Michel Foucault, in his seminal essay, What Is An Author?, considers the relationship between author, text and reader: “... the quibbles and comparisons that a writer generates between himself and his text, erasing the signs of his particular individuality.” (Foucault, 1477) The forms of discourse and the impact of the “author function” on these established forms are theoretically questioned, while at the same time the absence of the author in a text is hypothesized. Keats's poetic character and temperament, as evidenced by his letters and exercised in his odes, can be characterized by his ideal of negative capability, which he defines as a state of mind in which "man is capable of being in uncertainties , in mysteries, in doubts, without any fractious search for facts and reason." (Cox, 109) Keats is describing the ability that human beings possess to transcend and revise their contexts; it is an intrinsic rejection of the attempt to formulate theories or categorical knowledge, particularly in poetic practice In the narrative that Keats's letters launch, the concept emerges only once, formally, however, the development of a unique aesthetic theory for him is always present letters must be contemplated together with biographical information, which contrasts the ways of thinking between Charles Wentworth Dilke and Keats's "exemplary" model, Shakespeare Negative Capability, for Keats, arises from the dichotomy that these figures proposed as methods for "true poetry"; To reach the standard of “true poetry,” Keats required the poet to be receptive rather than looking for facts or reasons. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay Although the condensed body of Keats's work does not include a text prescribed for his conception of aesthetic theory, which was a trend among his Romantic contemporaries, thoughts on poetic character and “non-identity” are stated in a series of letters. Keats fundamentally believes that aestheticism requires the removal of one's identity during the creative process; writing poetry must be approached by an individual who has nothing of himself to impart while possessing the ability to subdue his own personality. This notion can also be extracted from a lesser ode by Keats, “Ode on Indolence,” an 1819 poem that explains the writing process and the need for authorial removal. The content is relatively banal, as it follows the speaker's, presumably a poet, contemplation of a morning spent in idleness. Three figures approach the poet as he enters a state of “indolence”: Ambition, Love and Poetry. During the speaker's interactions with the figures, one realizes that poetry, or “poetry,” cannot be entirely banished; indolence is a necessary state for productive poetry, combined with the dissociation of identity and self, or, in Foucauldian terms, the “subject.” Foucault's theory on the interpretation of texts aware of the absence or "death" of the author is compatible with the ode. Keats's other odes tend to thematize ideas, rather than implement them, as “Ode on Indolence” demonstrates; just as exponents of Foucault's essay and poststructuralist thought deny any identity to a text, Keats inherently denies any temperament and identity to the poet. Keats addresses the lived reality of poetic performance, not only as an aesthetic space to display expression, but also as a coercive agent to invade and structure modes of human thought and consciousness. The origin of "negative capacity" can easily be traced back toperpetually revised letter written by Keats to brothers George and Tom on 21 December 1817; the term, in a formal sense, occurs only once in all of Keats's writings. In theoretical terms, however, Keats was persistently interested in elucidating a process for writing “true poetry”. Keats's contemporary and personal companion, Charles Dilke, proposed aspects of aesthetic theory that relied on categorization and didacticism. In his letter of 17-27 September 1819, addressed to George Keats, Keats describes Dilke's character, calling him "a Man who cannot feel that he has a personal identity unless he has made up his mind about everything" (Cox , 326) Li Ou, in his biographical exposition, "Keats and Negative Capability", contextualizes the relationship between Dilke and Keats, as well as the influence Dilke exerted on him: "...Dilke, like Coleridge who searches with irritation facts and reason, an example of something opposite to negative capacity in its 'consequitive' and dogmatic approach to experience." (Ou, 5) Influence, according to Ou, occurs in the form of a contradiction; Dilke's logic, which imposes a "dogmatic approach", is not compatible with Keats's perspective. In a letter to John Reynolds, Keats details his admiration for Shakespeare: "One of the three books I have with me is the Poems of Shakespeare: I never found so many beauties in the sonnets - they seem to be full of beautiful things said involuntarily - in the intensity of the elaboration of presumptions! (Cox, 126) Although Keats' influences are often acknowledged? John Milton and Edmund Spenser based on stylistic structure, thematic nature and diction, in terms of theory, Shakespeare is at the epicenter of Keats's aesthetic thinking. Considering Shakespeare as a poet who produces works and at the same time “works out ideas”, participates in an initial formation of what Keats will call a capacity for “being in uncertainty”. Shakespeare, Ou argues, is responsible for an early cognition of what Keats later called “negative capability.” He states: “A successful man with negative capabilities is a Camelion poet without a self but with metamorphic identities… It is no wonder that Shakespeare is again referred to as the exemplary Camelion poet, while Wordsworth, like Coleridge earlier , is placed on the opposite side,” (Ou, 6)The “Camelion poet” refers to the quality of identity displacement, which Shakespeare, according to Ou, applied to himself consistently. Keats routinely adopts this quality in his formation of poetic character and “non-identity.” Ou's mention of William Wordsworth is also significant to consider; he, similarly to Dilke, influenced Keats