Poetry and Creative Writing for All

John Keats

By Sharon Spencer

Romanticism was a progressive development of both art and literature, conceived in Europe during the late 18th century, and reaching the pinnacle of its popularity in Britain, France and Germany at the beginning of the 19th century. Coinciding as it did with the French Revolution, it was thought to be a counteraction to the constricting and rigid principles of Classicism. Up until this time reason and intellect had been the predominant trait present in creative accomplishments. Romanticism however intensified the emotions and imagination, encouraged the use of visual innovation and fairly exploded with unbridled fervour. During which process formal structure was actively ignored in the pursuit of emotive expression.

John Keats was a prototype of the Romantic era, a genius of his age.

Keats’ inspirational poetry appertains to his undeniable delight and deep affection for the exquisite loveliness of nature, and his obvious desolation at the inescapable demise that will ultimately occur, whilst simultaneously endeavouring to discover connections between this decaying world and the next which we imagine to be everlasting. In his struggle to communicate his impassioned emotions, he utilises remarkably sumptuous and lucid figurative illustrations.

Keats’ indisputable talent for symbolism, and his visionary ingenuity replicate a luxurious encounter for the reader, that is unlikely to be forgotten.

Born in 1795 in North London, Keats was the eldest son of an affluent livery stable manager. His parents, Thomas and Frances Jennings Keats had been blessed with five children, however one of their sons had died in babyhood. So John, who was born seven months into the pregnancy, grew up with his two remaining brothers and sister, Fanny. All the siblings were to enjoy an extremely close relationship, which was to endure for the entirety of their lifetime.

Upon reaching the vulnerable and impressionable age of eight, John’s father was killed in a tragic riding accident. Soon after Frances Jennings remarried, but the marriage was a short-lived affair, and so she moved to Edmonton to live at her mother’s, taking her four children with her. Six years later the cruel hand of fate was to deal the family another severe blow, and John’s mother succumbed to tuberculosis in the year 1810, whereupon the young orphans were taken care of by their grandmother who appointed guardians to oversee her young charges and their future well-being.

The young Keats attended Clarke’s school in Enfield, where he became great friends with the headmaster’s son, Charles Cowden Clarke. Although Charles encouraged Keats in his learning, and Keats read a broad spectrum of literature, his love of books was greatly overshadowed by his ability for fighting. Keats was really quite short in stature (approximately five feet) and wrote ‘My mind has been the most discontented and restless one that ever was put into a body too small for it’.

In 1811, Keats’ guardian removed him from Clarke’s and apprenticed him to a surgeon - apothecary. Keats studied hard and passed his examinations earning his medical license in 1816. However by this time he had developed an avid interest in poetry and decided to opt for a career as a poet instead of practising surgery as others had wished of him.

During his apprenticeship Keats had been introduced to Leigh Hunt and his literary circle, which included amongst others Percy Bysshe Shelley and William Wordsworth. Leigh was the editor of the Examiner, and he published Keats’ sonnets ‘On First Looking Into Chapman’s Homer’ and ‘O Solitude’. In 1817 Keats’ first volume of poetry was published, largely due to the powerful clout of his new-found friends, and in 1818 Keats’ epic poem, Endymion, found its way into print also.

Endymion was full of the rich imagery and vibrant colour that makes Keats such a popular writer but it lacked structure.

The critics were scathing in their attack, accusing him of belonging to Leigh Hunt’s cockney school of poetry and advising Keats to give up writing rather than produce such nonsense. His friend Shelley wrote a review which was much kinder, but it never saw the light of day.
It is perhaps ironic that Endymion, which begins with the line ‘A thing of beauty is a joy forever’ is held in such high regard today, and that the ‘cockney school of poetry’ that the critics despised with so much vehemence boasted some of our most revered poets amongst its number. As if this grievous disappointment wasn’t enough for Keats to bear, 1818 also saw the demise of his beloved brother Tom from tuberculosis, and the conception of his personal understanding that he too would be claimed by this unrelenting disease.

