Life of John Keats: His Life and Poetry, His Friends, Critics and After-FameColvin, Sidney
General
Life of John Keats: His Life and Poetry, His Friends, Critics and After-Fame
Colvin, Sidney
Keats, John, 1795-1821; Poets, English -- 19th century -- Biography
Not long after Keats had been put to school he lost his father, whose
horse fell and threw him in the City Road as he rode home late one night
after dining at Southgate, perhaps on his way home from the Enfield
School. His skull was fractured: he was picked up unconscious about one
o'clock and died at eight in the morning. This was on the 16th of April,
1804. Within twelve months his widow had taken a second husband--one
William Rawlings, described as 'of Moorgate in the city of London,
stable-keeper,' presumably therefore the successor of her first husband
in the management of her father's business. (It may be noted
incidentally that Rawlings, like Jennings, is a name common in Cornwall,
especially in and about the parish of Madron). This marriage must have
turned out unhappily, for it was soon followed by a separation, under
what circumstances or through whose fault we are not told. In the
correspondence of the Keats brothers after they were grown up no mention
is ever made of their stepfather, of whom the family seem soon to have
lost all knowledge. Mrs Rawlings went with her children to live at
Edmonton, in the house of her mother, Mrs Jennings, who was just about
this time left a widow. The family was well enough provided for, Mr
Jennings (who died March 8, 1805) having left a fortune of over L13,000,
of which, in addition to other legacies, he bequeathed a capital
yielding L200 a year to his widow absolutely; one yielding L50 a year to
his daughter Frances Rawlings, with reversion to her Keats children
after her death; and L1000 to be separately held in trust for the said
children and divided among them on the coming of age of the youngest.
Between the home, then, in Church Street, Edmonton, and the neighbouring
Enfield school, where the two elder brothers were in due time joined by
the youngest, the next five years of Keats's boyhood (1806-1811) were
passed in sufficient comfort and pleasantness. He did not live to attain
the years, or the success, of men who write their reminiscences; and
almost the only recollections he has left of his own early days refer to
holiday times in his grandmother's house at Edmonton. They are conveyed
in some rimes which he wrote years afterwards by way of foolishness to
amuse his young sister, and testify to a partiality, common also to
little boys not of genius, for dabbling by the brookside and keeping
small fishes in tubs,--
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Life of John Keats: His Life and Poetry, His Friends, Critics and After-Fame — John Shaqi
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