Open AccessIMPERMANENCE / MUTABILITY: READING PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY’S POETRY THROUGH BUDDHA
Author(s) -
Leila Hajjari,
Zahra Soltani Sarvestani
Publication year - 2017
Publication title -
littera aperta
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
ISSN - 2341-0663
DOI - 10.21071/ltap.v5i5.13320
Subject(s) - impermanence , gautama buddha , buddhism , poetry , literature , phenomenon , philosophy , mindset , art , epistemology , theology
As an ongoing phenomenon, the impermanence of the world has been observed by many people, both in ancient and modern times, in the East and in the West. Two of these authors are Gautama Buddha (an ancient, eastern philosopher from the 6th-5th centuries B.C.) and Percy Bysshe Shelley (a modern Western poet: 1792-1822). The aim of this paper is to examine in the light of Buddhist philosophy what impermanence means or looks in a selection of Shelley’s poems, after considering that this philosophy was not alien to the Europeans of the 18th and 19th centuries. Buddhism, seeing impermanence (anicca) as the foundation of the world, both acquiesces to it and urges the individuals to sway with its ebb and flow. Shelley mainly falters in the incorporation of the phenomenon into his mindset and his poems. However, he often shows a casual acceptance of it; and even, in a few cases, he presents it with a positive assessment.
Keywords: Buddhism, Shelley, impermanence, mutability, transience, anicca