"Happy is England I could be content!"
Happy is England! I could be content!
To see no other verdure than its own;
To feel no other breezes than are blown
Through its tall woods with high romances blent:
Yet do I sometimes feel a languishment
For skies Italian, and an inward groan
To sit upon an Alp as on a throne,
And half forget what world or worldling meant.
Happy is England, sweet her artless daughters;
Enough their simple loveliness for me,
Enough their whitest arms in silence clinging:
Yet do I often warmly burn to see
Beauties of deeper glance, and hear their singing,
And float with them about the summer waters
_______________
When I set about preparing this blog, I had a simple idea. Having previously asked the question, Who was Keats? I thought that this time, I would focus on the writing process. To that end, I told myself, I would extract from his work, those poems that could be considered autobiographical: in that they would speak of his aspirations, his preparation and application, and of the inevitable trials and tribulations that he had encountered along the way. And together with relevant passages from his letters, I hoped that these poems would be an appropriate measure of his success: If I could achieve a down-to-earth portrayal in verse, I told myself, of Keats's perception of what it was to be a poet, and of what it cost him to succeed, I would consider it success.
Well to that end I had some interesting titles to hand, of which these are a few; and appended to them a sentence or two as to why I thought they might be relevant. Taken together, I was certain that, "O Solitude! if I must with thee dwell!"; and "To one who has been long in city pent", had something to say, not just about Keats's perception of what it was to be a poet, but from where or what poetic inspiration came. As for, "How many bards gild the lapses of time!", this poem seemed to represent not just Keats's appreciation of past poetic influences, but also his awareness of the need to stand apart from these influences, "so as to dwell on the present and the task in hand":
How many bards gild the lapses of time
A few of them have ever been the food
Of my delighted fancy - I could brood
Over their beauties, earthly, or sublime:
And often, when I sit me down to rhyme,
These will in throngs before my mind intrude:
But no disturbance, no disturbance rude
Do they occasion, 'tis a pleasing chime.
So the numbered sounds that evening store;
The songs of birds, the whispering of the leaves,
The voice of waters, the great bell that heaves
With solemn sound, and thousand others more,
That distance of recognizance bereaves,
Made pleasing music; and not wild uproar.
_______________
Moving on, and for now, passing over Sleep and Poetry, and Ode to Psyche, (to the soul), it is worth stopping for a few moments at "O thou whose face hath felt the winter's wind", a poem that I labelled "philosophical". In a letter written in February 1818, Keats, in reflective mood, explained to his friend John Hamilton Reynolds, (himself a writer), how this poem came to be written:
"I was lead into these thoughts my dear Reynolds" [his musings on what constitutes a perfect life in the context of "Poesy"], "by the beauty of the morning operating on a sense of idleness - I have not read any Books - The Morning said I was right - I had no idea but of the morning and the Thrush said I was right - seeming to say:
O thou whose face hath felt the winter's wind;
Whose eye has seen the Snow clouds hung in Mist
And the black-elm tops 'mong the freezing Stars
To thee the spring will be a harvest time--
O thou whose only book has been the light
Of supreme darkness which thou feedest on
Night after night, when Phoebus was away
To thee the Spring shall be a triple morn--
O fret not after knowledge - I have none
And yet my song comes native with the warmth
O fret not after knowledge - I have none
And yet the Evening listens - He who saddens
At thoughts of idleness cannot be idle,
And he's awake who thinks himself asleep.
_______________
Now whatever insights we might gain from these poems, I quickly came to appreciate that my approach was too simplistic. What was essential was that Keats's poetry should be placed in context, a task made difficult, (relying on his poems alone), by Keats's indifference to the age in which he was living, and in particular to that society that existed beyond his narrow circle of friends. So a different approach was needed if I was to accurately convey a sense, not just of the depth and strength of his commitment to the poetic craft, but also, something of the influences that shaped him, and identified him, as being among that group of poets known as The Romantics.
Now in the context of understanding Keats's detachment from the wider society, (and his need, at times, to separate himself from his closest friends), we must remember that Keats was a sensual being, something readily apparent here, where in reassuring Fanny Brawne he conveys something of the pain that he has endured in separating himself from her. The letter was written at Winchester, in August 1819:
"Forgive me for this Flint-worded Letter - and believe and see that I cannot think of you without some sort of energy - though mal a propos - even as I leave off - it seems to me that even a few more moments thought of you would uncrystallize and dissolve me - I must not give way to it - but turn to my writing again - If I fail I shall die hard - O my love, your lips are growing sweet again to my fancy - I must forget them - ..."
