1.
1809 in literature
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This article presents lists of the literary events and publications in 1809. February 24 – The Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, London, is destroyed by fire, the putative manuscript of The History of Cardenio may have been lost in the blaze. March 1 – The literary and political periodical The Quarterly Review is first published by John Murray in London, june 1 – Samuel Taylor Coleridge founds The Friend, a weekly periodical which runs for some 25 issues. July 7 – Jane Austen settles with her sister and mother at Chawton Cottage in Chawton, near Alton, Hampshire, september 18 – A new Theatre Royal, Covent Garden, London opens to replace the first burnt down in 1808, with a performance of Macbeth. An increase in ticket prices causes the Old Price Riots which last for 64 days until the manager, John Philip Kemble, the Walnut Street Theatre in Philadelphia is established as The New Circus by the Circus of Pepin and Breschard. It is the oldest continuously operating theatre in the English-speaking world and the oldest in the United States
2.
1814 in literature
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This article presents lists of the literary events and publications in 1814. January 14 – The Imperial Public Library in Saint Petersburg opens to the public, january 26 – Actor Edmund Kean makes his London début in an adult leading rôle as Shylock at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane. His Lara sells 6,000 copies on publication in the summer, walter Scott is to say of Byrons poetry He beat me out of the field in description of the stronger passions and in deep-seated knowledge of the human heart. September 12–15 – Battle of Baltimore, American lawyer Francis Scott Key, witnessing the bombardment of Baltimore, Maryland, from a British ship, in 1931 as The Star-Spangled Banner it is officially adopted at the national anthem of the United States. November 29 – In London, The Times newspaper is printed using a steam press for the first time at a rate of 1100 copies per hour. Late – Publication of the Brothers Grimms Grimms Fairy Tales, first edition, the earliest known printed Arabic language version of One Thousand and One Nights begins publication in Calcutta by the British East India Company. Alfred de Vigny enrolls as an officer in the Maison du Roi, or, Anecdotes of Felix and his Sister Serena. M. S. Forester – Lord Hornblower
3.
1821 in literature
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This article presents lists of the literary events and publications in 1821. August 4 – Atkinson & Alexander publish The Saturday Evening Post for the first time as a newspaper in the United States. James Ballantyne begins publishing his Novelists Library in Edinburgh edited by Sir Walter Scott, percy Bysshe Shelleys Queen Mab, a philosophical poem is distributed by an unauthorized publisher in London leading to prosecution by the Society for the Prevention of Vice. In the first known obscenity case in the United States, a Massachusetts court outlaws the John Cleland novel Fanny Hill, the publisher, Peter Holmes, is convicted for printing a lewd and obscene novel. At about this date Sunthorn Phu is imprisoned and begins his epic poem Phra Aphai Mani
4.
1824 in literature
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This article presents lists of the literary events and publications in 1824. January 24 – First issue of the radical quarterly founded by Jeremy Bentham, February 9 – Because of his familys dire financial straits, Charles Dickens, just turned 12, begins work in a blacking factory in London. On February 23 his father, John Dickens, is committed to the Marshalsea prison as a debtor, February 15 – Lord Byron falls ill at Missolonghi while taking part in the Greek War of Independence, dying of fever on April 19. April – The United States Literary Gazette, a semi-monthly, begins publication and it publishes poetry by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow and William Cullen Bryant, among many others. May 7 – Première of Beethovens Symphony No.9 at the Theater am Kärntnertor in Vienna, opposed only by Thomas Moore, the two volumes of memoirs are dismembered and burnt in the fireplace at the John Murray s office,50 Albemarle Street in London. June 21 – The Vagrancy Act in England provides for the prosecution of every Person wilfully exposing to view, or public Place, any obscene Print, Picture, or other indecent Exhibition. Julia Catherine Beckwiths St. Ursula’s Convent or, The Nun of Canada, the periodicals The Childrens Friend and The Childs Companion both publish their first issues
5.
1816 in poetry
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Nationality words link to articles with information on the nations poetry or literature. This pall of darkness inspires Byron to write his poem Darkness in July, regular conversation with Byron has an invigorating effect on Shelleys poetry. While on a tour the two take together, Shelley is inspired to write his Hymn to Intellectual Beauty. Shelley, in turn, influences Byrons poetry and this new influence shows itself in the third part of Childe Harolds Pilgrimage, which Byron is working on, as well as in Manfred, which he writes in the autumn of this year. In late August Percy Bysshe Shelley and Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin return to England from Switzerland, Shelley is introduced to John Keats in Hampstead towards the end of the year by their mutual friend, Leigh Hunt, who is to transfer his enthusiasm from Keats to Shelley. Sheriden, written at the request of Douglas Kinnaird, spoken at Drury Lane Theatre by Mrs. T
6.
