Among Monsters. III. Isabella: The Decaying Romance. IV. The Dream Realized on The Eve of St. Agnes. V. Concluding Remarks

V. Concluding Remarks.
In his late romances Keats voices his concerns about the numerous constrictions imposed on individuals, and the effect they have on romantic relationships, which cannot remain intact and exist outside the societal context. The poet expresses in a subtle but perceptible manner the radical ideology concerning aesthetic, social and political reform that was communicated by the Cockney School. Keats deconstructs the principles of “old romance” in an attempt to unmask the oppressive social limits that pervade it and sets up a poetic reality where society is as cruel in romantic space as in the physical world. This reality is manifested through the order of the three romances as they appeared in the 1820 volume.The three romances are not placed in chronological order in the 1820 volume, which allows a speculation of intent behind it. Lamia could have been placed before Isabella to attract the readers’ interest with its complexity, while The Eve of St. Agnes could have come last to demonstrate a progress from the lovers’ death to their salvation. The three romances can be read as a continuum, since they seem to share a similar ideology.A common denominator of all poems appears to be Keats’s ambivalent thoughts on standard gender performance, which are articulated through his characters’ struggles against conventions. He chooses to address a different set of constrictions in each poem, beginning with an attack on standardized femininity and beauty in Lamia, which attests to Wollstonecraft’s ideas about female manipulation by patriarchal societies while exposing the “monstrosity” of calculating and narrow-minded social norms as they are reflected through the male characters of the poem. Lamia’s complex character is the embodiment of Keats’s ambivalence about standard performance of gender. Lamia’s failure to appreciate and embrace her own unique self as both feminine and complex is expressed through her need for validation from a male lover that cannot escape society’s preconceptions and can only offer
Lamia a superficial version of love. An illusion of love can no longer exist in Keats’s world, even if in the real world it is sustained by willfully blind victims.
In Isabella Keats critiques the commercialization of the institution of marriage as another form of illusory love that the society of the early nineteenth century promoted. The poet makes his readers painfully aware of the sickening depression that resulted from women’s obligation to settle to arranged marriages. Keats’s affiliation with Cockney politics can be observed through his implicit commentary against the capitalist system and parochial patriarchal ideology of his time. The couple’s enemies, i.e. the capitalist merchants, flee unpunished for their crimes after having destroyed their sister’s life and killed their poor employee. Keats’s expressed concerns about the invincible power that comes with status and money along with the painful oppression his heroine, Isabella, experiences appear to be the main issues addressed in the poem that bring about the decay of romance.
The Eve of St. Agnes is the poet’s final attempt for implied social reform as it is voiced through his attack on religious pompousness and superstitions. The destruction of religious characters and the liberation of the young couple from the illusions of religion, at the end, can be seen as Keats’s triumphant victory over society’s destructive power that had prevailed in his previous romances. He allows his readers to hope for a positive turn of events in “new romance”, when prejudices and constrictions are surpassed. Madeline’s conscious choice to evade the realm of illusions and join the physical reality makes her the only one of Keats’s heroines that decides to take control over her life and break free from social manipulation.Keats makes Madeline’s liberation a collaborative achievement that was initiated with Porphyro’s interference. The two lovers, in contrast to the other couples, gradually become aware of the constructed reality and set of rules that oppress them and set out to become the sole agents and controllers of their lives.
The three male lovers in Keats’s romances are the primary representatives of the poet’s ambivalence and frustration towards standard performance of masculinity as they all exhibit traits of effeminacy. By attributing idleness, sensitivity and vulnerability to the lovers, Keats constructs new models of manhood that struggle with constrictions. In the cases of Lycius and Lorenzo, social standards and prejudices turn out to be fatal for the “effeminate” lovers who do not manage to surpass them. Porphyro is the only male lover that fights social preconceptions and comes out victorious. The poet calls for active realization of change which occurs only in The Eve of St. Agnes.
Passivity and submission to the oppressions of society do not survive in Keats’s romances and therefore the characters that cannot find a way out of these proclivities die. Keats promotes the radical Cockney ideas about sexuality, religion, rights and status and calls for actively critical approaches towards them through his late, “new romances”. The questioning and subversion of conventions in the poems open up new and more fluid modes of thought. Without contesting a clear stance towards gender, romance, poetry and politics, Lamia, Isabella, and The Eve of St. Agnes nourish a critical and fluid approach of these re- negotiated terms, as the reader is urged to remain “Negatively capable” of interpreting Keats’s poetry. Keats allows a variety of fluid interpretations to emerge from his readers’ active minds as “every mental pursuit takes its reality and worth from the ardour of the pursuer” .