John Keats

1. John Keats London 1795 – Rome 1821

2. Born in London on October 29 or 31, 1795. • the son of a rich livery stable owner; • first studies at a private school at Enfield; • his father dies when he is eight; • his mother dies of tuberculosis six years later; • great affection for his family and the death of both his parents causes a great shock; • at the age of fifteen he is apprenticed to a surgeon and apothecary; • the next four years he studies medicine at Guy’s Hospital in London; • 1816 he abandons the medical career for literature. • 1817 publication of his first volume of verse, titled “Poems”, containing his first great • sonnet “On first looking into Chapman’s Homer” which reveals his great qualities • in embryo; • April 1818 publication of “Endymion” – his first long and serious poem – a long mythological poem which is an allegory of his search for an ideal female love; • this work clearly reveals his cult of beauty from the very first line which reads • “A thing of beauty is a joy for ever” ;

3. By this time the family tendency to consumption (= tuberculosis) becomes manifest in • him and he tries to cure himself by moving to the Isle of Wight in the hope that the • seashore has a beneficial effect on his health. • Summer 1818 walking tour through the Highlands with a friend. • Due to the hardships suffered during the tour, his health worsens. • Once back to London, he finds his brother dying of tuberculosis and assists him till death. • The negative reviews his poem “Endymion” receives from critics contribute to the • worsening of his health conditions. • Around this time he falls passionately in love with Fanny Brawne and for a time they are • engaged. • Unfortunately, financial difficulties, Keats's deteriorating health and his almost religious • pursuit of poetry preclude marriage. • Between autumn 1818 and autumn 1819 – the best of his literary production: • Hyperion – an unfinished epic poem retelling the myth of the war between the Greek gods and the Titans; • La Belle Dame sans Merci – a literary ballad;

4. Keats’s greatest narrative poem – it is the work which best exemplifies his relish (= delight in) of sensation. It is a tale of the elopementof two lovers against a background of family feud, which evokes medieval romantic beauty tinged with gothicelements. Its symbolic imagery is very effective, but its greatest achievement is the handling of images of sensation In the original version of this poem, Keats emphasized the young lovers' sexuality, but his publishers, who feared public reaction, forced him to tone down the eroticism. • The Eve of • St. Agnes A poem telling the story of a magic female snake who falls in lovewith a young man, and transforms herself by magic into a woman. They live together in joy, until a well-intentioned scholar ruins the lovers' happiness by pointing out that it's a deception. Until the magic spell is broken by the voice of reason and science, they are both sublimely happy. • Lamia

5. A series of five odes: • Relations between: • pleasure and pain; • happiness and melancholy; • art and life; • reality and imagination. • To Psyche • To a Nightingale • On a Grecian Urn • To Autumn • On Melancholy In the same period 1818 -1819 numerous letters containing precious informationon his development as a poet and the working of his genius – a remarkable spiritual autobiography. In 1820 he coughs up blood and immediately understand its meaning; he writes “that drop of blood is my death warrant”. He travels to Italy in a vain attempt to recover his health or, at least, to delay his death. He dies in Rome in February 1821 and is buried in the Protestant cemetery.

6. Beauty and Art The aim of any work of art is to represent beauty. Our first experience of beauty derives from the senses, fromthe concrete physical sensations, so it’s physical beauty that we come into contact with at first. In this process of apprehension all senses, sight, hearing, taste, smell and touch, are involved. This physical beauty, is to be foundin all forms of nature: in the colours of plants, in the sweet perfume of flowers, in the attractive forms of a woman etc, and … it may lead to a much deeper experience of joy, i.e. to experience spiritual beauty. These two different types of beauty, one linked to the physical sphere of life, (and, therefore, subject to change, decay and death) and the other to the sphere of the spirit, which is instead related to eternity, are closely intertwined as the former is the expression of the latter. Keats finds spiritual beauty, which is not subject to change, in poetry and in any other form of art,

7. Consequently, … the contemplation of beauty is the central theme of Keats’s poetry and the Classical Greek worldis the main source of inspiration for Keats. Negative capability It is “when man is capable of being in uncertainties, Mysteries, doubts without any irritable reaching after fact & reason”. Per capacità negativa si intende il saper «stare nelle incertezze, nei misteri, nei dubbi, senza essere impaziente di pervenire a fatti e a ragioni» Keats believed that great people (especially poets) have the ability toaccept that not everything can be resolved. Negative capability,in his opinion, is the ability of a poet to suppress his ego,to remove himselfand his judgments from the work In other words,helooks at his object, at the source of his inspiration, so closely that he seems to lose his own identity, his sense of separation from the thing and identify himself with it.

8. Test yourself While reading the previous paragraph take notes under the following headings. Then use the information you have gathered to organise your knowledge about the work of John Keats. • The family problems which affected his poetic output; • The substance of his poetry; • The role of imagination; • The central theme of his works; • What the “negative capability” is and what the poet’s task is. • His father died as a consequence of a riding incident when he was only eight, his mother died of TB six years later; his brother Thomas died of the same disease in December 1818. These sad events inevitably influenced his literary production, in the sense that in the Odes Keats produced between 1818 and 1819 he reflected on the relations existing between pleasure and pain, happiness and melancholy, art and life, death and eternity etc. • As already said in the previous answer, personal experience affects Keats’s literary • output but it is not the substance of his poetry, it is only the starting point. • In other words, Keats’s poetry is not his spiritual autobiography; it does not deal with • his personal experiences, which are only an excuse the poet uses to reflect on • universal values, such aspleasure and pain; happiness and melancholy; • art and life; reality and imagination, death and eternity.This approach is confirmed • by the use Keats makes of the poetic “I”, which does not represent himself but a • universal being, not linked to the events of his time.

9. Keats believes in the supreme value of imagination; he thinks that the artist • wouldn’t be able to create a great work of art without imagination, which takes two • main forms: • the form of an artificial imagined world; • a vision of what he would like human life to be. • The contemplation of beauty is the central theme of Keats’s poetry and the Classical Greek world is the main source of inspiration for Keats. According to him the expression of beauty is the ideal of all art. • The poet is gifted with the so-called “negative capability”, i.e. the ability the • poet has to suppress his certainties andhispersonality, toremove himself and • his judgments from the work. In other words,the poet is able to look at his object, • at the source of his inspiration, so closely that he seems to lose his own identity, • his sense of separation from the thing and identify himself with it. • As for the poet’s task, he must render beautywhich leads to truth through • poetry.