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Have you ever experienced something sublime, that even makes your heart irritating? It could be seeing Grand Canyon, a great athlete in motion, or holding your baby for the first time. It depends on each individual's experience. John Keats had that experience from reading Chapman's translation of Homer. He was so impressed, that he continued to write a poem in one sitting, which he named as "On First Looking into Chapman's Homer". To illustrate the strong impact, as well as to communicate the condensed emotion he had, Keats uses various metaphors and references, and figurative language in a specific form. Before go further, I shall read the poem first.

In the first four lines, notice especially, “travell'd” and the references to “realms”, “goodly states and kingdoms” or “western islands”. Literally, the speaker talks about travel, however, the title preludes that it is about reading, which is further confirmed in line 4, where Keats depicts the lands he travels as 'which bards in fealty to Apollo hold'. / Apollo is the classical god of poetry, and bards are who compose and sing poetry. So, the realms within them are not denotative lands that on earth, but are expressing metaphorically the world of poetry. Then, the reference of the location, such as the “states” and “kingdoms” could be indicating various genres and types of poetry. Thus, the extensive travels are actually illustrated as a figure for reading, in the “realms of gold”.

The phrase “realms of gold” in the first line can be significantly related in two ways: as the world of poetry and or as the world of imagination. Since poetry is produced by the imagination, those two interpretation can be determined coincidently. However, in simple terms, the expression within 'gold' suggests something precious and pure. So, it is possible that Keats is referring the phrase to the classics of literature that are famous, ageless and precious like gold. Or even in more simple terms, the...