In the poem ‘On the Grasshopper and Cricket’, the poet John Keats celebrates the music of the Earth. He finds beauty in hot summer as well as in the cold winter. Here, in this poem, the grasshopper is a symbol of hot summer and cricket is a symbol of cold winter. Read More Inter 2nd Year English Summaries.
One the Grasshopper and Cricket Summary
About Author
John Keats (31 October 1795 – 23 February 1821) was an English poet of the second generation of Romantic poets, with Lord Byron and Percy Bysshe Shelley, although his poems had been in publication for less than four years when he died of tuberculosis at the age of 25. They were indifferently received in his lifetime, but his fame grew rapidly after his death. The Encyclopaedia Britannica of 1888 called one ode “one of the final masterpieces”. Today his poems and letters remain among the most popular and analysed in English literature – in particular “Ode to a Nightingale”, “Ode on a Grecian Urn”, “Sleep and Poetry” and the sonnet “On First Looking into. Chapman’s Homer”.
The poem ‘On the Grasshopper and Cricket’ is written by John Keats in December 1816. It is a fine piece of Petrarchan Sonnet. It is inspired by the beauty of nature. It is about Nature and says that the poetry of earth never ceases the poet celebrates the music of the earth in this poem. He finds beauty in hot summer as well as in the cold winter. He Symbolizes the grasshopper as hot summer and the cricket as a very cold winter. He says that the music of nature or earth is always alive whether it is hot summer or cold winter.
Seasons may come and go. But nature never fails too inspire us with its songs. During the hot summer all the singing birds are tired and take rest under the shady branches of trees. They stop singing. But the song of nature goes on. We can still hear the voice of the grasshopper who runs from hedge to hedge. He sings endlessly and timelessly, and when tired, rests under some pleasant weed thus, the grasshopper carries on the duty of singing the everlasting song of nature. During summer, he is a fun loving and cheerful creature.
The poet further says that during the cold winter also the birds are silent. There is cutter silence on the frosty winter days. But the earth has its own way of expressing pleasure and joys. A cricket sings through the stones and breaks this silence. He sings from the stones but not from the trees. His songs appears to be increasingly the warmth every moment. People can hear it sitting in their houses. However, the poet says that to a person who is half sleep, it may appear to be a grasshoppers song coming from the grassy hills.
Thus, we can say that the grasshopper and the cricket perform a big responsibility. They carry on with nature’s continuous and everlasting music irrespective of the extreme climate. The poet has thus personified them. They are a symbol of constant joyous mood of nature. Hence the poem teaches us that we shall be joyful and pleasant no matter what the situations are in our life. With this attitude, we can easily over come all the obstacles in life.
Conclusion:
In conclusion, John Keats’ sonnet “On the Grasshopper and the Cricket” resonates with readers by drawing parallels between the chirping cricket in summer and the silent grasshopper in winter. Keats’s work celebrates the resilience of the poetic spirit, emphasizing how even in the harshest of times, creativity and beauty can be found in the world around us, serving as a timeless reminder of the cyclical nature of life and the enduring power of art and inspiration.