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John Keats
152 quotes
“Sweet are the pleasures that to verse belong, And doubly sweet a brotherhood in song.”
John Keats (1795–1821) first seen 1815 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: To George Felton Mathew" (November 1815)
“My spirit is too weak — mortality Weighs heavily on me like unwilling sleep, And each imagin'd pinnacle and steep Of godlike hardship tells me I must die Like a sick Eagle looking at the sky.”
John Keats (1795–1821) first seen 1817 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: On Seeing the Elgin Marbles" (1817)
“In drear-nighted December, Too happy, happy tree, Thy branches ne'er remember Their green felicity.”
John Keats (1795–1821) first seen 1817 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: In drear-nighted December', st. 1 (1817)
“But were there ever any Writh'd not of passed joy? The feel of not to feel it, When there is none to heal it, Nor numbed sense to steel it, Was never said in rhyme.”
John Keats (1795–1821) said by 1821 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“It keeps eternal whisperings around Desolate shores, and with its mighty swell Gluts twice ten thousand Caverns, till the spell Of Hecate leaves them their old shadowy sound.”
John Keats (1795–1821) first seen 1817 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: On the Sea" (1817)
“When I have fears that I may cease to be Before my pen has glean'd my teeming brain, Before high piled books, in charact'ry, Hold like rich garners the full-ripen'd grain; When I behold, upon the night's starr'd face, Huge cloudy symbols of a high romance, And think that I may never live to trace Their shadows, with the magic hand of chance; And when I feel, fair creature of an hour! That I shall never look upon thee more, Never have relish in the faery power Of unreflecting love! — then on the shore Of the wide world I stand alone, and think Till Love and Fame to nothingness do sink.”
John Keats (1795–1821) first seen 1817 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: When I have fears that I may cease to be" (1817)
“Shed no tear! O shed no tear! The flower will bloom another year. Weep no more! O weep no more! Young buds sleep in the root's white core.”
John Keats (1795–1821) first seen 1818 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Faery Songs", I (1818)
“This living hand, now warm and capable Of earnest grasping, would, if it were cold And in the icy silence of the tomb, So haunt thy days and chill thy dreaming nights That thou wouldst wish thine own heart dry of blood So in my veins red life might stream again, And thou be conscience-calm'd — see here it is — I hold it towards you.”
John Keats (1795–1821) first seen 1819 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: This living hand" (1819)
“Bright star! would I were stedfast as thou art — Not in lone splendour hung aloft the night And watching with eternal lids apart, Like nature's patient, sleepless Eremite, The moving waters at their priestlike task Of pure ablution round earth's human shores.”
John Keats (1795–1821) first seen 1819 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Bright Star" (1819)
“None can usurp this height... But those to whom the miseries of the world Are misery, and will not let them rest.”
John Keats (1795–1821) first seen 1819 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: The Fall of Hyperion: A Dream" (1819), Canto I, l. 147
“The day is gone, and all its sweets are gone! Sweet voice, sweet lips, soft hand, and softer breast.”
John Keats (1795–1821) first seen 1819 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Sonnet "The Day is Gone" (wr. 1819; pub. 1848)
“To his sight The husk of natural objects opens quite To the core; and every secret essence there Reveals the elements of good and fair; Making him see, where Learning hath no light.”
John Keats (1795–1821) first seen 1821 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: The Poet", London Magazine (October 1821)
“Here lies one whose name was writ in water.”
John Keats (1795–1821) first seen 1821 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Epitaph for himself (1821)
“My chest of books divide amongst my friends.”
John Keats (1795–1821) first seen 1821 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Last will and testament (1821)
“I am certain of nothing but the holiness of the heart's affections and the truth of imagination — what the imagination seizes as beauty must be truth — whether it existed before or not.”
John Keats (1795–1821) first seen 1817 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: To Benjamin Bailey (November 22, 1817)
“The imagination may be compared to Adam's dream — he awoke and found it truth.”
