In these lines we encounter a number references to green, which stand in contrast to the desert that was mentioned at the beginning of the poem.  ‘Haste’ means to quicken – move quickly. The Nile moves to the sea as does any other river. Here, the poet identifies similarities between the Nile river and the rivers in England. However, the longest river in England is 354km (Severn – remember ‘Severn shore?’), while the river Nile is 6,650 km long. I don’t think it is quite comparable. This is my humble opinion.

However, when we look at these lines, they not only compare the Nile to rivers in England, but it is also an attempt by the poet to argue that the Nile is merely another river – this is a denial of the deified status of the Nile, which the Egyptians attribute to it.

Here’s something interesting!

“Particularly during the Victorian period it was seen that much of the basis of European civilization came from Egypt and had some kind of influence from Egypt,” he says. “And so, I think it was bizarre to people in the Victorian period that their whole ancestry was based upon the Nile and yet the source of it was unknown.”

Here are some very useful links to more content on the poem>>>

https://www.academia.edu/36598439/Discuss_Coleridge_and_Keats_in_terms_of_Romantic_Orientalism

https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=129940072