% g % I * V Copyright0 by Aitecn Ward. AH rights reserved first published in by The [’iking Press, hit.. 6 Madison Avenue, hiew York ;ar X.Y, Published jinmiiaijfou.fty m Canada by The Macmiiian Companyof Canada Limited Library of Cangreit m/ndtfj) card FLUPMhe.tr fiÿ.-15,?1-6 SfTtJnd Printing /niquan iry6j Third Printing July itr$f MBr, Fet ir[ DasSterville and Bnimer types Printed in the LLS.A. by I'ail-Kaltou Prcu.Ine. To MARJORIE HOPE NICOLSON A N D THE ME M Q R Y OF VICTORIA LOUISE Sen EAGER - r ' _ Contents Preface IX . 1 Close to the Source i J . TheWideningStream =3 in. The Dark City 47 IY. The Green Shore 77 v. A Leap into the Sea US Vi. Soundings and Quicksands 147 VII, Mist and Crag 102 VI J1 - TheShores of Darkness 210 i x. The Melancholy Storm if!8 x. The Temple of Delight 2f>fi x1, Between Despair and Energy «9S xn. Unmeridian’d and Objectless 3*5 XIII. A Wrecked Life 348 xiv. End of the Voyage 374 Epilogue 403 Notes t(i SelectiveBibliography -Hi Index 443 PI tiles Fro>1tiipircr I JOHN KEATJ, I0IG Lite mast by n. ft. Hayden F<tll<iiL'h\g pfifcc 386 II CumcF Ki:Aia Miniature by JosephScvetrt Ill TOM Itr.VIS Drawing by Joseph Severn. IV BENJAMIN It-OLEltT IlAVDON Bortrait by Georgians M, 7.ornliit V LEIGJ! HUNT Portrait l>y H, It. Haydnn VI JOSEPH SEVEHW After 3 drawing bySeymour Kirknp VII C”AHl.K5 HkyWiS Bust by Aridftw Wilson VIII JOILN KEATS, iSafr Drawing by Joseph Severn IX JOHN KEATS., )8I(> Brawiiig by Charles Brown X Manuscript dralt of "On First Looking into Chapman's Homer" XI FAVSV BHAWWE From A silhouette cm by Auguste Edouard XII Wentworth Place, Hwptteihl XIII Letter to Fanny Brawne. October iBrr> XIV Jotis KEATS, IS--21 Drawing by Joseph Severn XV Piurrii tli Spatrij Rome Plans r aml VII jut photograph* by Christopher Oxford bom (he collection in Reals Memorial House, icpiculiicsvl hn Mirmiitloii of [he iltinjtneiu! Rr>ti>ugli Court’ dt.The soLiice of cad) of rhe oilier plates appears with (he plane. Prelace «<- A NEW LiF£ or KEATS requires n T.voirrt of explanation. ThE story has been told many times before and will be told agoin, as new facts about Ills life continue to be brought to light and critical re¬ valuation clarifies and redefines his place in English poetry. But a new biography of Keatsshould attempt inorc than to present new informa¬ tion or synthesize recent criticism: it should try to convey a tietv sense of the meaning of Iris life, Keats's life has in fact meant somethirtg new to each generation that has reflected on it, for it was an extraor¬ dinary life, both in the intensity with which lie lived it and in the unconscious eloquence with which he recorded It. Indeed, it has that represenLalive quality, that fullness of significance, of which Keats himself was thinking when he wrote, "Shakespeare led a life of Alle¬ gory: his works arc the comments on it," As Lionel Trilling lias sug¬ gested, rt was a life cast in the herorc mould, A dose reading of Kerns's poems and letters reveals the allegory that lie himself sensed in it; Itis recurrent image for his own endeavour in poetry is a voyage of ex¬ ploration across uneliarted seas, lie [lied {hinting fie had not reached hisgoal; yet in spile of the interruption of his work just asfic attained — maturity, his life shows a sigridLeant completion the achievement of identity, the self-making which, according to Otto Rank, is the most important act of any ail1st's career. Keats's own remark on Milton may then be applied to him: "There was working in him as it were that same sort of thing as operates in the great world to the end of a Prophecy's being accomp]iijjed In our time Keats has been regarded increasingly as the man of Ills letters: so tnucEt so that F. R. Leavis has hail to remind usSharply that our final concern must be with his poetry. Ire my view of Keats Ids greatness as a man is something distinct from, >e: at the same lime stgifjjficamly related to, his greatness as a poet; his life was essentially a process of integrating these two aspects of E;is mutire. The profound anti delighted and ultimately tragic insight inm Initnau life which Keats uimmiiniiaied so iminedlately and directly in his letters was x ijRi:rA ot: something he jcHfUodi only sLd!i||y to express in ELL.'