Keats and King Lear

Summary

The first reference to Shakespeare of notable import in Keats’ letters is a reference to King Lear. It occurs in a letter written to Reynolds from Carisbrooke on 17 April 1817. Keats had crossed from Southampton to the Isle of Wight on the 15th, and at his inn at Southampton earlier that day he had (he says in a letter of the 15th to his brothers), felt lonely at breakfast and went and ‘unbox’d a Shakespeare’. The Shakespeare he unboxed was, no doubt, as Miss Spurgeon has said, the seven-volume edition of the Dramatic Works which we know he had bought in London in 1817. He was going to the Isle of Wight for a short period of recreation and study, and he had no doubt made his purchase with these ends in view. Miss Spurgeon thought that he probably got out the first volume of the set. The first play in the first volume was The Tempest; and certainly, after saying ‘I went and unbox’d a Shakespeare’ he adds, quoting Stephano, ‘Here’s my Comfort’. King Lear was in the last volume, along with Pericles, Romeo, Hamlet and Othello. After breakfast he went down to Southampton Water to inquire about his ferry. He found it would leave at 3 o’clock. No doubt, during the day and on the crossing, he read his Shakespeare.