ODE TO EVENING BY WILLIAM COLLINS
William Collins is a great pre-romantic poet. He is famous for the rare and precious quality of his poems. His 'Ode to Evening' is one of the finest odes in English Literature. It is full of melancholy. It presents a beautiful picture of a quiet evening. 'Ode to Evening' presents the picture of the poet's melancholic mood. Love of the quiet evening is the emotion of the poem. The beauty of the evening is incarnated in its quietness. The poem opens with the picture of personified evening: ''If aught of oaten stop or pastoral song, May hope, chaste Eve, to sooth thy modest ear, Like....................................................................'' The personification of evening is central to the poem. It has been developed in three phases. In the beginning part of the poem the poet prese