1819 in poetry
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Nationality words link to articles with information on the nations poetry or literature. He has been inspired by a series of recent lectures by Hazlitt on English poets, in the summer he writes Lamia and on September 19 he writes his ode To Autumn at Winchester. Percy Bysshe Shelley, in Italy, also has one of his most productive years, william Wordsworth begins another major revision of The Prelude. This version is completed in 1820 and his first version, in two parts, was done in 1798 and 1799. A second major revision occurred in 1805 and 1806, the book is not published in any form until shortly after his death in 1850. H. Reynolds, Peter Bell, A lyrical ballad, writing under the pen name W. W. B, new York, Philadelphia, Published by Inskeep & Bradford, and Bradford & Inskeep John Howard Payne, Brutus, or, The Fall of Tarquin. An Historical Tragedy in Five Acts, London, T
7.
1820 in poetry
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Nationality words link to articles with information on the nations poetry or literature. On the suggestion of his doctors, he leaves London for Italy with his friend Joseph Severn and moves into a house on the Spanish Steps in Rome, william Wordsworth completes another major revision of The Prelude. This revision was begun in 1819 and his first version, in two parts, was done in 1798 and 1799. A second major revision, bringing the work to 13 parts, the book is not published in any form until shortly after his death in 1850, in a 14-part version. The revisions do not just add text but remove and rearrange passages as well, many of Wordsworths friends read the book in manuscript during his lifetime. First translation of the Old English epic poem Beowulf into a language, Danish, Bjovulfs Drape. Or goes to an American play, or looks at an American picture or statue
8.
1819 in science
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The year 1819 in science and technology involved some significant events, listed below. Johann Franz Encke computes the orbit of Comet Encke, identifying it as periodic, july 1 – Johann Georg Tralles discovers the Great Comet of 1819. It was the first comet analyzed using polarimetry, by François Arago, Joseph Bienaimé Caventou and Pierre Joseph Pelletier isolate the alkaloid brucine from Strychnos nux-vomica. October 15 – Desolation Island in the South Shetland Islands of the Antarctic is discovered by Captain William Smith in the Williams, greenough publishes his book, A critical examination of the first principles of geology in a series of essays. August – René Laennec publishes De l’Auscultation Médiate ou Traité du Diagnostic des Maladies des Poumons et du Coeur in Paris, English physician John Bostock publishes the first account of allergic rhinitis. May 22 – SS Savannah leaves port at Savannah, Georgia on a voyage to become the first steamship to cross the Atlantic Ocean, the ship arrives at Liverpool, England, on June 20. Invention of the M1819 breech-loading flintlock using interchangeable parts by Captain John H. Hall of Harpers Ferry Armory in the United States, Cambridge Philosophical Society founded as a scientific society at the University of Cambridge in England. Copley Medal, Not awarded May 3 – Nikolai Annenkov, botanist, June 5 – John Couch Adams, mathematician and astronomer. August 13 – George Gabriel Stokes, mathematician and physicist, september 18 – Léon Foucault, physicist. September 23 – Hippolyte Fizeau, physicist, january – Elsa Beata Bunge, Swedish botanist August 19 – James Watt, British inventor, mechanical engineer and mathematician. November 22 – John Stackhouse, English botanist
9.
Romney Literary Society
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The Romney Literary Society existed from January 30,1819, to February 15,1886, in Romney, West Virginia. Established as the Polemic Society of Romney, it became the first organization of its kind in the state of West Virginia. The society was founded by nine prominent men of Romney with the objectives of advancing literature and science, purchasing and maintaining a library, the society debated an extensive range of scientific and social topics, often violating its own rules which banned religious and political subjects. The societys library began in 1819 with the acquisition of two books, by 1861, it had grown to contain approximately 3,000 volumes on subjects such as literature, science, history, and art. The organization also sought to establish an institution for the education of the youth of the community. In 1846, the society constructed a building housed the Romney Classical Institute and its library. The institute was administered by noted Presbyterian Reverend William Henry Foote, following a dispute with the society, Foote founded a rival school in Romney, known as the Potomac Seminary, in 1850. The Romney Literary Society and the Romney Classical Institute continued to grow in influence until the onset of the American Civil War in 1861. The contents of the library were plundered by Union Army forces. Reorganized in 1869, the society took a role in Romneys civil development during Reconstruction. Between 1869 and 1870, it completed construction of Literary Hall, the organization used its influence to secure the West Virginia Schools for the Deaf and Blind for the town of Romney, and offered the school its former Romney Classical Institute campus. The schools opened on September 29,1870, interest in the society waned during its final years, and its last recorded meeting was held in 1886. The Romney Literary Society was organized on January 30,1819, by nine prominent men of Romney in the office of Dr. John Temple, a reputable physician in the community. With its establishment, the Romney Literary Society became the first organization of its kind in the state of West Virginia. The nine men at the societys first meeting were Thomas Blair, David Gibson, James P. Jack, Samuel Kercheval, Jr. Nathaniel Kuykendall, Charles T. Magill, James M. Stephens, John Temple, and William C. According to historian Hu Maxwell, these men elected Kuykendall as chairman, on February 4,1819, the committee delivered its draft of the constitution and the society adopted the document, which provided that the organization should be known as the Polemic Society of Romney. The societys constitution also specified that the officers should consist of a president, secretary, the funds collected were to cover the societys operating costs, and the remaining funds were to be used in purchasing books for the library. Under the constitution, the meetings were to be held weekly
10.