Now in this context of separateness and commitment to poetry, and in consideration of the influences that were at work, and the price paid by Keats's in striving for his ideal, there is much to be gained in retracing our steps back to April 1817, and following Keats form Carisbrooke on the Isle of Wight, to Margate, and from there to Canterbury, and Oxford, and back to Hampstead, as he worked on his epic poem Endymion; a work that in my previous blog I described as: "a benchmark for Keats: a quite deliberate test of his ability, in the future, to write extensively and with imagination." And in this journey he was not alone, for as he went from place to place, he was forever in the shadow of those literary greats who were to be such an important influence in his life: Chaucer, Spenser, Shakespeare, Milton, and Wordsworth; and as we go, we will get some understanding of what it was, for Keats, to be a poet.
At Carisbrooke he is in ebullient mood and creating an environment that is conducive to work. He has the works of Shakespeare and Spencer to hand, and has put up pictures of Haydon, Mary Queen of Scots, and Milton with his daughters, and he is bubbling with enthusiasm:
"I find that I cannot exist without poetry", he tells Reynolds, " - without eternal poetry - half the day will not do the whole of it - I begin with a little, but habit has made me a Leviathan - I had become all a Tremble from not having written anything of late - the Sonnet over leaf did me some good I slept the better last night for it".
It was, On The Sea, and was one of only a handful of poems that he wrote in the eight months that it took him to complete Endymion:
It keeps eternal whisperings around
Desolate shores, and with its mighty swell
Gluts twice ten thousand Caverns; till the spell
Of Hecate leaves them their old shadowy sound.
Often 'tis in such gentle temper found
That scarcely will the very smallest shell
Be moved for days from whence it sometime fell
When last the winds of Heaven were unbound
O ye who have your eyeballs vext and tir'd
Feast them upon the wideness of the Sea
O ye whose Ears are dimmed with uproar rude.
Or feed too much with cloying melody--
Sit ye near some old Cavern's Mouth and brood
Until ye start as if the Sea Nymphs quired--
_______________
At Margate, in May, he wrote to Leigh Hunt, friend and editor of the Examiner, in which his first poem was published, and to Benjamin Haydon, also a friend and historical painter, and to his publishers John Taylor and James Augustus Hessey. These letters are interesting for what they reveal about the cost, as he struggled with Endymion: his anxieties and self-doubt. And it is apparent from the letter to Haydon, that apart from his influence on Keats in respect of art and culture, more broadly, he fulfilled the role of mentor:
To Hunt:
"I vow that I have been down in the Mouth lately, at this work. [Endymion] These last two days however I have felt more confident - I have asked myself so often why I should be a poet more than other Men - seeing how great a thing it is - how much great things are to be gained by it - What a thing to be in the Mouth of Fame - that at last the idea has grown so monstrously beyond my seeming power of attainment that the other day I nearly consented with myself to drop into a Phaeton - yet 'tis a disgrace to fail even in a large attempt, and at this moment I drive the thought from me. I began my Poem about a Fortnight since and have done some every day except travelling ones - Perhaps I have done a good deal for the time but it appears such a Pin's point to me that I will not copy any out...."
And Haydon:
"I suppose by your telling me not to give way to forbodings George has mentioned to you what I have lately said in my Letters to him - truth is I have been in such a state of Mind as to read over my Lines and hate them. I am "one that gathers Samphire dreadful trade" the Cliff of Poesy Towers above me-...I read and write about eight hours a day. There is an old saying "well begun is half done" 't is a bad one. I would use instead - Not begun at all "till half done" so according to that I have not begun my Poem and consequently (a priori) can say nothing about it."
Then, and in the context of what he saw as Leigh Hunt's "self delusions" in respect of poetry, he wrote:
"There is no greater sin after the 7 deadly than to flatter onself into an idea of being a great Poet - or one of those beings who are privileged to wear out their Lives in the pursuit of Honor -how comfortable a feel it is that such a Crime must bring its heavy Penalty? That if one be a Selfdeluder accounts will be balanced."
And Taylor and Hessey:
"I went day by day at my Poem for a month at the end of which time the other day I found my Brain so overwrought that I had neither Rhyme nor reason in it - so was obliged to give up for a few days - I hope soon to be able to resume my Work - I have endeavoured to do so once or twice but to no Purpose - Instead of Poetry I have swimming in my head - and feel all the effects of a Mental Debauch - lowness of Spirits - anxiety to go on without the power to do so which does not at all tend to my ultimate Progression - However tomorrow I will begin my next Month - This evening I go to Canterbury - having got tired of Margate - I was not right in my head when I came - At Canty [Canterbury] I hope the remembrance of Chaucer will set me forward like a Billiard-ball."
