The Full Text of “Landscape with the Fall of Icarus”
The Full Text of “Landscape with the Fall of Icarus”
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“Landscape with the Fall of Icarus” Introduction
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"Landscape with the Fall of Icarus" is a poem by one of the foremost figures of 20th-century American poetry, William Carlos Williams, first published in Pictures from Brueghel and Other Poems in 1962. The poem is a work of ekphrasis—writing about a piece of visual art—and is part of a cycle of 10 poems inspired by the paintings of 16th-century artist Pieter Bruegel (or Brueghel) the Elder. Both Bruegel's painting and this poem depict the death of Icarus, the mythological figure who died after flying too close to the sun, in a rather unusual way: in both works, Icarus's death—caused by a fall from the sky after the wax holding his artificial wings together melted—is hardly a blip on the radar of the nearby townspeople, whose attention is turned instead toward the rhythms of daily life. Tragedy is thus presented as a question of perspective, something that depends on how close one is (literally and emotionally) to the event in question.
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“Landscape with the Fall of Icarus” Summary
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Bruegel's painting shows that it was spring when Icarus fell and died. At the time, a farmer was working the fields. All the human activity nearby was frantic and lively, taking place close to the shoreline. People were wrapped up with their own lives, and sweating in the same sun that melted the wax holding together Icarus's wings. An insignificant event occurred off the coast—there was a splash that nobody noticed. This was the sound of Icarus hitting the water and dying.
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“Landscape with the Fall of Icarus” Themes
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Life, Suffering, and Perspective
“Landscape with the Fall of Icarus” is a poem written about a 16th-century painting by Pieter Bruegel the Elder, which, as the name suggests, was inspired by the Greek myth of Icarus. The poem makes the point that the significance of suffering and tragedy depends upon perspective. No matter what terrible event might happen to an individual, the poem implies, the rest of the world will keep turning. Basically, life goes on.
In the original myth, Icarus is a young man who escapes captivity by flying with a pair of artificial wings made for him by his father, the great craftsman Daedalus. His father warns him not to fly too close to the sun, but Icarus does so anyway. The wax holding his wings together then melts from the sun’s heat, sending Icarus plummeting to his death.
Like most Greek tragedy, the myth seems epic, profound, and, above all, meaningful. In other words, it’s a story worthy of people’s attention, a tragedy with a purpose that contains a lesson about youthful arrogance. But here, in the poem, Icarus’s death is “quite unnoticed.”
In fact, the majority of this short poem does not discuss Icarus’s death at all, focusing instead on nearby activity. A farmer plows his field, for example, getting on with the economic work that life demands of him. There’s no mention of whether he even sees Icarus.
Further afield, a whole coastal community bustles with life—what Williams calls “the whole pageantry / of the year.” While “pageantry” here doesn’t refer to an actual parade or ceremony, it does speak to the way that most people’s attention is called elsewhere. Icarus may be dead, but his death as depicted here means very little to the rest of this world. Tragedy, then, is basically swallowed up by the continuation of everyday life.
Think about how, for example, a funeral procession to a cemetery will probably be followed by a row of cars full of people just trying to go about the business of their day. Similarly, the hustle of real life (as depicted in the poem and the painting) provides little time for dwelling on other people’s tragedy. That’s why the “pageantry / of the year,” by which Williams’s means the entirety of humanity’s performance, is concerned not with Icarus, but with “itself.”
Finally, it’s worth noting how the poem is bookended by matter-of-fact reports of what happened. Both the first and last stanza state the entirety of Icarus’s story—which, in other versions, is full of drama, emotion, and significance—in as few spare words. The death happens, but barely.
The fall is deliberately presented as a blink-and-you’ll miss-it moment, described as a mere “splash.” And with that, the poem ends, and the reader’s attention—like the attention of the others referenced in the poem—moves on. Like the spring season in which the poem is set, life continues at full speed, barely registering whatever tragedy has recently come to pass.