John Keats (1795–1821) first seen 1817 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: To Benjamin Bailey (November 22, 1817)
“O for a life of Sensations rather than of Thoughts!”
John Keats (1795–1821) first seen 1817 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: To Benjamin Bailey (November 22, 1817)
“I scarcely remember counting upon happiness — I look not for it if it be not in the present hour — nothing startles me beyond the moment. The setting sun will always set me to rights, or if a sparrow come before my Window I take part in its existence and pick about the gravel.”
John Keats (1795–1821) first seen 1817 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: To Benjamin Bailey (November 22, 1817)
“The excellency of every art is its intensity, capable of making all disagreeables evaporate, from their being in close relationship with beauty and truth.”
John Keats (1795–1821) first seen 1817 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: To G. and F. Keats (December 21, 1817)
“At once it struck me what quality went to form a man of achievement, especially in literature, and which Shakespeare possessed so enormously — I mean negative capability, that is, when a man is capable of being in uncertainties, mysteries, doubts, without any irritable reaching after fact and reason.”
John Keats (1795–1821) first seen 1817 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: To George and Thomas Keats (22 December 1817)
“They will explain themselves — as all poems should do without any comment.”
John Keats (1795–1821) first seen 1818 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: To George Keats (1818)
“Works of genius are the first things in this world.”
John Keats (1795–1821) first seen 1818 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: To G. and F. Keats (13 January 1818)
“Nothing is finer for the purposes of great productions than a very gradual ripening of the intellectual powers.”
John Keats (1795–1821) first seen 1818 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: To his brother George (23 January 1818)
“Poetry should be great and unobtrusive, a thing which enters into one's soul, and does not startle it or amaze it with itself, but with its subject.”
John Keats (1795–1821) first seen 1818 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: To John Hamilton Reynolds (3 February 1818)
“We hate poetry that has a palpable design upon us — and if we do not agree, seems to put its hand in its breeches pocket. Poetry should be great and unobtrusive, a thing which enters into one's soul, and does not startle or amaze with itself, but with its subject.”
John Keats (1795–1821) first seen 1818 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: To John Hamilton Reynolds (3 February 1818)
“Many have original minds who do not think it — they are led away by custom — Now it appears to me that almost any man may like the spider spin from his own inwards his own citadel.”
John Keats (1795–1821) first seen 1818 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: To John Hamilton Reynolds (19 February 1818)
“Scenery is fine — but human nature is finer.”
John Keats (1795–1821) first seen 1818 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: To Benjamin Bailey (13 March 1818)
“Every mental pursuit takes its reality and worth from the ardour of the pursuer.”
John Keats (1795–1821) first seen 1818 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: To Benjamin Bailey (13 March 1818)
“Axioms in philosophy are not axioms until they are proved upon our pulses: we read fine things but never feel them to the full until we have gone the same steps as the author.”
John Keats (1795–1821) first seen 1818 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: To John Hamilton Reynolds (3 May 1818)
“I compare human life to a large mansion of many apartments, two of which I can only describe, the doors of the rest being as yet shut upon me.”
John Keats (1795–1821) first seen 1818 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: To John Hamilton Reynolds (May 3, 1818)
“I am certain I have not a right feeling towards women - at this moment I am striving to be just to them, but I cannot. Is it because they fall so far beneath my boyish imagination? When I was a schoolboy I thought a fair woman a pure Goddess; my mind was a soft nest in which some one of them slept, though she knew it not.”
John Keats (1795–1821) first seen 1818 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: To Benjamin Bailey (18 July 1818)
“There is an awful warmth about my heart like a load of immortality.”
John Keats (1795–1821) first seen 1818 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: To John Hamilton Reynolds (September 22, 1818)
“I begin to get a little acquainted with my own strength and weakness. Praise or blame has but a momentary effect on the man whose love of beauty in the abstract makes him a severe critic on his own works.”
John Keats (1795–1821) first seen 1818 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: To James Hessey (9 October 1818)
“I think I shall be among the English Poets after my death.”
