The Scottish Adventure ...

On this day...English poet John Keats visited the home of another famous composer of verse, Robert Burns in 1818. During a summer walking tour in the North Country, whilst traversing 20 or 30 miles a day, Keats came to the family home of the Scottish Bard in Alloway.

The 'Ploughman Poet', who had died 24 years previously, has since been lauded as a founder of the Romantic movement, and influenced not only Keats himself, but also his contemporaries, such as Percy Bysshe Shelley and William Wordsworth. It was here that Keats composed his sonnet, 'Written in the Cottage Where Burns Was Born' - a poem most notable for its premonitory first line, 'this mortal body of a thousand days'. Keats died 43 days short of this number.

The Family Man...

On this day...Romantic poet William Wordsworth and his sister Dorothy moved into Dove Cottage in 1799. The previous autumn had seen the pair in Germany, along with fellow poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge. One of his many trips to Europe, Wordsworth was reportedly homesick and thus it was in 1799 that he moved back to the Lake District - the region in which he grew up. His work at this time comprised of 'The Lucy Poems', a series of five poems later included in his 'Lyrical Ballads' collection. Living near Coleridge and Robert Southey, the trio became collectively known as the 'Lake Poets'.

The Horseman...

On this day...Romantic poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge joined the cavalry in 1793. Using the false name, 'Silas Tomkyn Comberbache', Coleridge had quit his university education to enlist in the Royal Dragoons, with speculation suggesting it was either due to rising debt, or rejection from a girl that he loved.

Thought to subsequently suffer from about of severe depression, he was discharged with the help of his brothers on the grounds of 'insanity'. He was readmitted to Cambridge, and it was there that his great literary career began to blossom.

On this day...

Romantic poet Lord Byron made his maiden speech at the House of Lords in 1812. Receiving his peerage at the age of 10, upon the death of his great uncle, Byron did not actually take his seat in the House until the age of 23. In the few years previous, Byron had been abroad on a 'Grand Tour' including Albania, Greece and Portugal, a journey customary for such noblemen.Yet in was in 1812 that Byron first spoke in Parliament, and on an issue, supposedly close to his heart, or a least, close to his birthplace.

The Luddite 'frame-breakers' in Nottinghamshire had taken to destroying the texile machines, products of the industrial revolution, that were putting them out of work. Under a new Tory bill, such workers would face the death penalty, and it was against this 'most unparalleled distress' and 'squalid wretchedness' that Byron spoke. Opponents thought the speech not 'at all suited to our common notions of Parliementary [sic] eloquence', and even Byron himself thought he came across as 'a bit theatrical'. As it happened, the publication of 'Childe Harold's Pilgrimage' less than two weeks later, ensured Byron's success was in the poetic, rather than political, field.

On this day...

Scottish poet and lyricist Robert Burns, was born in 1759. 'Scotland's favourite son' started life with a fragmented education, built around rigorous labour on his father's farm, schooled mostly in Christianity by his father. Perhaps unusually, it was his hard physical work that led to the development of his writing craft; early songs and poetry were composed for various female farmhands, whom he encountered during his travels. Indeed his amorous adventures were legendary, Burns said to have fathered fifteen children, six out of wedlock. Burns had been on the verge of emigrating to Jamaicia, yet in a sudden turn, caused by the death of his then love Mary Campbell, Burns instead moved to Edinburugh and then Dumfries; steadily writing all the while. His works were greatly influenced by both Classical and Biblical themes, as well as, naturally, strong Scottish tradition. Said to be a pioneer of the Romantic movement, Burns' best known works include, 'Auld Lang Syne', 'A Red, Red Rose', and 'To a Mouse'. The night of his birth is celebrated throughout Scotland with 'Burn's Night'; a supper swathed in tradition, including haggis and readings of his poetry. Burns died in 1796, at the age of 37.

You and me could write a Bad Romance...

On a similar theme, the Guardian and Observer this week are launching a series about the Romantic poets. From tomorrow, each day the paper will include a booklet about an influential poet of the era, including Keats, Shelley, Byron, Coleridge and Wordsworth. The booklets will contain some of their finest works, excerpts of personal correspondance and a foreward from a well known admirer; names such as Margaret Drabble, Andrew Motion, and even Germain Greer appearing. In honour of the series, Andrew Motion has recorded a podcast which can be found here

On this day...

