Thrilled to find this site.

[Raphael]

Thanks for sharing your experiences and welcome to the forum.

[BrokenLyre]

It's great to hear the experiences of a new person on the Forum. Welcome.
Ahhh Hampstead...will I ever get the chance to go? I was so close when i visited London 10 years ago or so...but I was with a group and we had little time...so close yet so far from Hampstead. Kills me now.

[Keats9264]

Thanks. I was about 25 when I was in Hampstead, I was a return student to college. So that was about 20 years ago! I remember it fondly, but wish I could have seen it after it was restored!

I was lucky to be able to break away from my "group" for a few times and go off on my own. That is around the time I discovered my fear of heights as I sat for an hour on a lion in Trafalgar Square trying to figure out why I couldn't get down. Got kinda sore!

I had e-mailed the House asking about what was currently in their gardens. A lady replied that they are plants/flowers appropriate to the time he lived, but wouldn't give me specifics.

I see they are having a House Detective event there for families to come and find "mystery objects" on August 3rd. Hmm. Wonder what exactly that means.

Many more activities than when I was there!

[Malia]

Keats9264--I first visited Keats House when I was a student back in 1995 and I was fortunate enough to also see it last November fresh from its restoration. There are definite differences, but for the most part they are all positive changes. Back in '95, the place was literally falling apart and we only had limited access to the upstairs because the supports in the floor were so weak. We weren't allowed into Keats's bedroom and we had no access at all to Fanny's side of the house upstairs. Is that how it was when you visited?
Now, much more of Fanny's side is open and you can walk into Keats's bedroom and have a good look around. The only downside to the restoration is that they've removed pretty much all of the manuscripts. There are no original letters or poetical manuscripts on display as there were back in '95, which is sad . . . but they told me it was necessary in order to preserve the documents. So, I suppose I'm OK with it for that reason

[Raphael]

What is on display Malia?

[Keats9264]

Yes, parts of the upstairs were not accessible and parts of Fanny's side when I was there. The manuscripts and documents in the display cases were some of the best part to me. Fanny's (Johns) ring and some of her personal effects were in a vertical display case in the front room. I copied down some of the manuscripts in the other room, which also had his death mask. That poem about his dying in Rome was in there ("piazza steps"....etc.) in it's original writing. Darn I can't think of it, or who wrote it, I'll have to look at my journal. It inspired me to write a poem at the time as well. I'll have to dig out my London journal and post again!

[Keats9264]

btw, I recently re-read Keats and The Bostonians. Back when I visited the house, I still had a sour view of Fanny until I bought his complete book of letters and also Keats and The Bostonians. It explains how Americans helped preserve Keats legacy, more than the English did, as well as unearth the deeper nuances of Keats and Fanny's relationship.

[Raphael]

Have you read Fanny's letters to Miss Keats? It's obvious from reading them how much she loved John Keats.

[Cybele]

btw, I recently re-read Keats and The Bostonians. Back when I visited the house, I still had a sour view of Fanny until I bought his complete book of letters and also Keats and The Bostonians. It explains how Americans helped preserve Keats legacy, more than the English did, as well as unearth the deeper nuances of Keats and Fanny's relationship.

Yay! "Keats and the Bostonians" -- I will be looking for it!
Thanks for the recommendation!

[Cybele]

Have you read Fanny's letters to Miss Keats? It's obvious from reading them how much she loved John Keats.

When one reads Fanny B's letters to Fanny K. it certainly is obvious that she cared very deeply for John.

However, my first encounter with John's letters to Fanny made me a bit uncomfortable, since they were obviously *very personal.* My second reaction was, "Whoa! This boy needs a cold shower!"
They were so passionate and, at times, overwrought I felt sometimes like a voyeur.

[Raphael]

When one reads Fanny B's letters to Fanny K. it certainly is obvious that she cared very deeply for John.

I had tears in my eyes reading them- it was clear that she was writing under some restraint so as to not further upset Miss K, but also I think her inclination to be a bit reserved (outwardly) on how she felt and the restraints placed upon young middle class women back then. We get some signs of her passion when she wrote "I must say loved him best." And "if I am to lose him I lose everything." So he was her everything. That speaks volumes.

However, my first encounter with John's letters to Fanny made me a bit uncomfortable, since they were obviously *very personal.*

I know what you mean- they are so intimate and heartfelt.

My second reaction was, "Whoa! This boy needs a cold shower!"

My reaction was, he needed to make love! And what a sexy young man!

They were so passionate and, at times, overwrought I felt sometimes like a voyeur.

I felt a bit humbled reading them- here was someone who put his whole heart into his letters to his beloved- no matter if he was feeling sad, happy, fustrated, passionate. He would tell her how it was.

[Cybele]

. . . she wrote "I must say loved him best." And "if I am to lose him I lose everything." So he was her everything. That speaks volumes.

It certainly does! There's also the fact that she kept those letters her whole life.

However, my first encounter with John's letters to Fanny made me a bit uncomfortable, since they were obviously *very personal.*

I know what you mean- they are so intimate and heartfelt.

My second reaction was, "Whoa! This boy needs a cold shower!"

My reaction was, he needed to make love! And what a sexy young man!

That, too!
They were two very young people -- with all the hormones and pheromones that go with youth -- who could not act upon the drives that nature programs into us humans.

They were so passionate and, at times, overwrought I felt sometimes like a voyeur.

I felt a bit humbled reading them- here was someone who put his whole heart into his letters to his beloved- no matter if he was feeling sad, happy, fustrated, passionate. He would tell her how it was.

It's not surprising that he felt that his frustration had, at least in part, led to his illness.

[Raphael]

It certainly does! There's also the fact that she kept those letters her whole life.

I wonder if she kept them in a locked box so no-one would see them? I wonder how often she re-read them...
I wonder what finger she wore his ring on? It couldn't have been her engagement finger as Louis Lindo would have wondered whose it was and why she wore an engagement ring. I wonder whose ring she told him it was- he might have asked who she got it from.

My reaction was, he needed to make love! And what a sexy young man!

That, too!

Both or the latter?

They were two very young people -- with all the hormones and pheromones that go with youth -- who could not act upon the drives that nature programs into us humans.

But they weren't allowed to Cybele (except for kissing)...
I know I'm probably thinking as a c.21st woman but if he had been sending me letters like that I think I'd be more than a little profligate...that talk of "moistened and bedewed with pleasures..." I'd want to find out what he was talking about...

It's not surprising that he felt that his frustration had, at least in part, led to his illness.

Well, he wasn't entirely wrong- the stresses he had may have hastened the TB infection- it might have stayed latent if he hadn't been short of money and not selling his poems. Life was so unfair to him.

[Keats9264]

Hey, you know what the weather was like those years because of the volcanoes and everything right? We had had the year of "Eighteen hundred and froze to death" not long before and the weather worldwide had a small window in those years (and during his walking tour of Scotland) that just made everything cold gray and wet. I doubt whether his passions played any role really. I think his poverty, lack of adequate clothing, and miserable weather were all that were needed to aggravate the TB. My great grandmother died in a TB wave that swept Ohio in the 1920s (she was only in her 50's), it's really just hit or miss - just my humble opinion.

[Keats9264]

so...records showed unusual (erratic) weather patterns across Europe after 1816 as well. Weather would not be what they had been used to in their lifetimes, so they often might head out not properly dressed for temperatures they were expecting. I thought this was portrayed well in Bright Star as well. And of course it was during some of these dreary days in 1816 when Mary Shelley and co. were trapped inside writing.