But even in these troubled times, Keats was capable of lightness of touch, as in this moving ending to his letter to Hessey:
"So now in the name of Shakespeare, Raphael and all our Saints I commend you to the care of Heaven!"
Shakespeare, an ever present influence and quoted in his letters, was the inspiration for his sonnet, On The Sea. And when the lady of the house at Carisbrooke, where he was staying, insisted that he take with him the bust of Shakespeare that adorned the passage, it prompted this discussion on destiny, with Haydon:
"I remember you saying that you had notions of a good Genius presiding over you - I have of late had the same thought, for things which [I] do half at Random are afterwards confirmed by my judgement in a dozen features of Propriety - Is it too daring to fancy Shakespeare this Provider? When in the Isle of Wight I met with a Shakespeare in the Passage of the house at which I lodged - it comes nearer to my idea of him than any I have seen - I was but there a Week yet the old Woman made me take it with me though I went off in a hurry - Do you not think this is ominous of good? ..."
Now when reading Keats, I am conscious of the maxim that, "a little knowledge is a dangerous thing", something brought home to me with force, when I read this, another of those few poems that Keats wrote while working on Endymion.
Unfelt, unheard, unseen,
I've left my little queen,
Her languid arms in silver slumber lying:
Ah! through their nestling touch,
Who--who could tell how much
There is for madness--cruel, or complying?
Those faery lids how sleek"
Those lips how moist!--they speak,
In ripest quiet, shadows of sweet sounds:
Into my fancy's ear
Melting a burden dear
How "Love doth know no fullness nor no bounds."
True!--tender monitors!
I bend unto your laws:
This sweetest day for dalliance was born!
So without more ado,
I'll feel my heaven anew,
For all the blushing of the hasty morn.
_______________
When I first read this poem I felt certain that it was written for Fanny Brawne, until it occurred to me, that at this point they hadn't met. So for guidance I turned to the "experts". One tells me:
"Date uncertain, but written before the 17 August 1817. Published 1848."
While another, by far the most substantial commentary that I have to hand, says:
"Probably written early summer 1817 with the preceding poem ["You say you love"] and certainly before the 17 August 1817..." And going to the headnote for the poem in question, Miriam Allott, whose notes these are, links this poem to Keats's meeting a, "Mrs. Isabella Jones at Hastings May-June 1817" and suggests a link between this poem and the "Elizabethan poem, A Proper Wooing Song." Which goes to reinforce the point, that for a proper understanding of the depth of Keats commitment to poetry, and the influences at work in it, we simply have to consult the "experts". But for now I want to leave you with this, a lengthy quotation from Keats's letter to Benjamin Bailey, dated 8 October 1817, and written from Hampstead. Endymion is nearing completion and here he is quoting from a letter that he wrote to his brother George in the spring; and if you have the time, and inclination, between this and my next blog on the subject of Keats, there is plenty here to chew on:
""As to what you say about my being a poet, I retu[r]n no answer but by saying that the high idea I have of poetical fame makes me think I see it towering to high above me. At any rate I have no right to talk until Endymion is finished - it will be a test, a trial of my Powers of Imagination and chiefly of my invention which is a rare thing indeed - by which I must make 4000 Lines of one bare circumstance and fill them with Poetry, and when I consider that this is a great task, and that when it is done it will take me but a dozen paces towards the Temple of Fame - it makes me say - God forbid that I should be without such a task! I have heard Hunt say and may be asked - Why endeavour after a long Poem? To which I should answer - Do not the lovers of Poetry like to have a little Region to wander in where they may pick and choose, and in which the images are so numerous that many are forgotten and new in a second Reading: Which may be food for a week's stroll in Summer? Do not they like this better than what they can read through before Mrs. Williams comes down stairs? A Morning work at most. Besides a long Poem is a test of invention which I take to be the Polar Star of Poetry, as Fancy is the Sails, and Imagination the Rudder. Did our great Poets ever write short Pieces? I mean the shape of Tales - This same invention seems i[n]deed of late Years to have been forgotten as a Poetical excellence. But enough of this, I put on no Laurels till I shall have finished Endymion, and I hope Apollo is [not] angered at my having made a mockery at him at At Hunts"". To which he adds, significantly, ""I refused to visit Shelley, that I might have my own unfettered scope.""
________________© Cormac McCloskey
Sources:
From my notes: "so as to dwell on the present and the task in hand":
Letters of John Keats
Oxford Letters & Memoirs
Editor, Robert Gittings
ISBN 0-18-281081-2 (1990)
John Keats: The Complete Poems
Penguin Classics
Editor, John Barnard
ISBN (Not given) (1988)
Keats: The Complete Poems
Editor, Miriam Allott
Longman (1995)
ISBN 0-582-48457--X
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