Fear not for the future, weep not for the past.
Percy Bysshe Shelley
(Protestant Cemetery, Rome, Italy, 2008, film)
BYSSHE
"The fascination with fire-arms was one of many elements in Shelley's character which Hogg, a very down-to-earth personality despite all his masterly sarcasms, could never really account for. Another was Shelley's almost maniac disregard, on certain occasions, for the commonplace decencies of public normal public behaviour, as the time when he seized a baby out of its mother's arms while crossing Magdalen Bridge and began earnestly to question it about the nature of its Platonic pre-existence so that he might prove a point in an argument he was having with Hogg concerning metempsychosis."
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May262012
May232012
happyphantom replied to your post: boffingbyron replied to your post: boffingbyron…
Some photoshop guru needs to shop Byron’s face on that guy’s (ssshhh i forgot the name).this was the most labor intensive thing i’ve done
May202012
“Shelley also was always reading ; at his meals a book lay by his side, on the table, open. Tea and toast were often neglected, his author seldom ; his mutton and potatoes might grow cold ; his interest in a work never cooled. He invariably sallied forth, book in hand, reading to himself, if he was alone, if he had a companion reading aloud. He took a volume to bed with him, and read as long as his candle lasted ; he then slept impatiently, no doubt until it was light, and he recommenced reading at the early dawn. He was loth to leave his books to go to bed, and frequently sat up late reading ; sometimes indeed he remained at his studies all night. In consequence of this great watching, and of almost incessant reading, he would often fall asleep in the daytime dropping off in a moment like an infant. He often quietly transferred himself from his chair to the floor, and slept soundly on the carpet, and in the winter upon the rug, basking in the warmth like a cat ; and like a cat his little round head was roasted before a blazing fire. If any one humanely covered the poor head to shield it from the heat, the covering was impatiently put aside in his sleep. ‘You make your brains boil, Bysshe. I have seen and heard the steam rushing out violently at your nostrils and ears!’”
From Hogg’s biography of Shelley
May152012
Sorry for the lack of activity here recently. I’ve been revising and have exams this week, and as Shelley’s one of the writers I’m studying, finding stuff to post here has felt too much like work. Isn’t that sad? Anyway, everything will be back to normal soon. I’ve got my exam on the Romantics tomorrow morning, and unless it’s a horrible paper, I’ll hopefully be writing something about Alastor and Epipsychidion…the natural sublime, the problem of solitude, Platonic ideas about love etc etc.
In the mean-time, if anyone feels like submitting stuff (quotes, anecdotes, awkward photohops), feel free!
May52012
“O mighty mind, in whose deep stream this age
Shakes like a reed in the unheeding storm,
Why dost thou curb not thine own sacred rage?” Shelley, “Fragment: To Byron”
Shakes like a reed in the unheeding storm,
Why dost thou curb not thine own sacred rage?” Shelley, “Fragment: To Byron”
May32012
“‘Tis the tempestuous loveliness of terror;
For from the serpents gleams a brazen glare
Kindled by that inextricable error,
Which makes a thrilling vapour of the air
Become a […] and ever-shifting mirror
Of all the beauty and the terror there -
A woman’s countenance, with serpent-locks,
Gazing in death on Heaven from those wet rocks.” from “On the Medusa of Leonardo Da Vinci in the Florentine Gallery”
For from the serpents gleams a brazen glare
Kindled by that inextricable error,
Which makes a thrilling vapour of the air
Become a […] and ever-shifting mirror
Of all the beauty and the terror there -
A woman’s countenance, with serpent-locks,
Gazing in death on Heaven from those wet rocks.” from “On the Medusa of Leonardo Da Vinci in the Florentine Gallery”
May22012
“I cannot endure the horror, the evil, which comes to self in solitude.”
Shelley in a letter to Hogg
7PM
“A sexless thing it was, and in its growth
It seemed to have developed no defect
Of either sex, yet all the grace of both, —
In gentleness and strength its limbs were decked;
The bosom swelled lightly with its full youth,
The countenance was such as might select
Some artist that his skill should never die,
Imaging forth such perfect purity.” from “The Witch of Atlas”
It seemed to have developed no defect
Of either sex, yet all the grace of both, —
In gentleness and strength its limbs were decked;
The bosom swelled lightly with its full youth,
The countenance was such as might select
Some artist that his skill should never die,
Imaging forth such perfect purity.” from “The Witch of Atlas”
May12012
from “The Zucca”
I bore it to my chamber, and I planted
It in a vase full of the lightest mould;
The winter beams which out of Heaven slanted
Fell through the window-panes, disrobed of cold,
Upon its leaves and flowers; the stars which panted
In evening for the Day, whose car has rolled
Over the horizon’s wave, with looks of light
Smiled on it from the threshold of the night.
The mitigated influences of air
And light revived the plant, and from it grew
Strong leaves and tendrils, and its flowers fair,
Full as a cup with the vine’s burning dew,
O’erflowed with golden colours; an atmosphere
Of vital warmth enfolded it anew,
And every impulse sent to every part
The unbeheld pulsations of its heart.
Well might the plant grow beautiful and strong,
Even if the air and sun had smiled not on it;
For one wept o’er it all the winter long
Tears pure as Heaven’s rain, which fell upon it
Hour after hour; for sounds of softest song
Mixed with the stringed melodies that won it
To leave the gentle lips on which it slept,
Had loosed the heart of him who sat and wept.
Had loosed his heart, and shook the leaves and flowers
On which he wept, the while the savage storm
Waked by the darkest of December’s hours
Was raving round the chamber hushed and warm;
The birds were shivering in their leafless bowers,
The fish were frozen in the pools, the form
Of every summer plant was dead
Whilst this….
April242012
the plants name is called “makahiya” and hiya in tagalog means “shy”.
whenever you touch the plants leaves, they immediately fold up together looking as if its really shy hence the name.
“A sensitive plant in a garden grew…”
(Source: jaidefinichon, via alysian-fields)
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