| bonnet to provide honey for a small town. In a letter to his sister-in-law of 13th January 1820 (probably
his birthday) he extolls the good lady, "If you should have a boy do not christen him John... 'Tis a bad name and goes against a man. If my name had been Edmund I should have been more fortunate." The five-foot fussing vegetarian versifier wasn't content to blame his misfortune on his Christian name. Oh no. He had this to say on the subject of doctors if you got him started: "In disease Medical Men guess: if they cannot ascertain a disease they call it nervous" Actually, whinger though he was, Keats did have a point there. They did little to stop his early death from tuberculosis at only 25 years old. You can read Keats' Collected Poems on site and find out exactly why he is still so revered despite only living to such a tender age. Let us move on, though, to the last day of this unrivalled week of genius. The 31st October is not only hallowe'en - day of silly hats and trick or treating - but also the day on which Martians destroyed Los Angeles in HG Wells' 1938 War of the Worlds. To tie hats in with H G Wells' pessimistic sci-fi tale, I leave you with an anecdote. Wells once found a hat when leaving a party he was attending. Finding that the hat fitted his unusually sized head he shamelessly walked off with it. More shamelessly still, he wrote the following message to the owner of the hat: "I stole your hat. I like your hat. I shall keep your hat. Whenever I look inside it I shall think of you. I take off your hat to you". Charming. In honour of such remarkable behaviour your recommended reading this week is Stephen Crane's short story The Open Boat, which Wells described as "an imperishable gem". Incidentally, if you know of the whereabouts of Wells' hat now I would be grateful to know. Its time I had a new one. David Pinching, Editor |
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