Romney, West Virginia
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Romney is a city in and the county seat of Hampshire County, West Virginia, USA. The population was 1,940 at the 2000 census, while the covered by the citys ZIP code had a population of 5,873. The population was 1,848 at the 2010 census, Originally settled in 1725 by hunters and traders, Romney was known as Pearsalls Flats and was the site of the French and Indian War stockade Fort Pearsall. It is also home to the West Virginia Schools for the Deaf and Blind, Romney is located at 39°20′42″N 78°45′25″W. According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has an area of 0.96 square miles. The climate in this area is characterized by hot, humid summers, according to the Köppen Climate Classification system, Romney has a humid continental climate, abbreviated Cfa on climate maps. As of the census of 2010, there were 1,848 people,843 households, the population density was 1,925.0 inhabitants per square mile. There were 967 housing units at a density of 1,007.3 per square mile. The racial makeup of the city was 95. 8% White,2. 7% African American,0. 2% Native American,0. 1% Asian,0. 1% from other races, hispanic or Latino of any race were 1. 4% of the population. 46. 5% of all households were made up of individuals and 26. 2% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older, the average household size was 2.01 and the average family size was 2.83. The median age in the city was 41.9 years. 23. 6% of residents were under the age of 18,9. 4% were between the ages of 18 and 24,20. 3% were from 25 to 44, 23% were from 45 to 64, and 23. 6% were 65 years of age or older. The gender makeup of the city was 44. 1% male and 55. 9% female, as of the census of 2000, there were 1,940 people,884 households, and 454 families residing in the city. The population density was 2,114.3 people per square mile, there were 974 housing units at an average density of 1,061.5 per square mile. The racial makeup of the city was 96. 91% White,1. 91% African American,0. 05% Native American,0. 52% Asian,0. 21% from other races, hispanic or Latino of any race were 0. 67% of the population. 44. 8% of all households were made up of individuals and 26. 8% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older, the average household size was 1.97 and the average family size was 2.72. In the city, the population was out with 25. 2% under the age of 18,7. 4% from 18 to 24,20. 1% from 25 to 44,21. 3% from 45 to 64. The median age was 42 years, for every 100 females there were 76.2 males
11.
John Keats
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John Keats was an English Romantic poet. He had a significant influence on a range of poets. Jorge Luis Borges stated that his first encounter with Keatss work was the most significant literary experience of his life, the poetry of Keats is characterised by sensual imagery, most notably in the series of odes. This is typical of poets, as they aimed to accentuate extreme emotion through the emphasis of natural imagery. Today his poems and letters are some of the most popular, John Keats was born in Moorgate, London, on 31 October 1795 to Thomas Keats and his wife, born Frances Jennings. There is no evidence of his exact birthplace. Although Keats and his family seem to have marked his birthday on 29 October and he was the eldest of four surviving children, his younger siblings were George, Thomas, and Frances Mary Fanny who eventually married Spanish author Valentín Llanos Gutiérrez. Another son was lost in infancy and his father first worked as a hostler at the stables attached to the Swan and Hoop Inn, an establishment he later managed, and where the growing family lived for some years. Keats believed that he was born at the inn, a birthplace of humble origins, the Globe pub now occupies the site, a few yards from the modern-day Moorgate station. He was baptised at St Botolph-without-Bishopsgate, and sent to a dame school as a child. His parents were unable to afford Eton or Harrow, so in the summer of 1803, he was sent to board at John Clarkes school in Enfield, the small school had a liberal outlook and a progressive curriculum more modern than the larger, more prestigious schools. In the family atmosphere at Clarkes, Keats developed an interest in classics and history, the headmasters son, Charles Cowden Clarke, also became an important mentor and friend, introducing Keats to Renaissance literature, including Tasso, Spenser, and Chapmans translations. The young Keats was described by his friend Edward Holmes as a character, always in extremes, given to indolence. However, at 13 he began focusing his energy on reading and study, in April 1804, when Keats was eight, his father died. The cause of death was a fracture, suffered when he fell from his horse while returning from a visit to Keats. Frances remarried two months later, but left her new husband soon afterwards, and the four went to live with their grandmother, Alice Jennings. In March 1810 when Keats was 14, his mother died of tuberculosis and she appointed two guardians, Richard Abbey and John Sandell, to take care of them. That autumn, Keats left Clarkes school to apprentice with Thomas Hammond, a surgeon and apothecary who was a neighbour, Keats lodged in the attic above the surgery at 7 Church Street until 1813
12.