Where this theme appears in the poem:- Lines 1-21
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Line-by-Line Explanation & Analysis of “Landscape with the Fall of Icarus”
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Lines 1-3
According to Brueghel ...
... it was spring“Landscape with the Fall of Icarus” begins by making it clear that the poem is a work of ekphrasis—a form of literature in which a writer describes and reflects upon a work of visual art. This poem is inspired by (and takes its title from) a painting attributed to the 16th-century Dutch master, Pieter Bruegel the Elder. This poem is part of a sequence of 10 poems all based on Bruegel works. Both the poem'a title and the opening line, then, are part of the poem’s overall allusion to the painter of the original work. (As this is an ekphrastic poem, readers should check out the painting it's based on to understand what's happening here!)
The reference to Bruegel is only the first layer in the poem’s use of allusion. While the poem overall alludes to the painting, the painting itself alludes to the Greek myth of Icarus and Daedalus—and a brief understanding of that myth is necessary before looking at the poem in greater detail.
In the original myth, the young Icarus escapes captivity by flying with a pair of artificial wings made for him by his father, Daedalus. In spite of his father's warnings, Icarus flies too close to the sun. This melts the wax holding his wings together, and Icarus falls to his death.
The original myth, then, is a kind of fable that warns against excessive hubris (pride and arrogance). Both the painting and the poem play with the idea that, unless people experience something first-hand, they are unlikely to find profound lessons in the suffering of others—they are simply too busy leading their own lives. That’s why the poem and painting are title “Landscape with the Fall of Icarus,” and not simply “The Fall of Icarus.”
The opening stanza establishes the thread between the different allusions, and recognizes the authority of Bruegel, who is generally considered one of the most important painters of his era (the Dutch and Flemish Renaissance). Though the poem is, of course, not by Bruegel, the speaker sets out from the start that what happens in the poem is also what happened “according to Bruegel.”
The first tercet (three-line stanza) sets the scene, achieved entirely by one seasonal word: “spring.” Even with this one word, the poem sets up a kind of tension between life—the renewal and growth of springtime—and death in the figure of Icarus.
The poem is written in free verse, but there is an interesting metrical effect in the opening:
According to Brueghel
when Icarus fellBrueghel is pronounced with stressed syllable followed by an unstressed syllable. The second line picks up on the sound of the artist’s name, rhyming “-ghel” with “fell” (though given that the "-ghel" in "Brueghel" isn't stressed, the rhyme is subtle). Note above, however, how "fell" takes on a heavy stress after the unstressed “-us” in “Icarus,” meaning that, even in the seeming simplicity of the opening lines, the poem represents the myth in miniature. The heaviness of that stressed beat on “fell” subtly reflects the way that gravity brings Icarus crashing down to earth. The lack of punctuation and continual enjambment—both characteristic of Williams’s poetry—also give visual representation the fall, the poem crashing down the page as each line gives way rapidly to the next.
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Lines 4-5
a farmer was ...
... his field -
Lines 6-8
the whole pageantry ...
... awake tingling -
Lines 9-12
near ...
... with itself -
Lines 13-15
sweating in the ...
... the wings' wax -
Lines 16-21
unsignificantly ...
... Icarus drowning
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“Landscape with the Fall of Icarus” Symbols
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The Farmer
The farmer of lines 4 and 5 serves as a symbol of the general indifference to Icarus's death, and of the way that human life simply goes on in the face of suffering or tragedy.
Remember that the poem's main idea is that suffering depends on perspective. Most people, most of the time, are too caught up in their own lives to engage fully with—or in this case, even notice—another's tragedy. This isn't presented as some kind of condemnation of humanity, but rather as a cold, hard truth about how things work.
