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John Keats

English Romantic poet, 1795–1821. 2 explained quotes.

Portrait of John Keats
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“A thing of beauty is a joy for ever.”
John Keats · 1818
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“A thing of beauty is a joy for ever.”
John Keats · Endymion, Book I, line 1 · 1818 · Poet

The first line of Keats's long poem Endymion: beautiful things never lose their power to delight us, and their loveliness grows over time instead of fading.

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“Beauty is truth, truth beauty,—that is all ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.”
John Keats · Ode on a Grecian Urn · 1819 · Poet

The urn tells us that beauty and truth are the same thing, and that this is the only wisdom people need. Whether Keats himself believed it, or is letting the urn speak for itself, is still debated.

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About John Keats

John Keats trained as a surgeon’s apprentice before turning to poetry, and wrote almost all his major work in a few years before dying of tuberculosis in Rome at 25.

His odes are among the most admired poems in English. Critics savaged his early long poem Endymion, but its opening line became one of his most quoted.

More lines by Keats

Short quotes checked against their sources.

  • “Beauty is truth, truth beauty, – that is all ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.”
    Ode on a Grecian Urn, 1820
  • “Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness”
    To Autumn, 1820