John Keats

Keats was supposedly into a relationship with Isabella Jones, who he drew inspiration from for many of his works. A talented and beautiful female, he first met her while holidaying in the village of Bo Peep, near Hastings.

In 1818, while nursing his younger brother Tom, Keats first met Fanny Brawne. The two developed an intimacy towards each other, which resulted in Brawne shifting to the other half of Dilke's Wentworth Place in April of 1819.

The two started spending considerable time together. It is also argued that Keats gave Fanny Brawne a love sonnet, ‘Bright Star’, which was half done as a declaration of his love to her.

Born to Thomas and Frances Jennings Keats, John Keats was the eldest of the five children of the couple, one of whom died in infancy.

Baptized at St Botolph-without-Bishopsgate, Keats attained much of his primary education from a local dame school. Since his father worked as a livery stable-keeper, Keats had a very humble income to fall back upon.

Unable to afford Eton or Harrow, young Keats’ enrolled himself at the John Clarke's school in Enfield in 1803. Though the school was much smaller than and not as flamboyant as other larger, prestigious schools, it nevertheless had a liberal outlook and a progressive curriculum more modern than most others.

It was during his years at Clarke that Keats was exposed to classics and history, which he seemed to show a penchant for and which remained with him till the end of his life.

Meanwhile, Keats befriended Charles Cowden Clarke, his headmaster's son, who served as the mentor for him and introduced Keats to Renaissance literature, including Tasso, Spenser, and Chapman's translations.

Keats left Clarke’s school and found himself an employment with Thomas Hammond, a surgeon and apothecary, as an apprentice. Upon completing his apprenticeship, he eventually studied medicine at a London hospital.

Within a month, Keats started assisting surgeons in operation. He had a distinctive aptitude for medicine which led everyone, including his family and himself, to believe that he would became a doctor one fine day. The long training brought with it greater responsibility and bigger workload for Keats

Destiny seemed to have other plans for Keats, who was uncertain about his career in medicine and seemed to be more and more fascinated and devoted to literature and arts. He wrote his first ever poem in 1814, titled ‘An Imitation to Spenser’, after being inspired from fellow poets, Leigh Hunt and Lord Byron.

Unwillingly, Keats continued his studies and eventually received his apothecary license in 1816, which made him eligible to practice as an apothecary, physician and surgeon. However, adhering to the voice of his heart and following his true calling, he resolved to be a poet and not a surgeon.

Keats continued his training at Hospital but devoted most of his time in the study of literature. He started experimenting with verse forms, particularly that of sonnets.

It was in 1816 that Leigh Hunt agreed to publish Keats work, ‘O Solitude’, which was a sonnet, in his magazine, ‘The Examiner’. This marked Keats entry into the world of literature as it was the first ever work of Keats to be published. In the following years, Hunt played an influential role in the life of Keats and directed the latter’s course of writing.

Impressed by the success of his first ever literary work, Keats was inspired to write. To take forward his ambition and true calling, Keats started penning ‘Calidore’, while he was holidaying with Clarke on the seaside town of Margate.

October 1816 witnessed the publication of the first volume of Keats's verse, Poems. Though the book met with little critical success, Keats was unwilling to cede to the failure and started working on his next volume.

It was during this time that Keats befriended Woodhouse who recognized the potential of Keats as a poet and writer. He advised Keats on legal and literary matters and remained one of the confidantes of the latter till the end.

Keats next work was an essay titled, ‘Three Young Poets’ and sonnet ‘On First Looking into Chapman’s Homer’. Published by Hunt, the work opened the doors of the literary giants for Keats, who was introduced to the who’s who of the literary world, including Thomas Barnes (Times editor), Charles Lamb (writer), Vincent Novello (conductor), John Hamilton Reynolds (poet) and William Hazlitt, a powerful literary figure.