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ABSTRACT
This article seeks to add to our understanding of one of the principal characters in the life of John Keats. Joseph Severn accompanied Keats to Rome and was at his bedside when the poet died. Research for the essay began with the discovery of a painting in 1993. The Infant of the Apocalypse Caught up to Heaven occupied ten years of Severn’s life. Its star-crossed history provides an intriguing narrative, epitomising the irreverence towards Severn’s stature as an artist. This altarpiece in the Papal Basilica of St Paul outside the Walls, and many other acclaimed paintings by Severn displayed in galleries worldwide, challenge the received wisdom that Severn’s fame resulted entirely from his relationship with Keats. Finding the missing painting in Rome thirty years ago initiated this essay.
Acknowledgment
Throughout the research of this article, I have received a great deal of support and assistance. I would first like to extend my thanks and appreciation to Sue Brown (Joseph Severn, A Life – The Rewards of Friendship), Grant F. Scott (Joseph Severn – Life and Letters), Micol Forti (Curatore, Collezione Arte Moderna e Contemoranea, Musei Vaticani) and her assistant Rosalia Pagliarani, Dr Vincenzo Coraggio (Administrator San Paolo Fuori le Mura), Pietro Dominichelli (former Curator San Paolo Fuori le Mura).
Disclosure Statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.
Notes
1 Lord Brock, M.S., F.R.C.S. John Keats and Joseph Severn: The Tragedy of the Last Illness (London: The Keats-Shelley Memorial Association, 1973).
2 William Sharp, The Life and Letters of Joseph Severn (Alpha Editions, 2019; Marston: Sampson Low, 1892), vi.
3 Sheila Birkenhead, Illustrious Friends: The Story of Joseph Severn and his Son Arthur (London: Hamish Hamilton, 1965), i.
4 Andrew Motion, Keats (London: Faber, 1997), 573.
5 Grant F. Scott, ed., Joseph Severn: Letters and Memoirs (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2005), 267.
6 Scott, Joseph Severn, 229.
7 Ibid., 277.
8 Sharp, Life and Letters, 50.
9 Scott, Joseph Severn, 323.
10 Ibid., 23.
11 Sue Brown, Joseph Severn, A Life: The Rewards of Friendship (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009), 234.
12 Scott, Joseph Severn, 24.
13 Ibid., 710–12.
14 Joseph Severn, My Tedious Life, cited in Scott, 663.
15 Scott, Joseph Severn, 312, from a letter of 17 November 1827, held in private collection.
16 Brown, Rewards of Friendship, 195.
17 Scott, Joseph Severn, 312.
18 See note 10 above.
19 Sidney Colvin, Life of John Keats (London: Macmillan, 1917), 519–20.
20 Colvin, Life of Keats, 524.
21 Ibid., 526.
22 Sharp, Life and Letters, 118.
23 John Sterling, Essays and Tales (London, 1848), quoted in Colvin, Life of Keats, 527.
24 Grant F. Scott, ‘New Severn Letters and Paintings: An Update with Corrections,’ Keats-Shelley Journal 58 (2009): 114–38.
25 Sheila Birkenhead, Against Oblivion: The Life of Joseph Severn (Edinburgh: Cassell and Company Ltd, 1943), 155.
26 Scott, Joseph Severn, 330–2.
27 Ibid., 660.
28 Walter Jackson Bate, John Keats (Cambridge, MA: The Belknap Press, 1963), 696.
29 Brown, Rewards of Friendship, 228–9.
30 Scott, Joseph Severn, 395–404.
31 Ibid., 424–5.
32 Ibid., 547–50.
33 See note 26 above.
34 Torquato Tasso, Jerusalem Delivered: An English Prose Version (Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1987), 13.
35 John Keats, ‘On Fame.’
36 Using the abridged title of The Infant of the Apocalypse in the index of Joseph Severn: Letters and Memoirs (2005), Grant F. Scott, identifies the altarpiece as its smaller copy on three occasions, and once again in ‘New Severn Letters and Paintings: An Update with Corrections’ (2009). Sue Brown identifies the altarpiece as The Infant of the Apocalypse Saved from the Jaw of the Dragon in her biography Joseph Severn, A Life: The Rewards of Friendship (2009).
37 Scott, 631.
38 Krzysztof Cieszkowski to Peter Larner, personal email communication.
Additional information
Notes on contributors
Peter Larner
Peter Larner is an independent scholar, a former CEO in the logistics industry, and a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Logistics and Transport. At the age of 74, this is his first published essay.