A few questions about keats

[Purple Dinosaur]

I would be interested in knowing some of the political events that influenced Keats's work. This is just for a high school Brit Lit class so the info doesn't need to be spectacularly specific, but I've been, for some reason, having a bit of trouble coming across this information. I appreciate any help I can get, thank you.

[Saturn]

The Napoleonic Wars...

The reform debates in parliament - Catholic emancipation etc.

Those two cover a very wide area - they influenced not only Keats but the whole of the U.K. in both political, social and artistic terms.

[Purple Dinosaur]

Thanks man you are truly uber. ty ty ty

[Saturn]

No problem.

Sorry for being so vague, if I went into detail I'd be here all night

[Malia]

Here's a bit of politics that Keats found himself a part of. This is taken directly from Robert Gittings bio entitled John Keats (p. 344).

"He returned that afternoon from Walthamstow just as Henry Hunt the Radical orator was making his triumphal entry into London. A crowd of nearly 300,000 lined the streets from Islington to the Strand; red flags and red cockades were everywhere. Hunt has been arrested four weeks before at the mass meeting in St. Peter's Fields, Manchester. Panic action by the local Yeomanry, backed by a troop of Hussars, had led to eleven deaths and hundreds injured, adding the word Peterloo to history. Its permanent effect was to unite rival parties in the movement for constitutional and economic reform so that it became a nation-wide cause; its temporary effect was to elevate Hunt from an embarrassment for the Radicals into their hero. His propoganda procession included a youth still bearing the sabre-wounds of Peterloo. Cheapside was seething with cheering crowds as Keats made his way to Abbey; but if his own political feelings were stirred, he had the good sense to suppress them for the moment."

I've read elsewhere in Keats biographies that Keats was very much moved by the acts by government to silence people's right to free speech. There were libel laws forcefully in place when Keats was writing and saying the wrong thing could put you in jail--Leigh Hunt, I believe, was jailed at least once for his liberal ideas. These libel laws came in force as a reaction to the French Revolution. The last thing that the British rulers wanted was for the lower classes to revolt, so they strong-armed them to a degree.

[Saturn]

Excellent Malia I'm sure that will help this guy a lot.

[Purple Dinosaur]

Thanks a lot Malia, this is really good information This will help a lot, cheers

[Raphael]

There is a book called the Age of Elegance written in 1950, so in some ways dated, but goes into detail of the politics of the time and mentions John Keats in it a few times and how he was affected by it. I borrowed it from the library- maybe it will be in yours.