Guy's Hospital
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Guys Hospital is a large NHS hospital in the borough of Southwark in central London. It is part of Guys and St Thomas NHS Foundation Trust and one of the institutions that comprise the Kings Health Partners and it is a large teaching hospital and is, with St Thomas Hospital and Kings College Hospital, the location of Kings College London School of Medicine. The Tower Wing is the second tallest hospital building, standing at 148.65 metres with 34 floors. The hospital was founded in 1721 by Thomas Guy, a publisher of unlicensed Bibles who had made a fortune in the South Sea Bubble and it was originally established as a hospital to treat incurables discharged from St Thomas Hospital. Guy had been a Governor and benefactor of St Thomas and his fellow Governors supported his intention by granting the south-side of St Thomas Street for a rent for 999 years. Guy is interred in the crypt of the Chapel of his foundation, Guys has expanded over the centuries. The original buildings formed a courtyard facing St Thomas Street, comprising the hall on the east side, two inner quadrangles were divided by a cloister which was later restyled and dedicated to the hospitals members who fell in World War I. The east side comprised the wards and the counting house with the governors Burfoot Court Room. The north-side quadrangle is dominated by a statue of Lord Nuffield who was the chairman of governors for many years and these original parts of the hospital are now administrative and social accommodation. Despite substantial bomb damage during World War II, the original 18th century chapel remains intact including the tomb of Thomas Guy with a sculpture by John Bacon. A bequest of £200,000 by William Hunt in 1829, one of the largest charitable bequests in England in historic terms, Hunts name was given to the southern expansion of the hospital buildings. These were replaced c.2000 by new buildings for Kings College. In 1974, the added the 34-storey Guys Tower and 29-storey Guys House. At 148.65 metres high, Guys Tower regained its tallest hospital building in the status in 2014 and is currently the 21st tallest building in London. It was designed by Watkins Gray, over 13,650 staff work in Guys Hospital and St Thomas Hospital. They are two of the oldest teaching hospitals, and they are situated right in the heart of the capital, one of the services that the trust provides is dental care, looking after over 120,000 patients a year. The site consists of 19 distinct, but interconnected, buildings with functions including public medical services, teaching, research, collectively the buildings are known by local students as the squirrel due to the buildings strange silhouette. It was for six years surpassed by the Phase 3 Building of the Hong Kong Sanatorium and Hospital in Happy Valley, in May 2014 it regained its title following the completion of extensive repair and improvement works
13.
Hampstead Heath
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Hampstead Heath is a large, ancient London park, covering 320 hectares. This grassy public space sits astride a sandy ridge, one of the highest points in London, running from Hampstead to Highgate, which rests on a band of London Clay. The heath is rambling and hilly, embracing ponds, recent and ancient woodlands, a lido, playgrounds, and a training track, the south-east part of the heath is Parliament Hill, from which the view over London is protected by law. Running along its perimeter are a chain of ponds – including three open-air public swimming pools – which were originally reservoirs for drinking water from the River Fleet. The heath is a Site of Metropolitan Importance for Nature Conservation, lakeside concerts are held there in summer. The heath first entered the books in 986 when Ethelred the Unready granted one of his servants five hides of land at Hemstede. This same land is recorded in the Domesday Book of 1086 as held by the monastery of St. Peters at Westminster Abbey. Over time, plots of land in the manor were sold off for building, particularly in the early 19th century, the main part of the heath was acquired for the people by the Metropolitan Board of Works. Parliament Hill was purchased for the public for £300,000, Golders Hill was added in 1898 and Kenwood House and grounds were added in 1928. From 1808 to 1814 Hampstead Heath hosted a station in the shutter telegraph chain which connected the Admiralty in London to its ships in the port of Great Yarmouth. The City of London Corporation has managed the heath since 1989, before that it was managed by the GLC and before that by the London County Council. In 2009, the City of London proposed to upgrade a footpath across the heath into a service-road, the proposal met with protests from local residents and celebrities, and did not proceed. The heath sits astride a sandy ridge that rests on a band of London clay and it runs from east to west, its highest point being 134 metres. As the sand was easily penetrated by rainwater which was held by the clay. Hampstead Heath contains the largest single area of land in Greater London. Buses serve several roads around the heath, the heaths 320 hectares include a number of distinct areas. Hampstead Heath is an important refuge for wildlife, including snakes, foxes, rabbits, slow worms, squirrels. Common kingfishers, jackdaws, pipistrelles and Daubentons bats are seen over the ponds, some introduced species have also thrived at the site, for example muntjac deer, terrapins and ring-necked parakeets
14.
