Guest Post: His Name was Writ in Water – A Profile of John Keats

The following is a guest post from Steve Graubart, of ArtSpock, about the enigmatic English poet John Keats.

John Keats, born in Finsbury Pavement (near London) in1795, may be the greatest poet who ever lived. I am not alone in this view. Humanities scholars, poetry anthologies and literary journals all recognize him as one of the leading lions of world poesy. Keats weaves love, nature, myth, and history into sonnets, couplets, and other forms; each type of poem perfectly suited to its subject matter. Whether a lengthy epic, or a shorter piece, Keats mastered both styles with equal aplomb.  He wrote most of his major poems from 1817 to 1820, a three-year span that changed the face of Romantic lyric verse..

Much is known about Keat’s personal life. He wrote hundreds of letters to friends and family members that have survived intact to the present day. The Selected Letters of John Keats is itself regarded as a major literary work. These missives give great insight into his values and passions, and it is fascinating to see how a great poet expresses himself in letters.

At times, things could get contentious. Sometimes it was friends calling into question some incident or behavior. Other times, he became a lightning rod in literary squabbles, the target of jealous peers or obstinate publishers. He vigorously responded to personal attacks in the only way he knew—head on. A fine-tuned, sensitive imagination did not preclude him from vigorous debate, or even fisticuffs.

Keat’s literary achievements extend beyond the poems. He formulated a philosophical concept, Negative Capability, which marked his poetry and has reverberated powerfully throughout the arts. In a December, 1817 letter to his brothers George and Tom Keats, he explained Negative Capability as the ability of a person to resist the temptation to overreach in defining mysteries, to be capable of being in uncertainties, Mysteries and doubts without irritable reaching after fact and reason. He believed that many mysterious aspects of the world should retain their special status as questions, and that any coarse attempt to quantify or extensively explain them was not only bad form, but fruitless as well. He admired Shakespeare for this quality and thought Coleridge lacking in this regard.

The following poem, Ode on a Grecian Urn, illustrates Keat’s extraordinary talent to elicit deep emotion and empathy, even from static characters painted on a clay water container.

Thou still unravish’d bride of quietness,
Thou foster-child of silence and slow time,
Sylvan historian, who canst thou express
A flowery tale more sweetly than our rhyme:
What leaf-fring’d legend haunt about thy shape
Of deities or mortals, or of both,
In Tempe or the dales of Arcady?
What men or gods are these? What maidens loth?
What mad pursuit? What struggle to escape?
What pipes and timbrels? What wild ecstasy?
Heard melodies are sweet, but those unheard
Are sweeter: therefore, ye soft pipes, play on;
Not to the sensual ear, but, more endear’d,
Pipe to the spirit ditties of no tone:
Fair youth, beneath the trees, thou canst not leave
Thy song, nor ever can those trees be bare;
Bold lover, never, never canst thou kiss,
Though winning near the goal – yet, do not grieve;
She cannot fade, though thou hast not thy bliss,
For ever wilt thou love, and she be fair!
Ah, happy, happy boughs! that cannot shed
Your leaves, nor ever bid the spring adieu;
And, happy melodist, unwearied,
For ever piping songs for ever new;
More happy love! more happy, happy love!
For ever warm and still to be enjoy’d,
For ever panting, and for ever young;
All breathing human passion far above,
That leaves a heart high-sorrowful and cloy’d,
A burning forehead, and a parching tongue.
Who are these coming to the sacrifice?
To what green altar, O mysterious priest,
Lead’st thou that heifer lowing at the skies,
And all her silken flanks with garlands drest?
What little town by river or sea shore,
Or mountain-built with peaceful citadel,
Is emptied of this folk, this pious morn?
And, little town, thy streets for evermore
Will silent be; and not a soul to tell
Why thou art desolate, can e’er return.
O Attic shape! Fair attitude! with brede
Of marble men and maidens overwrought,
With forest branches and the trodden weed;
Thou, silent form, dost tease us out of thought
As doth eternity: Cold Pastoral!
When old age shall this generation waste,
Thou shalt remain, in midst of other woe
Than ours, a friend to man, to whom thou say’st,
“Beauty is truth, truth beauty,” – that is all
Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.

Jane Campion’s outstanding new film, Bright Star, portrays the love story of Keats and Fanny Brawne. Their love, and his life, was cut short by tuberculosis in 1921. His gravestone bears the epitaph “Here lies One Whose Name was writ in Water,” below a lyre with broken strings.

About the Author: Steve Graubart is a web-marketing writer and magazine journalist in financial services, K-12 education and builder/design industries. He is the host of ArtSpock, a blog dedicated to literary, visual, music and media arts, and is based in Chicago.