Resistance to Google is Futile

With a handful of seconds, a few quick, clattering taps of the keyboard, “keats” and "invisible writers” reveal entire books about Keats and his writing accessible through the internet.

As the second generation of British Romantics died or succumbed to more conservative views (being, at first, very supportive of the French Revolution of the time period), the Victorian period emerged. Despite a characterization much different from the Romantic and seemingly disconnected from the values towards nature and imagination, writers were influenced by the Keats and his contemporaries. Alfred Tennyson, according to Egendorf, was influenced by Shelley and Keats, particularly in his Arthurian medieval poetry. Keats’ writing also inspired the school of Pre-Raphaelites, who were concerned with the “links” between writing and painting (24).

And now, a simple search reveals 544 video results pop up on YouTube when one searches for “keats.”

Keats lived during a time when many of his contemporaries were sympathetic, or supportive, towards the French Revolution, while dwelling in their writing on medieval influences, as well as a desire to resist the preceding mode of classicism. In the introduction to English Romanticism, Laura Egendorf draws the contrast between the two forms of writing, illustrating how, in order to work against the ideas of classicism, Romantic writers looked to the specific and detailed, imagination over reason, and especially a celebration of nature (27-30).

Romanticism was also characterized by a preoccupation with death, the “world of dreams” and drugs. Coleridge could attest to the latter, but Keats surely could recite a few lines about the fist two. So if this where the high school students of today can find Keats? Is he hiding behind kohl-rimmed eyes and boots with straps and spikes?

A search of YouTube, a website now popular with millions for finding short videos on almost any subject, also depicts the incarnations of Keats. Older gentlemen recite odes while a seasonal landscapes, nature scenes and Greek art fade in and out. The video for one version of Ode to a Nightingale shows a few sketches of Keats. There are 529 views as of now. Another version of the same ode by a different person focuses more on brighter images such as nightingales, wine and Bacchanal scenes. This version has over one thousand views, though it strikes me as a slightly duller reading despite the more vibrant imagery. But for a 12th grade English project, a group of kids decided to showcase a biography of John Keats through the lens of a Pulp Fiction-like short film.