Fanny Brawne
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Frances Brawne Lindon is best known for her betrothal to English Romantic poet John Keats, a fact largely unknown until 1878, when Keatss letters to her were published. Their engagement, lasting from December 1818 until Keatss death in February 1821, Frances Brawne was born 9 August 1800 to Samuel and Frances at the Brawnes’ farm near the hamlet of West End, close to Hampstead, England. She was the eldest of three surviving children, her brother Samuel was born July 1804, and her sister Margaret was born April 1809. By 1810, her family was in Kentish Town, and on 11 April of that year her father died, at age thirty-five, subsequently, Mrs. Brawne moved the family to Hampstead Heath. Fanny was introduced to a society which was “varied and attractive, young officers from the Peninsular Wars, perhaps from Waterloo. Exotic French and Spanish émigrés. from their lodgings round Oriel House in Church Row and the chapel in Holly Place. ”After living at Wentworth Place for a brief time the Brawnes became friends with the Dilkes. At eighteen, Fanny Brawne “was small, her eyes were blue and often enhanced by blue ribbons in her hair, her mouth expressed determination. She was not conventionally beautiful, her nose was a little too aquiline, her face too pale and she could answer, at a moment’s notice, any question on historical costume. She was a politician, fiery in discussion, she was a voluminous reader. Indeed, books were her favourite topic of conversation” and it was through the Dilkes that Fanny Brawne met John Keats in November 1818 at Wentworth Place, where Keats had been living for some time with Charles Brown in the companion house to the Dilkes. Their initial meeting was cordial and expected—the Dilkes were fond of Keats, Keats’s grief was deep, as “Some years before, Keats had written that his love for his brothers was “an affection ‘passing the Love of Women’”. Fanny showed him the depth of her understanding and she gave him invigorating sympathy, keeping his mind from the past and from introspection, she encouraged his love of life by her obvious interest in him, and by her vivacity. Remarkably soon his own gaiety returned. ”In a letter begun 16 December 1818 to his brother George, in America, the first, Mrs. Brawn who took Browns house for the summer still resides in Hampstead. She is a nice woman and her daughter senior is I think beautiful, elegant, graceful, silly, fashionable. We have a tiff now and then—and she behaves a little better, or I must have sheered off. I am however tired of such style and shall decline any more of it It was not long before Keats fell completely in love with Fanny. “He had transfigured Fanny in his imagination, his passion creating in her the beauty which for him became the truth, and so she had come to be. The fulfilment of Endymion, the symbol of beauty, the reconciliation between real life and his poetic quest. ”On 18 October 1819, Keats proposed to Fanny Brawne
15.
La Belle Dame sans Merci
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La Belle Dame sans Merci is a ballad written by the English poet John Keats. It exists in two versions, with differences between them. The original was written by Keats in 1819 and he used the title of the 15th-century La Belle Dame sans Mercy by Alain Chartier, though the plots of the two poems are different. The poem is considered an English classic, stereotypical of other of Keats works and it avoids simplicity of interpretation despite simplicity of structure. At only a short twelve stanzas, of four lines each, with a simple ABCB rhyme scheme, the poem is nonetheless full of enigmas. O what can ail thee, knight-at-arms, Alone and palely loitering, the sedge has withered from the lake, And no birds sing. O what can ail thee, knight-at-arms, So haggard and so woe-begone, the squirrel’s granary is full, And the harvest’s done. I see a lily on thy brow, With anguish moist and fever-dew, I met a lady in the meads, Full beautiful, a fairy’s child, Her hair was long, her foot was light, And her eyes were wild. She found me roots of sweet, And honey wild. She took me to her Elfin grot, And there she wept and sighed full sore, and there she lullèd me asleep, And there I dreamed—Ah. Woe betide. — The latest dream I ever dreamt On the cold hill side, and this is why I sojourn here, Alone and palely loitering, Though the sedge is withered from the lake, And no birds sing. La Belle Dame sans Merci is a popular form given an artistic sheen by the Romantic poets, keatss economical manner of telling a story in La Belle Dame sans Merci is the direct opposite of his lavish manner in The Eve of St. Agnes. Part of the fascination exerted by the poem comes from Keats use of understatement, Keats sets his simple story of love and death in a bleak wintry landscape that is appropriate to it, The sedge has witherd from the lake / And no birds sing. Keats relates the condition of the trees and surroundings with condition of the knight who is also broken, in keeping with the ballad tradition, Keats does not identify his questioner, or the knight, or the destructively beautiful lady. What Keats does not include in his poem contributes as much to it in arousing the readers imagination as what he puts into it. La belle dame sans merci, the lady without pity, is a femme fatale. She destroys because it is her nature to destroy, Keats could have found patterns for his faerys child in folk mythology, classical literature, Renaissance poetry, or the medieval ballad. With a few skillful touches, he creates a woman who is at once beautiful, erotically attractive, fascinating, some readers see the poem as Keats personal rebellion against the pains of love
16.
John Keats's 1819 odes
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In 1819, John Keats composed six odes, which are among his most famous and well-regarded poems. While the exact order in which Keats composed the poems is unknown, as a whole, the odes represent Keatss attempt to create a new type of short lyrical poem, which influenced later generations. Early in 1819, Keats left his paid position as dresser at Guys Hospital, Southwark. He decided to forsake the life of a poet for a lucrative career –. It was during the months of spring 1819 that he wrote many of his major odes, following the month of May 1819, he began to tackle other forms of poetry, including a play, some longer pieces, and a return to his unfinished epic, Hyperion. After writing Ode to Psyche, Keats sent the poem to his brother and explained his new ode form, I have been endeavouring to discover a better Sonnet stanza than we have. The legitimate does not suit the language well, from the rhymes, the other appears too elegiac. I do not pretend to have succeeded, of these structural elements, the preface was discontinued in his next odes and the setting is reduced within the other odes until the scene is merely implied. The exact chronological and interpretive orders of the six 1819 poems are unknown, Keats simply dated the others May 1819. However, he worked on the poems together, and they form a sequence within their structures. Ode on a Grecian Urn is an ode with five stanzas containing 10 lines each. The first stanza begins with the narrator addressing an ancient urn as Thou still unravished bride of quietness, initiating a conversation between the poet and the object, which the reader is allowed to observe from a third-person point of view. With line 17, the second stanza begins to change tone as the poet shifts his focus from the urn as a whole to the individuals represented in the artwork. The two lovers, whose image the unknown artist has created through his craftsmanship, appear to the poet as a couple who cannot kiss yet do not grow old, as the poem comes to a close, the narrator once again addresses the urn as a single object. However, his tone becomes sharper as he seeks answers from the work of art that it appears unable to answer, Ode on Indolence comprises six stanzas containing ten lines each. The poem discusses a morning of laziness on the part of the narrator, the poem describes the three figures as wearing placid sandals and white robes, which alludes to the Grecian mythology that commonly appears in the 1819 odes. The images pass the three times, which causes him to compare them to images on a spinning urn. In line 10, the uses the word Phidian again as a reference to the Elgin marbles, whose creation was thought to have been overseen by Phidias
17.
