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/lit/ - Literature

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20939892 No.20939892 [Reply] [Original]

It's honestly crazy what he accomplished in his short life. He died when he was 25. Eliot didn't even publish his first poem (Prufrock) until he was 26. At 25, Shakespeare was probably still writing his first play, The Two Gentlemen of Verona (which isn't even good). If Yeats had died at 25, his most famous poem would be The Lake Isle of Innisfree. Keats deserves to be called the undisputed GOAT of English verse.

>> No.20939896

>>20939892
>Keats deserves to be called the undisputed GOAT of English verse.
why?

>> No.20939915

>>20939896
He wrote some of the best poems of all time in a very short time period. Other, longer-lived writers either have a lot of chaff or (in the case of Eliot) just didn't produce very much verse. Keats's poetry has three merits: it's good, there's a decent amount of it, and he produced it all when he was young, implying that if he'd lived another thirty years he'd have a massive bibliography of masterpieces.

>> No.20939926

>>20939892
Rimbaud stopped writing literature at age 20

>> No.20939955

>>20939892
Whether or not your literature becomes well-known, popular or is regarded as being of high quality really has less to do with what you do than with your connections and whether or not you're in the right place at the right time.

>> No.20940314

>>20939955
Keats's work wasn't very well-regarded by critics during his lifetime. His only important "connections" were his friendships with Shelley and Hunt, who did support Keats's work, but evidently that didn't help Keats's stature while he was alive. The "right place, right time" angle is probably true in that, if Keats had been writing 100 years later, his style would have clashed with the anti-romantic poetry of the 20th century, but then again, you could say that for any writer, e.g. a modern Shakespeare wouldn't find much of an audience for sonnets and verse dramas. Regardless, I personally find great merit in Keats's work, which to me is the most important thing.

>> No.20940439

>>20939892
He's very underrated even for his popularity. His philosophical vision we only get a small measure of, we know not how far THAT would have developed along with his poetry. But most understand nothing about that side of him, nothing about the inner structures of his works.

>> No.20940792

>>20939915
>implying that if he'd lived another thirty years he'd have a massive bibliography of masterpieces.
Not necessarily. "What if" is not and argument, neither is youth. All poetry should be judged on the results.

>> No.20940825

>>20940792
It really depends on the person. We can tell Mozart would have continued to produce inimitable works of genius.

>> No.20940967

>>20939892
That's bringing justice criterions in literature legacy. Are the works good? I believe so. Are they meritorious? Who would care in the literary canon. That may be selfish, but the reader is a reader. The tragic, shortened life and works of an author is a topic of interest, as a whole, but not for literature's merit. We are enjoying reading material, not bestowing medals here. Otherwise it's fapping on performance, which is kinda alien to literature. It ain't sports.

>> No.20940980

>>20940825
Did he produce them? No. We have what we have.

>> No.20940984

>>20939926
and that's a good thing

>> No.20940988

>>20940980
Retard.

>> No.20940996

>>20940988
Says the faggot salivating over non-existent works lmao

>> No.20941701

>>20940314
Probably the greatest tragedy in all of English literature was Keats and Shelley's early deaths in Italy. Imagine if they teamed up as they were planning to and lived to old age, the two greatest lyric poets in the English language inspiring each other to greater and greater heights. Fuck man. I'm depressed now.

>> No.20941721

>>20940996
>non-existent works
You have no imagination, and therefore no understanding. I'll use a word which a brainlet like yourself may understand better: direction. We can look at the direction an artist was going.

>> No.20941753

He’s a great poet but I do not think it fair to other poets to deal in what-ifs, Even so I can’t deny that I believe if he continued to cultivate his talent he’d be Shakespeare’s superior in terms of pure verse. (Not in the other areas however.)

>> No.20941762

>>20941701
And I didn't even mention Byron would have been there as well. Fuck. (Although Shelley did complain about Byron cramping his own work, but imagine the three of them hanging out)

>> No.20942084

>>20940439
What's his philosophy?