keatsgrove wrote:Saturn wrote:And a hearty welcome to keatsgrove, before I forget.
I like a hearty welcome! And I agree, everyone is interesting.
Re: the Keats - Shelley Museum - I'm conflicted in my "interactions" with Keats. On one hand, I want to know everything about him. On the other, out of respect, I feel like I should know and see only those things he'd want someone to see. Since he didn't seem to want much of the outside world to enter his Rome apartment towards the end, I want to respect his privacy, even though he's not there; I don't want to gawk at where he died. Yet I do read all of his letters. But I feel uncomfortable referring to him as "John".
Go figure.
I don't condemn anyone who appreciated their visit to the museum. We all commune in our own ways.
Hello, again, all my Keatsian friends. I, too, have not properly introduced myself, as well. My story is a lengthy and somewhat depressing one, so I'll save it for later. However, I would like to address the "gawk" sentiment. The summer of 2009, I was so fortunate enough to go to London (again); however, The House was still closed due to those much-needed repairs. My brother, my son, and I did travel to Rome. My son and his girlfriend-at-the-time went and did the whole Imperial ruins-architecture-Vatican thing while my brother and I did the #26 Piazza de Spagna and the Non-Protestant pilgrimage. To stand in that miniscule room and pay homage at that grave site is not to gawk. It is to honour the oh, so drastically cut short life of a vibrant, intelligent, generous, and sublimely creative young genius. It was a moment of reverence that I plan to do as many times as possible before I die (O, to be buried near where
he lived. . . ). The feeling, the vibrations true Keatsians feel those moments in that little room and at that final resting place (with, by the way, wild strawberries, not daisies/violets "growing over all") in the corner of that beautiful cemetery is not gawking. Please, it is a reverence, a veneration, if you will.
If I can ever learn (or desire to learn) how to manuever my way around a computer, I'll print my photographs for those interested.