Icarus's death is one of the most famous Greek myths of all, and has a serious lesson about the arrogance of youth at its heart. But in the "real world" of Bruegel's painting and Williams's poem, Icarus's death is a mere "splash." And the farmer, naturally, has work to do. It's spring, an important time in the agricultural calendar, and the farmer has to turn up the earth of his field so that he can plant new crops. Quite literally, he is sowing new life just as another life expires in an almost inaudible splash. The farmer stands in for all the people on the shore, who similarly have their own business to attend to, and for the way that the world keeps turning and turning in the face of suffering.
Where this symbol appears in the poem:- Lines 4-5: “a farmer was ploughing / his field”
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“Landscape with the Fall of Icarus” Poetic Devices & Figurative Language
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Alliteration
Alliteration is an important part of "Landscape with the Fall of Icarus." Overall, alliteration intensifies the poem's images, bringing them to life on the page.
The first two examples of alliteration are in the second stanza:
a farmer was ploughing
his field
the whole pageantryThe poem suggests that tragedy often goes unnoticed, because most people are busy getting on with their own lives and wrapped in their own dramas. The character of the farmer introduces this idea. The alliteration between "farmer" and "field" links the man with his labor, showing how he is too wrapped up in it to notice the "splash" caused by the fall of Icarus. The two alliterative /p/ sounds are also loud and bold, pre-empting the way that the coastal town's attention is anywhere but on Icarus. It's also worth noting that the relatively methodical placement of alliteration in this stanza mimics the deliberate pattern of the farmer's plowing.
The other examples of alliteration occur in the sixth stanza (lines 13-15):
sweating in the sun
that melted
the wings' waxThe /s/ sound plays an important role in this stanza and those nearby. Sibilance is often associated with water, giving the reader a sense of the atmosphere around the coastal town. The slippery /s/, which also occurs as consonance in nearby lines, evokes the wateriness of perspiration, which relates to both the hot hive of activity in the town and, perhaps, Icarus's nerve-wracking realization that he is going to fall to his death (which presumably occurs just before the moment in which the poem is set).
The two /w/ sounds in "wings' wax" represent the way in which Icarus's wings are held together—through wax—and how they fail him.
Where alliteration appears in the poem:- Line 4: “farmer,” “ploughing”
- Line 5: “field”
- Line 6: “pageantry”
- Line 13: “sweating,” “sun”
- Line 15: “wings' wax”
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Allusion
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Consonance
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Enjambment
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Metaphor
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Onomatopoeia
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"Landscape with the Fall of Icarus" Vocabulary
Select any word below to get its definition in the context of the poem. The words are listed in the order in which they appear in the poem.
- Brueghel
- Icarus
- Ploughing
- Pageantry
- The wings's wax
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(Location in poem: Line 1: “According to Brueghel”)
Bruegel (here spelled Brueghel, which is also correct) was an important painter of the 16th-century Dutch/Flemish Renaissance.
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Form, Meter, & Rhyme Scheme of “Landscape with the Fall of Icarus”
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Form
"Landscape with the Fall of Icarus" has 21 lines, divided equally into seven three-line stanzas (a.k.a. tercets).
In terms of form, this poem is pretty characteristic of Williams's general style. There is no punctuation, the lines are short, and breaks between phrases are implied by grammar, syntax (the arrangement of words), and enjambment. This general style creates a sense of falling here, in which the lines cascade down the page with unstoppable momentum. Of course, this mimics Icarus's fall itself.
The poem is also in a particular mode of poetry known as ekphrasis. This is writing that takes a piece of visual art as its subject—that art here being a painting of the same title as the poem, by the 16th-century artist Pieter Bruegel (or Brueghel) the Elder.
The poem handles Icarus's death in much the same way as the painting. That is, the point of the poem is not to linger on Icarus's death, but rather to show how it happens "quite unnoticed." Similarly, Bruegel depicts Icarus's "splash" off-center and not as part of the main "landscape."
