Lamia

Brought to you by Altrusian Grace Media and narrated by Matthew Schmitz.

"Lamia" is the English Romantic poet John Keats's lush, eerie tale of enchantment defeated by merciless rationality. Set in the world of ancient Greco-Roman myth, the poem tells the story of the serpent-spirit Lamia, who talks the god Hermes into transforming her into a beautiful woman so she can pursue her beloved, a handsome young man named Lycius. The couple is blissfully happy for a time—but their joy can't last. Icy reason, in the form of the philosopher Apollonius, at last punctures their shared dream. Often remembered as a Romantic screed against "cold philosophy," this poem is in fact a nuanced and ambivalent portrait of the beauties and dangers of the imagination—especially the imaginative visions of lovers. Keats published this poem in his 1820 collection Lamia, Isabella, the Eve of St. Agnes, and Other Poems.