View source for Landscape with the Fall of Icarus (poem)

{{Short description|Poem by William Carlos Williams}}
[[File:Bruegel, Pieter de Oude - De val van icarus - hi res.jpg|thumb|''[[Landscape with the Fall of Icarus]]'', 1558, formerly attributed to [[Pieter Bruegel the Elder]].]]
'''"Landscape with the Fall of Icarus"''' is an [[ecphrasis|ecphrastic]] poem by the 20th-century [[United States|American]] [[poet]] [[William Carlos Williams]] that was written in response to ''[[Landscape with the Fall of Icarus]]'', traditionally attributed to [[Pieter Bruegel the Elder|Pieter Bruegel]].  Williams first published the poem as part of a sequence in ''[[The Hudson Review]]'' in 1960,<ref>{{cite journal |last=Conarroe |first=Joel |title=The Measured Dance: Williams' "Pictures from Brueghel" |journal=Journal of Modern Literature |date=May 1971 |volume=1 |issue=4 |pages=565–577 |jstor=3830925 |publisher=Indiana University Press}}</ref> subsequently using the sequence as the basis for his final book, ''[[Pictures from Brueghel and Other Poems]]'', published in 1962.<ref>{{cite book |last=Williams |first=William Carlos |title=Pictures from Brueghel and other poems: collected poems 1950-1962 |year=1962 |publisher=New Directions |location=New York |isbn=978-0-8112-0234-3 |oclc=17518488 |url-access=registration |url=https://archive.org/details/picturesfrombrue0000will }}</ref>

The poem, as indicated by the title, touches upon the story from Ovid's ''Metamorphoses'', in which Icarus, the son of [[Daedalus]], took flight from Crete, where he and his father were trapped in exile, wearing wings made from wax and feathers. Icarus, disregarding one of his father's wishes that he not fly too close to the sun, did just that and melted his way to a feathery demise, drowning in the sea. The other warning from Daedalus was to not fly too close to the sea or the feathers of Icarus' wings would get wet and thus fail. This subject – and Bruegel's painting – are also treated by another [[Modernist]] poet, [[W. H. Auden]], in "[[Musée des Beaux Arts (poem)|Musée des Beaux Arts]]", first published in 1939.

==References==
{{Reflist}}

==External links==
* {{cite web |last=Williams |first=William Carlos |title=Landscape With The Fall of Icarus (full text) |url=https://www.poets.org/poetsorg/poem/landscape-fall-icarus |work=poets.org |publisher=Academy of American Poets |accessdate=November 1, 2011}} <!-- note, as a non-infringing copy, this is a legitimate EL.  The site reads: "From Collected Poems: 1939-1962, Volume II by William Carlos Williams, published by New Directions Publishing Corp. © 1962 by William Carlos Williams. Reprinted by permission of New Directions Publishing Corp."  -->
* {{cite web |title=On "Landscape with the Fall of Icarus" |url=http://www.english.illinois.edu/maps/poets/s_z/williams/icarus.htm |work=Modern American Poetry |publisher=[[University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign]] English Department |accessdate={{date|Nov 1, 2011}} |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190521020400/http://www.english.illinois.edu/maps/poets/s_z/williams/icarus.htm |archive-date={{date|21 May 2019}} |url-status=dead}}

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[[Category:American poems]]
[[Category:Poetry based on Metamorphoses]]
[[Category:Works based on art]]

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