through incompatible ideals. Keats possesses an awareness of theoretical thought contemporary with his career as a writer. Although he holds Shakespeare dear, he does not share this respect with Wordsworth for two reasons: first, Wordsworthian influence was attributed to Keats within the poetic circle, and Keats was conscious of securing his independence from that influence, and Secondly, Wordsworth's contribution to aesthetic theory essentially disagreed with Keats's ideas. In a letter to Reynolds, Keats demonstrates his contempt for “selfish” logic: “But for the sake of some domestic or imaginative passage, we must be forced to enter into a certain philosophy engendered by the whims of an egotist. Every man has his speculations, but every man does not meditate or strut over them until he strikes a false coin and deceives himself... We hate poetry that has a palpable design upon us" (Cox, 121) It is this "palpability" that causes incompatibility between poets; Keats valued sensitivity and humility as qualities of the figurepoetic, as Wordsworth defends his own "speculations" as an objective mode of thought. Jacob Wigod, author of “Negative Capability and Wise Passiveness,” attempts to reconcile the inherent differences between Wordsworth and Keats by comparing the two concepts, as the title suggests. He argues that, “Far from looking at the world in the Shakespearean or negative-capacities way, Wordsworth had developed a tightly bound set of didactic and moral principles from which he would not deviate.” (Wigod, 385) Wordsworth, whose career poetics considerably precedes that of Keats, it entered a status of canonicity while that career was still active. Simultaneously, Wordsworth was praised nationally and through his writings in the preface to Lyrical Ballads, established a universal form of poetic discourse. Keats does not accept “the set of didactic and moral principles” that Wordsworth promotes, since negative capacity is based on opposition. Wigod comments on the connecting factor between the poets: “The whole extent of Wordsworth's influence on Keats is almost untraceable. While Keats willingly appreciated wise passivity, Wordsworth's individualistic poetic strength precluded him from taking on a Shakespearean role of negative capability. "(Wigod, 390) As Wigod demonstrates, a reconciliation is possible, however, the negative ability relies on the contradiction between Dilke, Wordsworth and Shakespeare to exist. The concept arises from the inability to balance opposing views and, with the context provided both from Ou to Wigod, it becomes possible to conceive it concretely and trace it within Keats's poetic writing. Keats's corresponding aesthetic theory is composed of the "non-self", the "non-identity" of the poet and the poet. act of acceptance of binary oppositions, or rather, of the fulfillment associated with “inbetweenness”. In a letter to JA Hessey Keats provides a stable definition for the poetic character that conforms to the negative capacity: "As for the poetic character itself ... he is not himself – he has no self – he is everything and nothing – he has no character – he enjoys light and shadow; lives in taste, be it ugly or beautiful, high or low, rich or poor, mean or high - He takes as much pleasure in conceiving an Iago as an Imogen, delights the camelion poet" (Cox, 287)The "Poetic Character" as stated from Keats in the passage is the one who has no identity of his own that can overcome his imaginative faculty and leave an impression of his identity on what the imagination conceives . Keats argues that the “true poet” is he who has nothing to be imparted but is endowed with the ability to subjugate one's personality. Must maintain the ability to project oneself into the identities of others and to participate actively in all kinds of life experiences, both moral and immoral. Walter Jackson Bate, a notable figure in scholarship of Keats study, is the author of a seminal doctoral dissertation simply titled “Negative Capability.” In the publication he authenticates an interpretation and definition of negative capability and “poetic character”; defines this character as follows: “This self-annihilation of the poet through a sympathetic identification of himself with his subject – be it a creature or a phenomenon – will be realized through imagination, immediately and intuitively” (Bate, 32). “imagination” is treated as a conscious mental exercise; Keats demonstrates this awareness in the letters, and they will also be examined and excerpted from “Ode on Indolence”. Keats states that a poet who has no identity is certainly, "the most unpoetic thing of anything that exists; for he has no identity - he is continually seeking - and filling some other body - the sun, the moon, the sea and men and Women who are creaturesimpulsive are poetic and have an immutable attribute about them - The poet has no identity" (Cox, 295) The paradox that Keats presents in the passage becomes tangible in his poems, particularly those that exhibit grand narrative; , such as Lamia or the extant versions of Hyperion. The theory itself, when understood as a tool for writing, is most evident in the odes, particularly in the "Ode on Indolence", which can be seen as an exposition of the function of writing. To further authorize Keats's conception of "poetic character", he wrote to Richard Woodhouse on 27 October 1818: "When I am in a room with people, if ever I were free from speculating on the creations of my brain, then not it is I myself who comes home to myself: but the identity of everyone in the room begins to (so) press on me and, in a very short time, I am annihilated" (Cox, 295). The poetic gift of self-annihilation, which allows the artist to accept the opposites - the paradoxes and contradictions - of life, does not allow the poet to remain egocentric. Bate's argument incorporates the previously contested influences of Keats and assigns states to be “characterless.” negative capacity: “Such manifestation of the poetic gift will be permitted only to the poet who possesses the quality of the Negative Capacity, who is himself without character and without identity, who will not only tolerate but welcome without hesitation the annihilation of himself…This is the philosophy, not of Wordsworth or Milton, but of Shakespeare and Keats himself.”