"..Grecian Urn" and how Keats drew on other Source

[Erin R.]

Im writing a 4-5 page essay on John Keats' "Ode on a Grecian Urn. I need to write how Keats drew on other sources, ideas, or concepts. I have gathered a great deal of information but i am having trouble putting it together.
My main 'stuck' is how this poem is based on a series of paradoxes. I am unsure what to say about it.

Is it also true that Keats' poems such as "...Grecian Urn" and "...Nightingale" were of pure joy because of his physical and mental pain and suffering throughout his life? or was it because he was much of a day-dreamer (as i read in other posts here)? Or perhaps both?

I have about 2 1/2 weeks until this is due. Help would be much obliged.

[Guest]

It would be really helpful to read some of his letters to his friends, especially the one titled "To George and Thomas Keats" in which he coined the term Negative Capability.
His main theme throughout all his poems was that he would rather take life for everything it is--sufferings, love, yearning--rather than attain the unattainable state of enlightenment. Ignorant is bliss.

Hope it helps!