Letters of John Keats to His Family and Friends
If Reynolds calls tell him three lines will be acceptable, for I am squat
at Hampstead.
XXX.--TO GEORGE AND THOMAS KEATS.
[Hampstead,] Friday 23d January [1818].
My dear Brothers--I was thinking what hindered me from writing so long,
for I have so many things to say to you, and know not where to begin. It
shall be upon a thing most interesting to you, my Poem. Well! I have given
the first Book to Taylor; he seemed more than satisfied with it, and to my
surprise proposed publishing it in Quarto if Haydon would make a drawing
of some event therein, for a Frontispiece. I called on Haydon, he said he
would do anything I liked, but said he would rather paint a finished
picture, from it, which he seems eager to do; this in a year or two will
be a glorious thing for us; and it will be, for Haydon is struck with the
1st Book. I left Haydon and the next day received a letter from him,
proposing to make, as he says, with all his might, a finished chalk sketch
of my head, to be engraved in the first style and put at the head of my
Poem, saying at the same time he had never done the thing for any human
being, and that it must have considerable effect as he will put his name
to it--I begin to-day to copy my 2nd Book--"thus far into the bowels of
the land"--You shall hear whether it will be Quarto or non Quarto, picture
or non picture. Leigh Hunt I showed my 1st Book to--he allows it not much
merit as a whole; says it is unnatural and made ten objections to it in
the mere skimming over. He says the conversation is unnatural and too
high-flown for Brother and Sister--says it should be simple forgetting do
ye mind that they are both overshadowed by a supernatural Power, and of
force could not speak like Francesca in the Rimini. He must first prove
that Caliban's poetry is unnatural--This with me completely overturns his
objections--the fact is he and Shelley are hurt, and perhaps justly, at my
not having showed them the affair officiously and from several hints I
have had they appear much disposed to dissect and anatomise any trip or
slip I may have made.--But who's afraid? Ay! Tom! Demme if I am. I went
last Tuesday, an hour too late, to Hazlitt's Lecture on poetry, got there
just as they were coming out, when all these pounced upon me. Hazlitt,
John Hunt and Son, Wells, Bewick, all the Landseers, Bob Harris, aye and
more--the Landseers enquired after you particularly--I know not whether
Wordsworth has left town--But Sunday I dined with Hazlitt and Haydon, also
that I took Haslam with me--I dined with Brown lately. Dilke having taken
the Champion Theatricals was obliged to be in town--Fanny has returned to
Walthamstow.--Mr. Abbey appeared very glum, the last time I went to see
her, and said in an indirect way, that I had no business there--Rice has
been ill, but has been mending much lately--
I think a little change has taken place in my intellect lately--I cannot
bear to be uninterested or unemployed, I, who for so long a time have been
addicted to passiveness. Nothing is finer for the purposes of great
productions than a very gradual ripening of the intellectual powers. As an
instance of this--observe--I sat down yesterday to read King Lear once
again: the thing appeared to demand the prologue of a sonnet, I wrote it,
and began to read--(I know you would like to see it.)
ON SITTING DOWN TO KING LEAR ONCE AGAIN.
O golden-tongued Romance with serene Lute!
Fair-plumed Syren, Queen of far-away!
Leave melodising on this wintry day,
Shut up thine olden volume and be mute.
Adieu! for once again the fierce dispute
Betwixt Hell torment and impassion'd Clay
Must I burn through; once more assay
The bitter sweet of this Shakspearian fruit.
Chief Poet! and ye clouds of Albion,
Begetters of our deep eternal theme,
When I am through the old oak forest gone
Let me not wander in a barren dream,
But, when I am consumed with the Fire,
Give me new Phoenix-wings to fly at my desire.
So you see I am getting at it, with a sort of determination and strength,
though verily I do not feel it at this moment--this is my fourth letter
this morning, and I feel rather tired, and my head rather swimming--so I
will leave it open till to-morrow's post.--
I am in the habit of taking my papers to Dilke's and copying there; so I
chat and proceed at the same time. I have been there at my work this
evening, and the walk over the Heath takes off all sleep, so I will even
proceed with you. I left off short in my last just as I began an account
of a private theatrical--Well it was of the lowest order, all greasy and
oily, insomuch that if they had lived in olden times, when signs were hung
over the doors, the only appropriate one for that oily place would have
been--a guttered Candle. They played John Bull, The Review, and it was to
conclude with Bombastes Furioso--I saw from a Box the first Act of John
Bull, then went to Drury and did not return till it was over--when by
Wells's interest we got behind the scenes--there was not a yard wide all
the way round for actors, scene-shifters, and interlopers to move in--for
'Nota Bene' the Green Room was under the stage, and there was I threatened
over and over again to be turned out by the oily scene-shifters, there did
I hear a little painted Trollop own, very candidly, that she had failed
in Mary, with a "damn'd if she'd play a serious part again, as long as she
lived," and at the same time she was habited as the Quaker in the
Review.--There was a quarrel, and a fat good-natured looking girl in
soldiers' clothes wished she had only been a man for Tom's sake. One
fellow began a song, but an unlucky finger-point from the Gallery sent him
off like a shot. One chap was dressed to kill for the King in Bombastes,
and he stood at the edge of the scene in the very sweat of anxiety to show
himself, but Alas the thing was not played. The sweetest morsel of the
night moreover was, that the musicians began pegging and fagging away--at
an overture--never did you see faces more in earnest, three times did they
play it over, dropping all kinds of corrections and still did not the
curtain go up. Well then they went into a country dance, then into a
region they well knew, into the old boonsome Pothouse, and then to see how
pompous o' the sudden they turned; how they looked about and chatted; how
they did not care a damn; was a great treat----
I hope I have not tired you by this filling up of the dash in my last.