The poem actually begins by showing its admiration for the original painting, making clear that what follows is "According to Brueghel," who thus become a kind of authority. The opening and the ending of the poem both state the facts of what has happened in a way that is intentionally simple and sparse. Doing so underscores the poem's main thematic idea—that Icarus's death is not some grand, significant event.
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Meter
This poem reads mostly as free verse—that is, unmetered verse.
The first thing that any reader will notice about the poem is that its lines are very short. This, combined, with the lack of punctuation (and continual enjambment), creates a falling effect, mimicking the fall of Icarus.
Most lines have two stressed syllables—like the opening line—while some have just one (e.g., the self-contained "near" in line 9). Additionally, the first line of each stanza sometimes features a very similar metrical pattern. Lines 1, 4, and 19 all start with an iamb (da-DUM), followed by an anapest (da-da-DUM), followed by a dangling unstressed beat. Line 10 has a very similar form—going iamb-anapest, but lacking that final unstressed beat. Here are lines 1, 4, and 19 to illustrate:
Accord- | ing to Brue- | ghel
a farm- | er was plough- | ing
a splash | quite unnot- | iced
And here is line 10:
the edge | of the sea
This creates some very subtle consistency in the poem. The "splash" of Icarus's fall has the same rhythm as the farmer's work in the fields and of life in general in the town, which reflects the poem's idea that this fall isn't significant—it doesn't represent a major shift in the surrounding world.
Another interesting metrical moment appears in the opening two lines:
According to Brueghel
when Icarus fellThe rhyme between "Brueghel" and "fell" doesn't quite match because the rhyming syllable is unstressed in the first line, and stressed in the second. This creates a strong emphasis on "fell," again evoking the weight of Icarus's suddenly flightless body.
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Rhyme Scheme
There is no rhyme scheme in "Landscape with the Fall of Icarus." A neat rhyming pattern would probably feel too ordered for a poem that is on the one hand about a deadly fall, and on the other about the inattention of those nearby. That said, the poem does open with a very subtle rhyme:
According to Brueghel
when Icarus fellThe unstressed second syllable of "Brueghel" chimes with the stressed "fell." Rhymes featuring unstressed syllables are subtle, and this doesn't have a very important effect on the poem apart from starting it off on a gently melodic note. Lines 3 and 4 also rhyme a stressed syllable with an unstressed one ("spring," "ploughing"). It's not a hugely significant rhyme, but does link "spring" with the act of "ploughing," suggesting the renewal and new life that come with that time of year.
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“Landscape with the Fall of Icarus” Speaker
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The speaker does not impose much of a presence on "Landscape with the Fall of Icarus" and is generally taken to be Williams himself. The poem is a work of ekphrasis—writing about a piece of visual art—and seems keen to stay true in words to what happens in paint on the canvas. The poem is even introduced with "According to Brueghel," suggesting a kind of admiration for the painter that sets up as an authority on the poem's themes.
Notably, the speaker avoids what might be considered more "poetic" language. The vocabulary is intentionally simple, and there isn't a huge amount of complicated metaphor. This is in keeping generally with Williams's poetic style and also echoes one of the characteristics of Bruegel's paintings—a willingness to use materials drawn from everyday reality, rather than the sometimes grandiose world of classical mythology.
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“Landscape with the Fall of Icarus” Setting
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Technically speaking, the poem's setting is Bruegel's painting of the same name. The poem is a work of ekphrasis—writing about a piece of visual art—and talks about Icarus's death with a high degree of loyalty to the original painting.
The poem absorbs the "landscape" setting of the painting, depicting a coastal scene. It's a sunny day in spring, and a farmer is plowing his field while townspeople go about their lives. Though it never zooms in on the town in any detail, the poem refers to the "pageantry" of human activity going on—suggesting that this is a bustling place. No one notices Icarus's death, which is reduced to a mere "splash" at the end of the poem. Life simply goes on, as no one pauses to consider what has just fallen into the sea, let alone what the event means.
