A blog from Wordsworth Grasmere exploring the Romantic poets, and the literature and culture of the period. Do get in touch if you'd like to contribute a post
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1819 Byron writes to his publisher "So you want me to undertake what you call a 'great work?' an Epic Poem, I suppose, or some such. I'll try no such thing; I hate tasks"
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1827 Death of William Blake.
"Just before he died his countenance became fair. His eyes brighten'd and he burst out singing of the things he saw in heaven"
He is buried in Bunhill Fields Burial Grounds, London
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1827 Death of William Blake.
"Just before he died his countenance became fair. His eyes brighten'd and he burst out singing of the things he saw in heaven"
He is buried in Bunhill Fields Burial Grounds, London
#OTD
1815, Birth of Ada, Byron's only legitimate child. Ada Lovelace will become a pioneer of computer programming. Byron said of her "I hope the Gods have made her anything save poetical- it is enough to have one such fool in a family". He got his wish...
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1822 Shelley's body is dug up from where it has been buried in the sand for a month and burned on the beach. Afterwards Byron swims a mile and a half to his boat
Mary Shelley drafted Frankenstein in two notebooks. The first was probably purchased in Geneva, the second several months later in England. You can now read them online at the Shelley-Godwin archive
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1815 Mary Godwin writes "Dreamt that my little baby came to life again; that it had only been cold, and that we rubbed it before the fire, and it lived. Awake and find no baby – I think about the little thing all day"
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1818 Frankenstein is published. Percy Bysshe Shelley sends a copy to Walter Scott, with a note saying "The Author has requested me to send you, as a slight tribute of high admiration & respect, the accompanying volumes"
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1817 Keats visits Shakespeare's Birthplace with his friend Benjamin Bailey. Next to his name in the visitors' book, under 'place of abode', Keats writes 'Everywhere'
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1818, Keats dines with William and Mary Wordsworth. When Keats tries to make a point about poetry, Mary reaches out, puts her hand on Keats’ arm and whispers, “Mr Wordsworth is never interrupted”
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1820 Keats writes "I have seen foreign flowers in hothouses, of the most beautiful nature, but I do not care a straw for them. The simple flowers of our Spring are what I want to see again."
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1818 Coleridge writes "I have this morning been reading a strange publication - viz Poems with very wild interesting pictures." The book is by William Blake - it is Songs of Innocence and Experience
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1818 Keats dines with William and Mary Wordsworth. When Keats tries to make a point about poetry. Mary reaches out, puts her hand on Keats’ arm and whispers, “Mr Wordsworth is never interrupted”
#OTD
1818 Keats dines with William and Mary Wordsworth. When Keats tries to make a point about poetry. Mary reaches out, puts her hand on Keats’ arm and whispers, “Mr Wordsworth is never interrupted”
For Keats's birthday
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1795, a fascinating and meticulously researched blog from
@pumps1000
on his gravestone and that famous inscription 'Here lies one whose name was writ in water'
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1851 Mary Shelley dies in London. On the first anniversary of her death, her son and his wife opened her desk. Inside they found locks of her dead children's hair, a notebook she'd shared with Percy, and a copy of Adonaïs with one page folded round
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1821, Rome, the death of Keats. Severn later writes: "He is gone – he died with the most perfect ease – he seemed to go to sleep. On the 23rd, about 4, the approaches of death came on...." 1/4
#OTD
1851 Mary Shelley dies in London. On the first anniversary of her death, her son and his wife opened her desk. Inside they found locks of her dead children's hair, a notebook she'd shared with Percy, and a copy of Adonaïs with one page folded round
#OTD
1819 Keats writes to his brother
"You speak of Lord Byron and me — There is this great difference between us. He describes what he sees — I describe what I imagine — Mine is the hardest task"
#OTD
1819 Keats writes to his brother "You speak of Lord Byron and me—There is this great difference between us. He describes what he sees—I describe what I imagine—Mine is the hardest task"
#OTD
1851 Mary Shelley dies in London. On the first anniversary of her death, her son and his wife opened her desk. Inside they found locks of her dead children's hair, a notebook she'd shared with Percy, and a copy of Adonaïs with one page folded round
#OTD
1819 Byron writes to his publisher "So you want me to undertake what you call a 'great work?' an Epic Poem, I suppose, or some such. I'll try no such thing; I hate tasks"
#OTD
1822 Shelley's body is dug up from where it has been buried in the sand for a month and burned on the beach. It takes three hours. Afterwards Byron swims a mile and a half to his boat 1/2