Ode to Psyche
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Ode to Psyche is a poem by John Keats written in spring 1819. The poem is the first of his 1819 odes, which include Ode on a Grecian Urn, Ode to Psyche is an experiment in the ode genre, and Keatss attempt at an expanded version of the sonnet format that describes a dramatic scene. The poem serves as an important departure from Keatss early poems, Keats uses the imagination to show the narrators intent to resurrect Psyche and reincarnate himself into Eros. Keats attempts this by dedicating an untrodden region of his mind to the worship of the neglected goddess, Keats was never a professional writer. Instead, he supported himself with an income that he earned as a surgeon for Guys Hospital. At the age of 23, Keats left the hospital, losing his source of income and he lived with Charles Brown, a friend who collected Keatss poetry while supporting him, during spring 1819 and composed poetry. The early products of this effort included La Belle Dame sans Merci and Ode to Psyche, Keats was exposed to a few sources of the Psyche myth. His contemporary sources for the myth included Lemprieres Classical Dictionary and Mary Tighes Psyche, Keats wrote to his brother George, just a few months before writing Ode to Psyche, to say that he was no longer delighted by Tighes writing. Dissatisfied, he turned to Apuleiuss Golden Ass, translated by William Adlington in 1566, Ode to Psyche, Keatss 67 line ode, was the first of his major odes of 1819. As such, the poem is an experiment in the ode structure that he was to rely on for his next five odes. Although Keats spent time considering the language of the poem, the choice of wording and phrasing is below that found within his later works, including Hyperion or the odes that followed. Ode to Psyche is important because it is Keatss first attempt at a sonnet form that would include longer more lines. Also, he did not want the poem to be based simply around that message, so he incorporated elements, such as plot and characters. Of these additions, the use of a preface was discontinued in his next odes along with the removal of details that describe setting within the poems, they would only be implied within later odes. H. W. Garrod, in his analysis of Keatss sonnet form, believes that Keats took various aspects of sonnet forms, in particular, Keats relies on Petrarchs sonnet structure and the pouncing rhymes that are found within Petrarchs octave stanzas. However, M. R. Ridley disputes that Keats favours Petrarch, regardless of which sonnet structure was favoured over the other, Keats wanted to avoid the downsides of both forms. Ode to Psyche begins with an altered Shakespearean rhyme scheme of ababcdcdeffeef, the use of rhyme does not continue throughout the poem, and the lines that follow are divided into different groups, a quatrain, couplets, and a line on its own. These are then followed by a series of lines that are modelled after the Shakespearean sonnet form
18.
Ode on a Grecian Urn
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Ode on a Grecian Urn is a poem written by the English Romantic poet John Keats in May 1819 and published anonymously in the January 1820, Number 15, issue of the magazine Annals of the Fine Arts. The poem is one of several Great Odes of 1819, which includes Ode on Indolence, Ode on Melancholy, Ode to a Nightingale, Keats found earlier forms of poetry unsatisfactory for his purpose, and the collection represented a new development of the ode form. He was inspired to write the poem after reading two articles by English artist and writer Benjamin Haydon, divided into five stanzas of ten lines each, the ode contains a narrators discourse on a series of designs on a Grecian urn. The poem focuses on two scenes, one in which a lover eternally pursues a beloved without fulfilment, and another of villagers about to perform a sacrifice, Ode on a Grecian Urn was not well received by contemporary critics. It was only by the century that it began to be praised. A long debate over the final statement divided 20th-century critics. By the spring of 1819, Keats had left his job as dresser, or assistant house surgeon, at Guys Hospital, Southwark, London, living with his friend Charles Brown, the 23-year-old was burdened with money problems and despaired when his brother George sought his financial assistance. The poems were transcribed by Brown, who provided copies to the publisher Richard Woodhouse. Their exact date of composition is unknown, Keats simply dated Ode on a Grecian Urn May 1819, while the five poems display a unity in stanza forms and themes, the unity fails to provide clear evidence of the order in which they were composed. In the odes of 1819 Keats explores his contemplations about relationships between the soul, eternity, nature, and art and his idea of using classical Greek art as a metaphor originated in his reading of Haydons Examiner articles of 2 May and 9 May 1819. Keatss inspiration for the topic was not limited to Haydon, and he may have recalled his experience with the Elgin Marbles and their influence on his sonnet On Seeing the Elgin Marbles. Keats was also exposed to the Townley, Borghese, and Holland House vases, many contemporary essays and articles on these works shared Keatss view that classical Greek art was both idealistic and captured Greek virtues. Although he was influenced by examples of existing Greek vases, in the poem he attempted to describe an artistic type. Following the initial publication, the Examiner published Keatss ode together with Haydons two previously published articles, Keats also included the poem in his 1820 collection Lamia, Isabella, The Eve of St Agnes, and Other Poems. In 1819, Keats had attempted to write sonnets, but found that the form did not satisfy his purpose because the pattern of rhyme worked against the tone that he wished to achieve. When he turned to the ode form, he found that the standard Pindaric form used by such as John Dryden was inadequate for properly discussing philosophy. Keats developed his own type of ode in Ode to Psyche, Keatss creation established a new poetic tone that accorded with his aesthetic ideas about poetry. He further altered this new form in Ode to a Nightingale and Ode on a Grecian Urn by adding a voice within the ode
19.
