1. The Chambered Nautilus
Oliver Wendell Holmes

2. The Chambered Nautilus
Stanza One Verbatim
The Chambered Nautilus
Oliver Wendell Holmes
This is the ship of pearl, which, poets feign,
Sails the unshadowed main,--
The venturous bark that flings
On the sweet summer wind its purpled wings
In gulfs enchanted, where siren sings,
And coral reefs lie bare,
Where cold sea maids rise to sun their streaming hair.

3. The Chambered Nautilus
Stanza Two Verbatim
The Chambered Nautilus
Oliver Wendell Holmes
Its web of living gauze no more unfurl;
Wreaked is the ship of pearl!
And every chambered cell,
Where its dim dreaming life was wont to dwell,
As the frail tenant shaped his growing shell,
Before thee lives revealed,--
Its irised ceiling rent, its sunless crypt unsealed!

4. The Chambered Nautilus
Stanza Three Verbatim
The Chambered Nautilus
Oliver Wendell Holmes
Year after year beheld the silent toil
That spread his lustrous coil;
Still, as the spiral grew,
He left the past year’s dwelling for the new,
Stole with soft step its shining archway through,
Built up its idle door,
Stretched in his last-found home, and knew the old no more.

5. The Chambered Nautilus
Stanza Four Verbatim
The Chambered Nautilus
Oliver Wendell Holmes
Thanks for the heavenly message brought by thee,
Child of the wandering sea,
Cast from her lap, forlorn!
From thy dead lips a clearer note is born
Than ever Triton blew from wreathèd horn!
While on mine ear it rings,
Through the deep caves of thought I hear a voice that sings:--

6. The Chambered Nautilus
Stanza Five Verbatim
The Chambered Nautilus
Oliver Wendell Holmes
Build thee more stately mansions, O my soul,
As the swift seasons roll!
Leave thy low-vaulted past!
Let each new temple, nobler than the last,
Shut thee from heaven with a dome more vast
Till thou at length art free,
Leaving thine outgrown shell by life’s unresting sea!

7. The Chambered Nautilus
Stanza One Analysis
The Chambered Nautilus
Oliver Wendell Holmes
We should want to be as the nautilus is throughout the expanse of our lives.
The nautilus is not afraid to take chances if they could better its life.
It makes the best of the beautiful yet dangerous world it lives in.
Nothing gets in its way.

8. The Chambered Nautilus
Stanza Two Analysis
The Chambered Nautilus
Oliver Wendell Holmes
Even when the nautilus has died, its work and beauty live on within its broken shell.
The shell is what it has worked to improve every day of its life until the end.

9. The Chambered Nautilus
Stanza Three Analysis
The Chambered Nautilus
Oliver Wendell Holmes
As time passed, the nautilus built on, adding to and improving its previous works.
As one beautiful environment was completed, it began building a bigger and better one, leaving the old behind.

10. The Chambered Nautilus
Stanza Four Analysis
The Chambered Nautilus
Oliver Wendell Holmes
For these examples we should thank the nautilus, whose life was devoted to labor, only to die in the end.
Even after death, its shell delivers the message of how we should live our lives.
We should keep the example in mind.

11. The Chambered Nautilus
Stanza Five Analysis
The Chambered Nautilus
Oliver Wendell Holmes
We must make ourselves better people as every moment passes by.
Pay close attention to the present and future, not so much to the past, only try to improve.
If you work to improve, your life will be bettered until you die.
Perhaps after that, your example will be remembered and taken on my someone new.

12. The Chambered Nautilus
Aspects of Romanticism
The Chambered Nautilus
Oliver Wendell Holmes
• The Chambered Nautilus references Greek Mythology, such as the sirens, Triton’s horn, and seamaids.
• The poet sees poetry as the highest expression of the imagination as shown in Line 1: “This is a ship of pearl, which, poets feign.”
• The nautilus’ life is an adventure.
• The poet looks to the nautilus to discover the best way to live, using a parable.
• There is no mention of a god, the nautilus controls his own life.

13. The Chambered Nautilus
Aspects of Romanticism II
The Chambered Nautilus
Oliver Wendell Holmes
• There is no mention of a god, the nautilus controls his own life.
• The poem displays nature’s beauty, the nautilus shell, as a path to development.
• The entire poem places faith in experience.
• The nautilus champions freedom and the worth of individuality.

14. The Chambered Nautilus
Last Notes
The Chambered Nautilus
Oliver Wendell Holmes
• A nautilus is a sea creature living in a spiraling shell.
• Within the poem is an extended metaphor comparing the nautilus to a ship.
• The poet wants to live a successful life.
• The poem switches from talking to the reader in stanzas 1-3 to talking with the nautilus in stanza 4.

15. El fin