In the summer of 1818 Keats embarked on a walking tour of Northern England and Scotland, only returning home to look after his brother, Tom. It was while he was tending to his brother’s poor health that he met the love of his life, Fanny Brawne, and they quickly became betrothed. Keats was overcome with adulation, completely beguiled he inundated her with letters. Thirty-seven of which have survived to the present day, and are the object of much speculation and intrigue to all who read them.

Inspired by his lady love, Fanny, Keats wrote some of his best work between 1818 and 1819.

During 1818 he had begun to write ‘Hyperion’ but stopped for a brief period on the death of his brother. However in the later months of 1819 he rewrote the epic poem, renaming it ‘The Fall of Hyperion’, by which time Keats himself had developed tuberculosis, and in the February of 1820 he coughed up blood for the first time. Upon examining the specimen Keats realised that the blood was arterial, and knew without any doubt his death was imminent.

Having published his third and most noteworthy volume of poetry in July 1820, Keats finally received the acclaim he was due. However fate was not merciful to this sensitive young man; as he was much too ill in the advanced stage of the disease that had claimed the lives of his nearest and dearest to be heartened by the reviews.

Unable to marry his sweetheart, Fanny, due to financial constraints and ill health, Keats followed the medical advice available at the time, and moved to a warmer climate in a vain attempt to stem the virulent malady that gripped him so unreservedly. Declining an invitation from Shelley to visit Pisa, Keats travelled to Rome via the Bay of Biscay in some turbulent waters. While his devoted friend and confidant, Joseph Severn (the painter) lovingly and with deep affection served as his nurse and companion, until February 23rd 1821, when he was finally released from the torturous existence life had become and death claimed him. He was laid to rest in a Protestant cemetery in Rome at the youthful age of twenty-five years.

Keats was not only a poet of the highest calibre, but also a man with the potential for deep-rooted unwavering friendship and intense love.

Whilst his generosity and compassionate nature made him very personable to those who knew and loved him, Keats’ life was tragically brief, incorporating all the components necessary to transform a fictional novel into a best-seller. Nevertheless, against all odds Keats hauled himself from out of the emotionally distressing quagmire of human suffering and misery. Prevailing triumphantly over considerable adversity in order to make a significant contribution to the vast, richly embroidered and ornately adorned tapestry that is English literature in all its glorious splendour.

To Autumn

Seasons of mists and mellow fruitfulness,
Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun;
Conspiring with him how to load and bless
With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eves run;
To bend with apples the moss’d cottage - trees,
And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core;
To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells
With a sweet kernel; to set budding more,
And still more, later flowers for the bees,
Until they think warm days will never cease,
For summer has o’er-brimmed their clammy cells.

Who hath not seen thee oft amid thy store?
Sometimes whoever seeks abroad may find
Thee sitting carelessly on a granary floor,
Thy hair soft-lifted by the winnowing wind;
Or on a half-reap’d furrow sound asleep,
Drows’d with the fume of poppies, while thy hook
Spares the next swath and all its twined flowers:
And sometimes like a gleaner thou dost keep
Steady thy laden head across a brook;
Or by a cyder-press, with patient look,
Thou watchest the last oozings hours by hours.

Where are the songs of spring? Ay, where are they?
Think not of them, thou hast thy music too,
While barred clouds bloom the soft-dying day,
And touch the stubble plains with rosy hue;
Then in a wailful choir the small gnats mourn
Among the river sallows, borne aloft
Or sinking as the light wind lives or dies;
And full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn;
Hedge-crickets sing; and now with treble soft
The red-breast whistles from a garden-croft;
And gathering swallows twitter in the skies.

Sonnet

Oh! how I love, on a fair summer’s eve,
When streams of light pour down the golden west,
And on the balmy zephyrs tranquil rest
The silver clouds far - far away to leave
All meaner thoughts, and take a sweet reprieve
From little cares; to find, with easy quest,
A fragrant wild, with nature’s beauty drest,
And there into the delight my soul deceive.
There warm my breast with patriotic lore,
Musing on Milton’s fate - on Sydney’s bier -
Till their stern forms before my mind arise:
Perhaps on wing of Poesy upsoar,
Full often dropping a delicious tear,
When some melodious sorrow spells mine eyes.

This article was taken from an issue of Poetry Now Magazine. 

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