.
POEMS IN PROCESS / A9
2
Ou t of the day & night A joy has taken flight Fresh spring & summer 4 & winter hoar Move my faint heart with grief but with delight No more, o, never more
JOHN KEATS From The Eve of St. Agnes1 [Stanza 26]
heart rorives?her payers said
-J^Jj^MeeJv pearled
strips her hat of all its * w realms pearl
jt soonall fvs heart revives?her prating done, itsVreathed earl she stripV her hair he warmed jkwels one by atie
[HERE KEATS BEGINS A NE W SHEET]
Loosens h'r frngr int hnrH''''3 and doth harp
26
Anon
Dui !>uui* his heart revives?her praying done,
frees:
Of all its wreathe'd pearl her hair she stripo Unclasps her warmed jewels one by one
by degrees
4. This fair copy of the second draft retains, and poem contains additional changes in wording. even enlarges, the blank space, indicating that That published version also incorporates revisions Shelley still hasn't made up his mind what to insert introduced by other hands. Because Keats's friend after the word 'summer.' We may speculate, by Richard Woodhouse and his publisher, John Tayreference to the fragmentary version of this stanza lor, took alarm at the suggestion, made more in the second draft, that he had in mind as possi-explicit in one of the stanzas Keats added to his bilities either an adjective, 'gray' or 'green,' or else original draft, that the pleasure of which Madeline the noun 'autumn.' Mary Shelley closed up this would dream would include sexual pleasure particspace when she published the poem in 1824, with ularly, they worked over Woodhouse's transcripts the result that editors, following her version, have of the poem and produced a less risque text that until very recently printed this line as though Shel-combined Keats's draft and his revised fair copy ley had intended it to be one metric foot shorter along with, as Jack Stillinger has conjectured, their than the corresponding line of stanza 1. ow n suggestions. 1. Transcribed from Keats's first draft of all but For a photographic reproduction of the page of the first seven stanzas of The Eve of St. Agnes; the the holograph manuscript of The Eve of St. Agnes manuscript is now in the Houghton Library, Har-containing the poem's stanza 30, see the color vard University. Keats's published version of the insert.
.
A10 / POEMS IN PROCESS
Loosens her fragrant boddice: inH rlnu n olipc Her sweet attire folio light omopo dum i by
creeps rusteling to her knees
Mermaid in sea weed
Half hidden lil i _i 'isn iTnf llm Bi r And nioiL inclodioua
dreaming
She stands awhile in a thought; and sees
on
In fancy fair Saint Agnes j/ t her bed But dares not look behind or all the charm is(ii/idead
[Stanza 30]
But
And rlill oho alept: An d still she slept an azure-lidded sleep In blanched linen, smooth and lavender'd While he from frorth the closet brough a heap
Of candied tift-fc LIU, uitli apple Quince and plumb and gourd creamed Wit h jellies soother than the dai^r curd tinct An d lucent 'ymp-jjmnnth with ciannamon -And juguf'd datoc from thit nrr Fnphnitnr fnrd. 1 ? 11 ? ' ;j- -?--? Manna and daites in J in I ' i ('ill O iad Mann a wild and Bragantino ? S 3 I sugar'd dates transferred ? In Bi'ijj,a?tinc from TUL Fro m fez?and spiced danties every one From wmltliji Samarchand to cedard lebanon silken T o Autumn 2 Season of Mists and mellow fruitfulness Close bosom friend of the naturring sun; Conspiring with him how to load and bless Th e Vines with fruit that round the thatch eves run To bend with apples the moss'd Cottage trees An d fill all furuits with sweeness to the core To swell the gourd, and plump the hazle shells Wit h a white kernel; to set budding more An d still more later flowers for the bees Until they think warn days with never cease For Summe r has o'erbrimm'd their clammy cells? 2. From an untitled manuscript?apparently idly, in a state of creative excitement. Keats made
Keats's first draft of the poem?in the Houghton a few further changes before publishing the poem Library, Harvard University. The many pen-slips in the form included in the selections above. and errors in spelling indicate that Keats wrote rap
.
POEMS IN PROCESS / A11
