John Keats and the Perils of Posterity

In this talk Nicholas Roe will be introducing his brilliant new book, 'John Keats and the Perils of Posterity', due to be published in September 2025 by Oxford University Press.

Fanny Brawne's words entrusting Keats's reputation to ‘all the friends that time has left him’ are in many ways a keynote for the book. It tells the story of how across the decades Keats, formerly judged 'a by-word of reproach in literature', steadily faced-down set-backs, opposition, and ignorance as the world slowly and belatedly learned to appreciate his poetry. Keats had endeavoured to cancel his name for posterity (‘Here lies one whose name was writ in water’) yet by the end of the nineteenth century he was acknowledged an 'accepted master' of English poetry alongside Chaucer, Spenser, and Milton.

By the centenary of his death his poetry had 'gone global' like Shakespeare. Now celebrated as a Romantic genius, Keats’s poems and letters were gathered in elaborate editions and his life had been repeatedly written by Charles Brown, Leigh Hunt, Richard Monckton Milnes, W. M. Rossetti, and Sidney Colvin. Eagerly collected and as keenly prized, his manuscripts and other items of Keatsiana now commanded thousands of pounds at auction. At Hampstead and Rome his homes were carefully preserved, and his grave in the non-Catholic cemetery had become a destination for literary pilgrims. Yet how did this extraordinary Keatsian transition happen? In this centenary year of Keats House, come along to Nicholas's talk and find out!

Image ALT text: A painting by Joseph Severn, of Keats sitting on Hampstead Heath and listening to a nightingale.

ALT text: The round logo of 'Keats House 100: yours to explore, 1925 – 2025’ along with a silhouette of Keats House, in white on a brown background.

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