John Keats (1795–1821) first seen 1818 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: To George and Georgiana Keats (14 October 1818)
“The poetical character... is not itself — it has no self — it is every thing and nothing — It has no character — it enjoys light and shade; it lives in gusto, be it fair or foul, high or low, rich or poor, mean or elevated. — It has as much delight in conceiving an Iago as an Imogen. What shocks the virtuous philospher, delights the camelion poet.”
John Keats (1795–1821) first seen 1818 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: To Richard Woodhouse (27 October 1818)
“A poet is the most unpoetical of anything in existence; because he has no identity — he is continually informing — and filling some other body.”
John Keats (1795–1821) first seen 1818 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: To Richard Woodhouse (27 October 1818)
“A man's life of any worth is a continual allegory — and very few eyes can see the mystery of life — a life like the Scriptures, figurative... Lord Byron cuts a figure, but he is not figurative. Shakespeare led a life of allegory: his works are the comments on it.”
John Keats (1795–1821) first seen 1819 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: To George and Georgiana Keats (14 February – 3 May 1819)
“Nothing ever becomes real till it is experienced — Even a proverb is no proverb to you till your Life has illustrated it.”
John Keats (1795–1821) first seen 1819 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: To George and Georgiana Keats (14 February – 3 May 1819)
“I myself am pursuing the same instinctive course as the veriest human animal you can think of — I am, however young, writing at random — straining at particles of light in the midst of a great darkness — without knowing the bearing of any one assertion, of any one opinion. Yet may I not in this be free from sin?”
John Keats (1795–1821) first seen 1819 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: To George and Georgiana Keats (19 March 1819)
“Call the world if you please "The vale of soul-making.”
John Keats (1795–1821) first seen 1819 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: To George and Georgiana Keats (21 April 1819)
“I have two luxuries to brood over in my walks, your loveliness and the hour of my death. O that I could have possession of them both in the same minute.”
John Keats (1795–1821) first seen 1819 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: To Fanny Brawne (25 July 1819)
“I have nothing to speak of but my self-and what can I say but what I feel”
John Keats (1795–1821) first seen 1819 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: To John Hamilton Reynolds (24 August 1819)
“Some think I have lost that poetical ardour and fire 'tis said I once had- the fact is, perhaps I have; but, instead of that, I hope I shall substitute a more thoughtful and quiet power.”
John Keats (1795–1821) first seen 1819 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: To George Keats (21 September 1819)
“I have been astonished that Men could die Martyrs for religion – I have shudder’d at it – I shudder no more – I could be martyr’d for my Religion – Love is my religion – I could die for that – I could die for you. My Creed is Love and you are its only tenet.”
John Keats (1795–1821) first seen 1820 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: To Fanny Brawne (13 October 1820)
“If I should die," said I to myself, "I have left no immortal work behind me — nothing to make my friends proud of my memory — but I have loved the principle of beauty in all things, and if I had had time I would have made myself remembered.”
John Keats (1795–1821) first seen 1820 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: To Fanny Brawne (c. February 1820)
“You are always new. The last of your kisses was ever the sweetest; the last smile the brightest; the last movement the gracefullest.”
John Keats (1795–1821) first seen 1820 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: To Fanny Brawne (March 1820)
“You might curb your magnanimity, and be more of an artist, and load every rift of your subject with ore.”
John Keats (1795–1821) first seen 1820 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: To Percy Bysshe Shelley (August 1820)
“I can scarcely bid you good-bye, even in a letter. I always made an awkward bow. God bless you!”
John Keats (1795–1821) first seen 1820 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: To Charles Armitage Brown (30 November 1820)
“I stood tip-toe upon a little hill, The air was cooling, and so very still, That the sweet buds which with a modest pride Pull droopingly, in slanting curve aside, Their scantly leaved, and finely tapering stems, Had not yet lost those starry diadems Caught from the early sobbing of the morn.”
John Keats (1795–1821) said by 1821 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“And then there crept A little noiseless noise among the leaves, Born of the very sigh that silence heaves.”
John Keats (1795–1821) said by 1821 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source