. t>ociry LLS lie re¬ shaped his poetic medium to convey it, Slowly—that is., Eit tlnce ycart of die most concentrated cllori in our litcnUird, My account of his life, therefore, is conceÿipti primarily witli the developiufcm ol his — diaratler ns a poet that audacious net of sdhcreiuioiL which lie de¬ scribed in eonnettion with the writing of.lifitlymiofl,. Where Ids previ¬ ous biogippliers have viewed him against ihc tom; itidiiicni id English poetry or his day-to-day study of [be poets from whom be teamed bis art, or against ilie wide backdrop of Regency society or the minutiae of ids daily existence, 1 h:tve tried to convey something of the inner drama of liis creative life ui it is recorded in bis poems and tetters. Inevitably itiis has limited my critical focus. The interpret:!tion of Kcnts'.s poetry in die following pages is offered not os die detailed anti rounded criticism which can alone do justice to Lite individual poem, but tis a study, ehicily through Ids imagery, of the process by which bis goal in poetry became deer to linn, in ihaL mirarnlons unfolding which Jolhii Middleton Murry has cttlletl the mystery of Keats, The ptyitery remains beyond analysis in [be end. and fortunately so: for it is the compelling reason for ns to continue reading Keats, It is a pleasure to record the obligations incurred in writing this boot. My first thanks arc due to Elizabeth Ames and the Yaddo Cor¬ poralion, for hospitality of the most constructive sort in the early stages of my work. I am also grateful to the American Association of University Women for the award of a Shirley Farr Fellowship which helped me tocontinue it. The staffs of the New York Public Library, [he Pierpont Morgan Library, the Skidmore College Library, tbe 1larvaid University Li¬ brary, the Cambridge University Library, the British Museum, and the Keats Memorial Library of tfie PlbnipsLejid Borough Council have extended mo many courtesies. For permission to examine manuscripts andotherdocuments relating to Keats, I owe especial [hanks toSignora Vera Cactiatore, Curator of the Keats-Sheliey Memorial House in Rome; Mr,J. H, Preston,formerCuratorof the Keats Memorial House and Museum lit Hampstead;and mosLof all to Miss Mabel A, E.Steele, Curator of the Keats Collection of the Harvard University Library, who has generously and knowledgeably answered countless quesLions about the Keats documents in her charge, f am also grateful to all the present owners and custodians of Keats's letters for answering my in¬ quiries regarding them. The Keats Memorial Library of die Hampstead lS-orough Council has kindly granted permission to use cm the tide page a drawing aficr that by JosephSeven!, found in Charles brown's copy of fltrriyrm'on, of the PRY,FA CZ X i Greek lyre which Keats asked m haveengraved on his tombstone. For permission tu reproduce die ilfnsirations hi this book i am grateful to the Houghton Library of Harvard University, the Keats Memorial House in Hampstead, the Kents-She[ley Memorial House in Rome, the Radio Tillies Htilton Picture Library of Loudon, lire Victoria and Al¬ bert Js-fctseTiiti, and the National Portrait.Gallery, Lundyu, In my effort to work as completely as possible from Keats's own writings and those nf his friends, I am profoundly indebted to KenLs's editors -Harry Ruxton Forman, Maurire Tiuxtoti Forman, M. W. Gar- rod, and tlyder Edward Rollins, l am also keenly aware of what1owe lo the researches of many scholars in the field of Keats and ids circle,. espetially to Keats's previous biographers, Sir Sidney Col\'in,. Miss Amy Lowell, Miss Dormhy Hewlett, and Mi'- Robert Gitiings. On several earlier occasions I haveexpressed my disagreement with certain aspects of Mr. timings' interpretation of Keats's life, particularly Keats's relations with Isabella Jones and [he influence of Horton's An/iinmy e>f Alclan'tfioly on his work. 1 would like to take [his op¬ portuney to record my admiration of many other aspects oE Mr, Gsi¬ tings' research and of the manner in which he lias set it forth. In theinterest oi general readability, I base kept (Etc documentation of this book to a minimum, it is assumed (hat students of Keats will befamiliar with his poems and letters in the editions of H. W. Garrod and H. E. Rollins and with the documents collected by Professor Rollins in 77jc Keais Circle and More f.eUers «nd Papers oj{tic Kean Circle, Therefore, except where a reference is obscure or a point con¬ troverted, I base not given notes to these primary' sources i:i the life of Keats. I hope tEial my general indebtedness to l!tc previous hiog- raphes of Kcai.s and his friends evil[ also be immediately apparent to Students of Lite period and will be sufficiently acknowledged in the bibliography. Again for thesake of a readable narrative, f have quoted freely from Keats's letters without indicating omissions and base some¬ times transposed 'he order of sentences; 1 have taken care, however, not to distort Keats's meaning in the process, and J trust that the dose reader of Keats will rccognbc and accept these occasional condensa¬ tions of the text, Wherever I have departed from the established te*: in my quotations, iho emendations are indicated in Miss Dorothy Hewlett graciously answered a number of questions I asked Iter concerning Keats's liTe. and Mr. A. j. Lidding provided some valuable information about hosing in die nineteenth century. For OLIKT information I am indebted to Mr. W. R LeFauu. Librarian of the Royal .Society of Surgeon* of 1’rigHmh Mr. William I.iclilen- wangor, Assistant Hoad of rhr I’cferenre Section; Librarv'.-ot Congress} Mr- Cyril E. R. Flatten. Town Clerk of the Uormigb of Enfield: Miss