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Literary and Historical Context of “Landscape with the Fall of Icarus”
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Literary Context
"Landscape with the Fall of Icarus" is taken from William Carlos Williams's final book of poetry, Pictures from Brueghel and Other Poems (1962), which won the Pulitzer Prize shortly after William's death the following year. The poem is an example of ekphrasis and focuses on a painting by the 16th-century Dutch artist Pieter Bruegel the Elder. The poem shares its title with the painting and is part of a larger cycle of 10 poems all based on works by Bruegel.
The poem is also characteristic of Williams's style: short lines, minimal punctuation, and spare vocabulary. Williams is closely associated with the imagist movement in poetry that prioritized precise, clear imagery over more highbrow tendencies like mythical allusion (though, of course, there is one here!) and complex formal schemes.
In the original myth that both the poem and painting depict, a young man named Icarus escapes captivity by flying with a pair of artificial wings made for him by his father, the craftsman Daedalus. When Icarus flies too close to the sun, the wax holding his wings together melts, sending Icarus to his death. The original myth is a fable that warns against excessive hubris (pride and arrogance), and has inspired many other works of art in the centuries since it first appeared.
W.H. Auden, the prominent 20th-century Anglo-American poet, also wrote about the same subject in "Musée des Beaux Arts." Like Williams, Auden highlights the seeming insignificance of Icarus's death—how everyone turns "leisurely" away from tragedy to get on with their own lives. A less famous poem on the same painting is Michael Hamburger's "Lines on Bruegel's Icarus," which strikes a slightly different tone from the other two poems.
As a work of ekphrasis, "Landscape with the Fall of Icarus" comes from a long and rich line of poetic tradition. Readers might want to check out some other examples of the form, such as John Keats's "Ode on a Grecian Urn," "On the Medusa of Leonardo da Vinci in the Florentine Gallery" by Percy Bysshe Shelley, Thom Gunn's "In Santa Maria del Popolo," "Self-Portrait in a Convex Mirror" by John Ashbery, and "Deeply Morbid" by Stevie Smith.
Historical Context
This poem is taken from Williams's final collection, published not long before his death at the age of 79 in 1963. In 1962, John F. Kennedy was President of the United States, and the year is also notable for the Cuban Missile Crisis. That said, the poem is single-mindedly concerned with Bruegel's painting that it's only through the language and style that the 20th-century shows its face. The context of the subject itself straddles two worlds: Bruegel's 16th-century Europe and, through the myth of Icarus, ancient Greece.
Pieter Bruegel (also spelled Brueghel) is widely acknowledged as one of the most important painters of all time, though in truth little is known about his early years. He was born between 1525 and 1530 to what was most likely a peasant family, placing him at significant disadvantage to other painters from more wealthy backgrounds. He travelled to Italy to explore the Italian Renaissance, but was more impressed by the natural landscapes he saw on his way home—and this influence is certainly at play in the original painting.
Bruegel's paintings were often complex and full of individual figures, though they also placed emphasis on everyday life—particularly peasant life—as a worthy subject. His "Landscape with the Fall of Icarus" represents a meeting point between two different genres of visual art: landscape and history painting. In a way, both poem and painting use Icarus as a way of denying the relevance of mythology in everyday existence—and the art that existence generates.
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More “Landscape with the Fall of Icarus” Resources
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External Resources
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The Painting Analyzed — A short discussion about the original artwork.
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More About Bruegel — A short film about the great painter.
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Williams's Life Story — A valuable resource on Williams's life and work from the Poetry Foundation.
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The Painting Itself — Check out the famous painting by Pieter Bruegel the Elder that inspired the poem. Can you spot Icarus?
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Auden's Take on the same painting — Check out LitCharts analysis of a different ekphrastic poem that focuses on the same painting— Musée des Beaux Arts time by W.H. Auden.
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LitCharts on Other Poems by William Carlos Williams
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