"
For some unexplained reason Keats broke his apprenticeship to the
surgeon at Edmonton after four years. He did not however give up
the idea of becoming a doctor, and he went on with his studies at
the London hospitals. Keats was by this time about nineteen. He
was small--only about five feet--so that his fellow-students
called him "little Keats." But his face was fine, and out of it
looked eyes "like those of a wild gipsy-maid set in the face of a
young god." He was a steady student, although he did "scribble
doggerel rhymes" among his notes, and he passed his examinations
well. Yet the work was all against the grain. More and more he
began to feel that real nothing but poetry mattered, that for him
it was the real business of life. It was hard to study when even
a sunbeam had power to set his thoughts astray. "There came a
sunbeam into the room," once he said to a friend, "and with it a
whole troop of creatures floating in the ray, and I was off with
them to Oberon and Fairyland."
Keats gradually made several friends among the young writers of
the day.
Pages:
929
930
931
932
933
934
935
936
937
938
939
940
941
942
943
944
945
946
947
948
949
950
951
952
953