The evening of November 19, 1816, found John Keats at the studio of the historical painter Benjamin Robert Haydon. A month had passed since they first met; and now they were rapidly developing a firm friendship. That evening, Haydon recalled, they enjoyed “a most eager interchange of thoughts” while sketching each other's profile, as a result of which the painter produced one of the most iconic images of Keats (Fig. 1). As soon as Keats had returned home, the vivid recollections of their interaction “wrought [him] up” to dedicate a sonnet to Haydon. Out of gratitude for that delightful evening, Keats sent the sonnet to Haydon the following day:
Great Spirits now on Earth are sojourning
He of the Cloud, the Cataract the Lake
Who on Helvellyn's summit wide awake
Catches his freshness from Archangel's wing
He of the Rose, the Violet, the Spring
The social Smile, the Chain for freedom's sake:
And lo!—whose stedfastness would never take
A Meaner Sound than Raphael's Whispering.
And other Spirits are there standing apart
Upon the Forehead of the Age to come;
These, These will give the World another heart
And other pulses—hear ye not the hum
Of mighty Workings in a distant Mart?
Listen awhile ye Nations, and be dumb.!
(LJK, 1:117)Keats lionized Haydon as one of the three contemporary “Great Spirits” as he saw them, along with William Wordsworth and Leigh Hunt. An avowed admirer of the genius of “this glorious Haydon,” Keats declared his artistic creations to be one of the “three things to rejoice at in this Age” (LJK, 1:114, 203). In this sonnet, Keats expressed his ardent respect for Haydon by juxtaposing the brilliance of these “Great Spirits” with that of those “other Spirits” of the coming age, presumably including the young poet himself, who were still “standing apart” from such illustrious predecessors.
Haydon played an important part in the writing of Keats's sonnet—not only as part of its subject-matter, but also in its drafting and revision.