(Bate, 29)Bate argues for Keats's independence as both a poet and a theoretical critic, thus provoking an individual to approach a text, both as a reader and writer, with a suspension of identity and preconceived notions of self. In examining negative capacity and poetic "non-identity" and its relationship to writing, it is plausible to make a connection with poststructuralist thought, particularly that imposed by Michel Foucault. Keats's theoretical conceptions lend themselves easily to a Foucauldian lens; What is an author? questions the precedence of authorial identity in texts, just as Keats warrants the removal of “poetic identity” in the act of writing texts. Although Foucault acknowledges fidelity to structuralism as the most appropriate method for deconstructing the text, the notion of “nothingness” that structures his essay is intrinsically poststructuralist. Jo-Anne Cappeluti's publication, "For the Love of Nothing: Auden, Keats, and Deconstruction," links Keats's ideals to those of poststructuralist thought. She argues that “deconstruction by definition is an exercise of the intellect's predilection to refute and deny aesthetic experience. Deconstruction loves to deny this “nothingness”, but seems unaware of how the attempt at demystification increasingly intertwines the intellect with the imagination.” (Cappeluti, 345) The “intertwining” between “intellect and imagination” can be interpreted as a supposition that regulates romantic thought. Negative Capability is concerned with shifting the intellect and personal speculations and substituting “non-identity” in its place. Indolence, as recited in the “Ode on Indolence,” requires the denial of “aesthetic experience”; being in a state of indolence means rejecting aesthetic thinking and personal identity to experience “true poetry”. Keats, again in a letter to Reynolds, states that “The Genius of Poetry must work out its own salvation in a man: It cannot be matured by law and precept, but by sensation and vigilance itself – That which is creative must create itself." (Cox, 287) Just as negative capacity does not support "law and precept," neither can "The Genius of Poetry." The text, particularly the creative one, relies on itself formeaning; absence of identity, absence of author are necessary to elaborate a discourse or a way of thinking. Foucault, in his essay, explores the consequences of the interpretation of a text and the expropriation of the author to whom that text is attributed. Likewise, “Ode on Indolence” is essentially a call for authors to consciously enter a state of “indolence” to produce work; there must first be an absence, to initiate a presence. Foucault defines the function of writing as such: “The essential basis of this writing is not the exalted emotions linked to the act of composition or the insertion of a subject into language. Rather, it is primarily about creating an opening into which the writing subject disappears into infinity.”(Foucault, 1477)Keats's ode is almost emotionless; rather, the speaker abandons the emotion, represented by the figures of Ambition and Love. “O madness! What is Love? And where is it?/ And to that poor ambition, is born/ From the brief fit of fever of a man's little heart…” (lines 42-44) exclaims the speaker when he realizes that he is unable to join them when experiences indolence. In contrast, “demonic poetry” cannot be dismissed so easily. Keats perhaps alludes to the necessary removal of the self that guarantees access to “true poetic” thought; since the speaker cannot abandon Poetry, he is paradoxically led to desire it and reject it. Keats found a mind associated with indolence, which was a narrow private path, not an "avenue for all thoughts." (Wigod, 390). Cappeluti also comments on the connection between poetry and a method of deconstruction: "Poetry invites this process, and deconstruction thrives on doing nothing with it, but the answer lies in the power of language... Poets see language as a powerful medium to involve people in the aesthetic nature of the human being. (Cappeluti, 356) Cappeluti emphasizes the importance of human action in the language of poetry. To conceive of indolence linguistically is to see it not just as a state that provides access to “poetry,” but a space in which a poet can gain agency and a sense of humanism. It requires the removal and stripping of identity to enter indolence and, consequently, experience aesthetic movement. Furthermore, Foucault underlines the primary necessity of the "identity sacrifice": "Writing is now linked to sacrifice and the sacrifice of life itself; it is an obliteration of the self that does not require representation in books because it occurs in the daily existence of the writer.” (Foucault, 1477) The “obliteration of the self” corresponds to the “self-annihilation” discussed above. Foucault is aware of the authorial sacrifice that a writer must make to produce a text; Keats's negative capacity can be perceived as one of the first methods of deconstruction in this context, as it is an aspect that manifests itself in the poet, rather than in his work. Deconstruction involves a state of mind in which intrinsically opposing and irreconcilable ideas exist simultaneously without any possibility. of a synthesis, which can lead to certainties. Although Keats does not speak of irreconcilable ideas in the letters, uncertainties presuppose such a situation, while reason removes uncertainties to arrive at certainties. In “Ode on Indolence”, the relationship between the speaker and Poetry can be defined as a relationship between “irreconcilable ideas”. The idea of ​​existing “in between” is characteristic of Keats in his letters, poems and theoretical discussions; this contradictory nature aims to alleviate any concrete norms or conventions that classify or organize poetry. Foucault's argument embraces the author and his affiliation with “contradictions”: “The author serves to neutralize the contradictions that.