British poet George Gordon Byron, more commonly known just as Lord Byron, was born in 1788. A highly controversial character, Byron, it seems was born in to a family of similar ilk. Son of 'Mad Jack', and great-nephew of 'the Wicked Lord', Byron inherited his peerage at the age of ten, and even before then rumours about the nature of his character were surfacing. Accused by many of being bisexual, Byron had many relationships with men and women alike; yet the strigent sodomy laws in Britain at the time neccessitated his travelling abroad for many years to find the freedom he wanted. Due to the Napoleonic Wars, Byron avoided Europe and so travelled to the East and spent time in both Albania and Athens. Following several scandalous affairs, notably with Lady Caroline Lamb, and a marriage marred by rumours of incest, he left for Italy, where he famously met Percy Bysshe Shelley and his wife Mary. The subsequent years of his life were of great cultural interest, first contributing to the Armenian language by means of a dictionary, and then to the Greek independence by refitting the Greek fleet with his own money and fighting. A leading Romantic, Byron wrote prolifically, his most famous works including, 'Childe Harold's Pilgrimage' and 'Don Juan'. The man labelled 'mad, bad and dangerous to know', died in 1824, at the age of 36.

On this day...

English poet Percy Bysshe Shelley married novelist Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin in 1816.Shelley's second wife, Godwin followed 16 year old Harriet Westbrook, with whom Shelley eloped and had a child. Three years later, he abandoned her in favour of Godwin, and their subsequent marriage came only weeks after Westbrook's suicide. Godwin helped to edit and promote her husband's works, yet was a successful writer in her own right. The Shelleys, Lord Byron, John William Polidori and Claire Clairmont famously spent a summer in Geneva where Mary conceived the idea for her novel 'Frankenstein'. The couple had four children together.

On this day...

Percy Bysshe Shelley's 'Adonais' was first published in England in 1821. Perhaps one of the most poignant elegies in the English language, Shelley's poem was written for fellow romantic poet John Keats, who had died earlier that year at the age of only 25. The title is thought to be a combination of Greek god Adonis and Hewbrew for Lord, Adonai; and so idealised Greek themes of beauty, nature and romance feature heavily throughout. Having been introduced in 1816, Shelley and Keats were close companions; Shelley saying of the latter, after inviting him to stay; 'I am aware indeed that I am nourishing a rival who will far surpass me and this is an additional motive and will be an added pleasure.' When Shelley died in a year later, at the age of 22, his body was found washed up with a copy a Keats' work in his pocket.

A walk in the park...

This day also celebrates a more obscure anniversary. 1797 saw Samuel Taylor Coleridge and William Wordsworth embark on a walking holiday in Quantock Hills in Somerset; a holiday which would produce Coleridge's most famous work, 'The Rime of the Ancient Mariner'. Their original idea was to create a piece of work which would provide immediate commercial success to pay for their trip, preferrably something gothic to be included in popular magazines. However, Wordsworth stated that their styles 'would not assimilate', and so it was left to Coleridge to finish the work. Five months of work produced a finished article, and 'The Rime of the Ancient Mariner' was published in 'Lyrical Ballads' in 1798. Far from being a immediate bestseller, Coleridge's poem was criticised for being obscure and difficult to read, leading to a revised edition in 1815 in which he added marginal notes, glossing the text. The poem was succeeded by another of Coleridge's great works, 'Christabel'.

On this day...

Arguably one of the most famous English poets in history, John Keats, was born in 1795. Although his work was not well received in his lifetime, Keats, together with Percy Bysshe Shelley and Lord Byron, is now cited as the one of the cornerstones of the romantic movement in poetry; his works going on to influence and inspire such poets as Alfred Lord Tennyson and Wilfred Owen. Yet his life was tragically short. Soon after his brother Tom died from tuberculosis, Keats himself began to show symptoms of the disease. In 1820, with the signs becoming more pronounced, Keats left for Italy with his friend Joseph Severn. He died in 1821, in a house on the Spainish Steps in Rome, now the Keats-Shelley Memorial House, where works, correspondence and original furniture remain. Known for his florid description and rich imagery, Keats most famous works are 'Ode to a Nightingale' and 'Endymion'. His death inspired another great work, 'Adonis', by Shelley.

On this day...

Samuel Taylor Coleridge was born in 1772. Together with William Wordsworth, he founded the Romantic Movement of poetry in England; his most famous poem being 'The Rime of the Ancient Mariner'. He wrote prose, his autobiography 'Biographia Literaria' providing much dispute between critics. Many saw it as the decline of his health, now specualted to be bipolar disorder, which he treated with copious amounts of opium. He died in 1834 and is regarded as one of the most important English poets.