Constable the bookseller has offered Reynolds ten guineas a sheet to write
for his Magazine--it is an Edinburgh one, which Blackwood's started up in
opposition to. Hunt said he was nearly sure that the 'Cockney School' was
written by Scott[44] so you are right Tom!--There are no more little bits
of news I can remember at present.
I remain, My dear Brothers, Your very affectionate Brother
JOHN.
XXXI.--TO BENJAMIN BAILEY.
[Hampstead,] Friday Jan{y.} 23 [1818].
My dear Bailey--Twelve days have pass'd since your last reached me.--What
has gone through the myriads of human minds since the 12th? We talk of the
immense Number of Books, the Volumes ranged thousands by thousands--but
perhaps more goes through the human intelligence in Twelve days than ever
was written.--_How has that unfortunate family lived through the twelve?_
One saying of yours I shall never forget--you may not recollect it--it
being perhaps said when you were looking on the Surface and seeming of
Humanity alone, without a thought of the past or the future--or the deeps
of good and evil--you were at that moment estranged from speculation, and
I think you have arguments ready for the Man who would utter it to
you--this is a formidable preface for a simple thing--merely you said,
"_Why should woman suffer?_" Aye, why should she? "By heavens I'd coin my
very Soul, and drop my Blood for Drachmas!" These things are, and he, who
feels how incompetent the most skyey Knight-errantry is to heal this
bruised fairness, is like a sensitive leaf on the hot hand of
thought.--Your tearing, my dear friend, a spiritless and gloomy letter up,
to re-write to me, is what I shall never forget--it was to me a real
thing--Things have happened lately of great perplexity--you must have
heard of them--Reynolds and Haydon retorting and recriminating--and
parting for ever--the same thing has happened between Haydon and Hunt. It
is unfortunate--Men should bear with each other: there lives not the Man
who may not be cut up, aye Lashed to pieces on his weakest side. The best
of Men have but a portion of good in them--a kind of spiritual yeast in
their frames, which creates the ferment of existence--by which a Man is
propelled to act, and strive, and buffet with Circumstance. The sure way,
Bailey, is first to know a Man's faults, and then be passive--if after
that he insensibly draws you towards him then you have no power to break
the link. Before I felt interested in either Reynolds or Haydon, I was
well read in their faults; yet, knowing them, I have been cementing
gradually with both. I have an affection for them both, for reasons almost
opposite--and to both must I of necessity cling, supported always by the
hope that, when a little time, a few years, shall have tried me more fully
in their esteem, I may be able to bring them together. The time must come,
because they have both hearts: and they will recollect the best parts of
each other, when this gust is overblown.--I had a message from you through
a letter to Jane--I think, about Cripps--there can be no idea of binding
until a sufficient sum is sure for him--and even then the thing should be
maturely considered by all his helpers--I shall try my luck upon as many
fat purses as I can meet with.--Cripps is improving very fast: I have the
greater hopes of him because he is so slow in development. A Man of great
executing powers at 20, with a look and a speech almost stupid, is sure to
do something.
I have just looked through the Second Side of your Letter--I feel a great
content at it.--I was at Hunt's the other day, and he surprised me with a
real authenticated lock of _Milton's Hair_. I know you would like what I
wrote thereon, so here it is--_as they say of a Sheep in a Nursery
Book_:--
ON SEEING A LOCK OF MILTON'S HAIR.
Chief of Organic Numbers!
Old Scholar of the Spheres!
Thy spirit never slumbers,
But rolls about our ears
For ever, and for ever!
O what a mad endeavour
Worketh he,
Who to thy sacred and ennobled hearse
Would offer a burnt sacrifice of verse
And melody.
How heavenward thou soundest,
Live Temple of sweet noise,
And Discord unconfoundest,
Giving Delight new joys,
And Pleasure nobler pinions!
O, where are thy dominions?
Lend thine ear
To a young Delian oath,--aye, by thy soul,
By all that from thy mortal lips did roll,
And by the kernel of thine earthly love,
Beauty, in things on earth, and things above,
I swear!
When every childish fashion
Has vanish'd from my rhyme,
Will I, gray-gone in passion,
Leave to an after-time,
Hymning and harmony
Of thee, and of thy works, and of thy life;
But vain is now the burning and the strife,
Pangs are in vain, until I grow high-rife
With old Philosophy,
And mad with glimpses of futurity!
For many years my offering must be hush'd;
When I do speak, I'll think upon this hour,
Because I feel my forehead hot and flush'd,
Even at the simplest vassal of thy power,--
A lock of thy bright hair,--
Sudden it came,
And I was startled, when I caught thy name
Coupled so unaware;
Yet, at the moment, temperate was my blood.
I thought I had beheld it from the flood.