Ode to a Nightingale
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According to Brown, a nightingale had built its nest near the house Keats and Brown shared in the spring of 1819. Inspired by the song, Keats composed the poem in one day. It soon became one of his 1819 odes and was first published in Annals of the Fine Arts the following July, the poem is one of the most frequently anthologized in the English language. Ode to a Nightingale is a poem that describes Keatss journey into the state of negative capability. The nightingale described within the poem experiences a type of death, instead, the songbird is capable of living through its song, which is a fate that humans cannot expect. The poem ends with an acceptance that pleasure cannot last and that death is an part of life. In the poem, Keats imagines the loss of the physical world, the contrast between the immortal nightingale and mortal man sitting in his garden, is made all the more acute by an effort of the imagination. The presence of weather is noticeable in the poem, as spring came early in 1819, of Keatss six major odes of 1819, Ode to Psyche, was probably written first and To Autumn written last. Sometime between these two, he wrote Ode to a Nightingale, the poem was composed at the Hampstead house Keats shared with Brown, possibly while sitting beneath a plum tree in the garden. According to Keats friend Brown, Keats finished the ode in just one morning, Keats felt a tranquil and continual joy in her song, and one morning he took his chair from the breakfast-table to the grass-plot under a plum-tree, where he sat for two or three hours. When he came into the house, I perceived he had some scraps of paper in his hand, on inquiry, I found those scraps, four or five in number, contained his poetic feelings on the song of the nightingale. Browns account is personal, as he claimed the poem was influenced by his house. However, Keats relied on both his own imagination and other literature as sources for his depiction of the nightingale. The exact date of Ode to a Nightingale, as well as Ode on Indolence, Ode on Melancholy, however, he worked on the four poems together, and there is a unity in both their stanza forms and their themes. The exact order the poems were written in is also unknown, while Keats was writing Ode on a Grecian Urn and the other poems, Brown transcribed copies of the poems and submitted them to Richard Woodhouse. During this time, Benjamin Haydon, Keats friend, was given a copy of Ode to a Nightingale, Elmes paid Keats a small sum of money, and the poem was published in the July issue. The poem was included in Keats 1820 collection of poems, Lamia, Isabella, The Eve of St Agnes. Ode to a Nightingale was probably the first of the set of four odes that Keats wrote following Ode to Psyche
20.
Ode on Indolence
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The Ode on Indolence is one of five odes composed by English poet John Keats in the spring of 1819. The others were Ode on a Grecian Urn, Ode on Melancholy, Ode to a Nightingale and Ode to Psyche. The poem describes the state of indolence, otherwise known as laziness, after finishing the spring poems, Keats wrote in June 1819 that its composition brought him more pleasure than anything else he had written that year. Unlike the other odes he wrote that year, Ode on Indolence was not published until 1848,27 years after his death, the poem is an example of Keatss break from the structure of the classical form. It follows the poets contemplation of a morning spent in idleness, three figures are presented—Ambition, Love and Poesy — dressed in placid sandals and white robes. The narrator examines each using a series of questions and statements on life, the poem concludes with the narrator giving up on having all three of the figures as part of his life. Some critics regard Ode on Indolence as inferior to the other four 1819 odes, others suggest that the poem exemplifies a continuity of themes and imagery characteristic of his more widely read works, and provides valuable biographical insight into his poetic career. By the spring of 1819, Keats had left his paid position as a surgeon at Guys Hospital, Southwark, London. On 12 May 1819, he abandoned this plan after receiving a request for assistance from his brother. Unable to help, Keats was torn by guilt and despair and it was under these circumstances that he wrote Ode on Indolence. In a letter to his brother dated 19 March 1819, Keats discussed indolence as a subject, during this period, Keatss friend Charles Armitage Brown transcribed copies of the spring odes and submitted them to publisher Richard Woodhouse. Keats wrote to his friend Sarah Jeffrey, he thing I have most enjoyed this year has been writing an ode to Indolence, despite this enjoyment, however, he was not entirely satisfied with Ode on Indolence, and it remained unpublished until 1848. Keatss notes and papers do not reveal the precise dating of the 1819 odes, literary scholars have proposed several different orders of composition, arguing that the poems form a sequence within their structures. In The Consecrated Urn, Bernard Blackstone observes that Indolence has been thought the first, second. Nevertheless, he argues that Ode on Indolence was probably composed last, Ode on Indolence relies on ten line stanzas with a rhyme scheme that begins with a Shakespearian quatrain and ends with a Miltonic sestet. This pattern is used in Ode on Melancholy, Ode to a Nightingale and Ode on a Grecian Urn, which further unifies the poems in their structure in addition to their themes. The poem contains a complicated use of assonance, as evident in line 19, O why did ye not melt, and leave my sense, where the pairs ye/leave and melt/sense share vowel sounds. A more disorganized use of assonance appears in line 31, A third time passd they by, and, passing, turnd, in which the pairs third/turnd, time/by, and passd/passing share vowel sounds
21.
