2. Biography
• John Keats was one of the finest English poets of the Romantic school of
writing. He was famous for the "Ode to a Nightingale," "Ode to a Grecian Urn,"
and "Ode to Autumn."
• Keats was born in London (October 31, 1795), the eldest of five children. His
father was a livery-stable keeper, but died when Keats was only 8 years old. He
grew up in his grandmother's home at Edmonton, near London.
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3. Early Training, Education and Influence
• At school he read widely, won prizes and learned to love poetry. He loved reading
poems and the works of Edmund Spenser in particular. He studied medicine at
Edmonton, at Guy's Hospital, London, and apprenticed to a surgeon. Meanwhile, he
was composing verses and meeting other young romantic writers, including Leigh Hunt,
famous for Story of Rimini. It was Hunt introduced Keats to fellow-poet Percy
Bysshe Shelley.
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4. Early Career as a Poet
• Keats gave up medicine to write, living poorly off a little money left by his
grandmother. He also published his first sonnets in The Examiner. His first volume of
poems combined 'Hymn to Pan' and the 'Bacchic procession' anticipating his future
great odes. His first published poem, 'O Solitude,' appeared in a magazine when he
was 21.
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5. Major Works, including Famous Odes
• At 23, his first long mythological poem, "Endymion," was published. In 4,000
lines, it tells of the love of the moon goddess Cynthia for the young shepherd
Endymion. He then produced the epic poems "Hyperion" and "The Fall of
Hyperion." He also wrote his famous odes: "Ode to a Nightingale," "Ode to
Autumn," "Ode on a Grecian Urn," "Ode on Melancholy," and "Ode to Psyche"
and most of his other best pieces. These poems use vivid word pictures to
praise the world's beautiful things, yet are alloyed with sadness because Keats
knew he could not enjoy them forever.
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6. Last Years and Early Death
• He was in despair for good reasons. He was too poor to marry Fanny Brawne, the
woman he loved. His mother and brother Tom had died of tuberculosis. And by age
24 Keats also had the disease. Already ill, he sailed for Italy to escape England's cold
winter but died there the next year, at the young age of 25.
• The house in which he died is now a place of literary pilgrimage with library of
English Romantic literature, known as Keats-Shelley house.
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7. Works by John Keats
• Poems with 'Hymn to Pan' and the "Bacchic procession" 1817
• "O Solitude" 1816
• Poems 1817
• Endymion 1818
• "Hyperion", epic poem 1819
• "The Fall of Hyperion", epic poem 1819
• Lamia and other poems, including his famous Hellenic odes "On a Grecian Urn"
and "To Psyche" 1820
• "Isabella" 1820
• "The Eve of St. Agnes" 1820
• "The Beautiful Woman Without Mercy" 1888 (Published after he died)
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8. A Thing of Beauty (Endymion)
• A thing of beauty is a joy for ever:
Its loveliness increases; it will never
Pass into nothingness; but still will keep
A bower quiet for us, and a sleep
Full of sweet dreams, and health, and quiet breathing.
Therefore, on every morrow, are we wreathing
A flowery band to bind us to the earth,
Spite of despondence, of the inhuman dearth
Of noble natures, of the gloomy days,
Of all the unhealthy and o'er-darkn'd ways
Made for our searching: yes, in spite of all,
Some shape of beauty moves away the pall
From our dark spirits. Such the sun, the moon,
Trees old and young, sprouting a shady boon
For simple sheep; and such are daffodils
With the green world they live in; and clear rills
That for themselves a cooling covert make
'Gainst the hot season; the mid-forest brake,
Rich with a sprinkling of fair musk-rose blooms:
And such too is the grandeur of the dooms
We have imagined for the mighty dead;
An endless fountain of immortal drink,
Pouring unto us from the heaven's brink.
-John Keats-
9. A Party Of Lovers
• Pensive they sit, and roll their languid eyes,
Nibble their toast, and cool their tea with sighs,
Or else forget the purpose of the night,
Forget their tea -- forget their appetite.
See with cross'd arms they sit -- ah! happy crew,
The fire is going out and no one rings
For coals, and therefore no coals Betty brings.
A fly is in the milk-pot -- must he die
By a humane society?
No, no; there Mr. Werter takes his spoon,
Inserts it, dips the handle, and lo! soon
The little straggler, sav'd from perils dark,
Across the teaboard draws a long wet mark.
Arise! take snuffers by the handle,
There's a large cauliflower in each candle.
A winding-sheet, ah me! I must away
To No. 7, just beyond the circus gay.
'Alas, my friend! your coat sits very well;
Where may your tailor live?' 'I may not tell.
O pardon me -- I'm absent now and then.
Where might my tailor live? I say again
I cannot tell, let me no more be teaz'd --
He lives in Wapping, might live where he pleas'd.'
-John Keats-
