By Phin Upham Paul Valery’s aphorism “’man thinks, therefor I
am’ said the universe” epitomizes the idea expressed by Keats’
in “Autumn.” The act of observing does more than recognize, for
Keats, it creates. The concept of length, for example, is not
measured but created with the invention of the ruler. In
”Autumn,” Keats revolutionizes the usual understanding of autumn
by allowing the act of observation to play a role in its
creation. For Keats, the bees do not hum, and the grain overflow
because it is autumn, instead, because the bees hum and the
grain overflows, therefor it is autumn. This unlikely
juxtaposition of cause and effect shows itself most clearly in
the second to last stanza. Man’s role in autumn is strangely
passive. Autumn seems defined by those aspects that man can
observe – touch, taste, feel, see, smell. Man observes and
names, but seems distinct from the process that so affects the
rest of nature. “Where are the songs of spring?” asks the third
stanza. “Think not of them, thou hast thy mus