Ode on Melancholy
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Ode on Melancholy is one of five odes composed by English poet John Keats in the spring of 1819, along with Ode on a Grecian Urn, Ode to a Nightingale, Ode on Indolence, and Ode to Psyche. While studying at Enfield, Keats attempted to gain a knowledge of Grecian art from translations of Tooke’s Pantheon, Lemprieres Classical Dictionary, although Keats attempted to learn Ancient Greek, the majority of his understanding of Grecian mythology came from the translations into English. Unlike the speaker of Ode on a Grecian Urn, Ode to a Nightingale, and Ode to Psyche, the speaker of Ode on Melancholy speaks directly to the reader rather than to an object or an emotion. With only three stanzas, the poem is the shortest of the odes Keats wrote in 1819, however, according to Harold Bloom, one can presume that the “harmony was threatened if fully half of was concerned with the useless quest after “The Melancholy”. Despite its adjusted length, Keats thought the poem to be of a higher quality than Ode on Indolence, Ode on Melancholy consists of three stanzas with ten lines each. As with Ode on a Grecian Urn, Ode on Indolence, the general meter of the poem is iambic pentameter. Keats himself fails to appear in the poem, which creates what Andrew Bennett describes as a separation between the author, the poet, and the reader. The use of the “droop-headed flowers” to describe the onset of an ill-temper, according to Bloom, but Thomas McFarland, while acknowledging the importance of the original first stanza to Keatss endeavor, openly praises the removal of the lines as an act of what he calls compression. McFarland believes that the poems strength lies in its ability to avoid the Seemingly endless wordage of Endymion and lets the final stanza push the main themes on its own. The words “burst Joy’s Grape” in line 28 lead Daniel Brass to state, The height of the joy, the moment when the world can improve no further, is both the end of joy and the beginning of melancholy. In The Masks of Keats, Thomas McFarland suggests that Keatss beautiful words and he too writes that the images of the bursting grape and the globèd peonies show an intention by the poet to bring the subject of sexuality into the discussion on melancholy
22.
To Autumn
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To Autumn is a poem by English Romantic poet John Keats. The work was composed on 19 September 1819 and published in 1820 in a volume of Keatss poetry that included Lamia, to Autumn is the final work in a group of poems known as Keatss 1819 odes. Although personal problems left him time to devote to poetry in 1819. The work marks the end of his career, as he needed to earn money. A little over a following the publication of To Autumn. The poem has three eleven-line stanzas which describe a progression through the season, from the maturation of the crops to the harvest. The imagery is richly achieved through the personification of Autumn, and it has parallels in the work of English landscape artists, with Keats himself describing the fields of stubble that he saw on his walk as being like that in a painting. One of the most anthologised English lyric poems, To Autumn has been regarded by critics as one of the most perfect poems in the English language. During the spring of 1819, Keats wrote many of his odes, Ode on a Grecian Urn, Ode on Indolence, Ode on Melancholy, Ode to a Nightingale. In his free time he read works as varied as Robert Burtons Anatomy of Melancholy, Thomas Chattertons poetry. Despite these distractions, on 19 September 1819 he found time to write To Autumn, the poem marks the final moment of his career as a poet. No longer able to afford to devote his time to the composition of poems, Keatss declining health and personal responsibilities also raised obstacles to his continuing poetic efforts. On 19 September 1819, Keats walked near Winchester along the River Itchen, not everything on Keatss mind at the time was bright, the poet knew in September that he would have to finally abandon Hyperion. Thus, in the letter that he wrote to Reynolds, Keats also included a note saying that he abandoned his long poem. Keats did not send To Autumn to Reynolds, but did include the poem within a letter to Richard Woodhouse, Keatss publisher and friend, and dated it on the same day. The poem was revised and included in Keatss 1820 collection of poetry titled Lamia, Isabella, the Eve of St. Agnes, who hath not seen thee oft amid thy store. Where are the songs of Spring, to Autumn describes, in its three stanzas, three different aspects of the season, its fruitfulness, its labour and its ultimate decline. Through the stanzas there is a progression from early autumn to mid autumn, parallel to this, the poem depicts the day turning from morning to afternoon and into dusk
