This evening I was at a Claire Tomalin lecture about Jane Austen at the South Bank Centre in London and afterwards she did a book signing. Thinking of our online conversations about how great a Keats biography by Claire Tomalin or Richard Holmes would be, I took the opportunity to ask her whether she had thought of it. She said that so many of her friends have already written biographies of him, but that she genuinely loved his poetry. She mentioned the biographical introduction she wrote on Keats for a selection of his poetry - I had already read this, but I think we have too few biographies of Keats by women and I'd be interested in her perspective & how it would add to or differ to Aileen Ward's or those written by men. Sadly I think she is planning to write a biography on George Herbert instead. I got the impression she thought the Keats biographical market was already over-saturated, although she didn't say this directly.
If I ever meet Richard Holmes, I shall try & "work on" him too!
Take care all!
Cath
