Definition of Imagery
Towards the end of Act 1, Panthea describes Asia's place of exile to Prometheus, utilizing a variety of language to portray her as a ghostly figure. Shelley utilizes natural imagery to this effect:
Deeply in truth; but the Eastern star looks white,
And Asia waits in that far Indian vale
The scene of her sad exile—rugged once
And desolate and frozen like this ravine;
But now invested with fair flowers and herbs,
And haunted by sweet airs and sounds, which flow
Among the woods and waters, from the ether
Of her transforming presence—which would fade
If it were mingled not with thine.
At the beginning of Act 2, Scene 1, Asia personifies spring, addressing it as a "child of many winds." The description of the joy of Spring that follows is intended as a form of imagery, paralleling her emotional state:
Unlock with LitCharts A+O Spring!
O child of many winds! As suddenly
Thou comest as the memory of a dream,
Which now is sad because it hath been sweet;
Like genius, or like joy which riseth up
As from the earth, clothing with golden clouds
The desert of our life …
This is the season, this the day, the hour;
At sunrise thou shouldst come, sweet sister mine …
Too long desired, too long delaying, come!
At the beginning of Act 2, Scene 1, Asia personifies spring, addressing it as a "child of many winds." The description of the joy of Spring that follows is intended as a form of imagery, paralleling her emotional state:
Unlock with LitCharts A+O Spring!
O child of many winds! As suddenly
Thou comest as the memory of a dream,
Which now is sad because it hath been sweet;
Like genius, or like joy which riseth up
As from the earth, clothing with golden clouds
The desert of our life …
This is the season, this the day, the hour;
At sunrise thou shouldst come, sweet sister mine …
Too long desired, too long delaying, come!
In the following scene from Act 2, Scene 3, Panthea describes the entrance into the Demogorgon's realm to Asia. According to Panthea, the entrance is surrounded by an "oracular vapor," which, as the name suggests, might contain something about the truth of the world or the future. Using metaphor and imagery, Shelley describes the many "young men" who seek these truths:
Unlock with LitCharts A+Hither the sound has borne us—to the realm
Of Demogorgon, and the mighty portal,
Like a volcano’s meteor-breathing chasm,
Whence the oracular vapour is hurled up
Which lonely men drink wandering in their youth,
And call truth, virtue, love, genius, or joy,
That maddening wine of life, whose dregs they drain
To deep intoxication; and uplift,
Like Maenads who cry loud, Evoe! Evoe!
The voice which is contagion to the world.