John Keats' apprenticeship

Abstract

Visitors to Keats House museum in London, UK, are often surprised by the first display case. A small leather notebook, containing lecture notes on physiology and anatomy, is flanked by medical instruments—pharmacy jars, forceps, amputation saws, a leech urn. Labels explain that the notes were made by John Keats during his 2-year stint as a medical student at Guy's Hospital, which followed his 4-year apprenticeship to an apothecary–surgeon. The poet was, you learn, soon promoted to surgical dresser at Guy's, a position which involved “the first management of serious incidents”, 24 hours a day for 1 week out of every 3. A “Certificate to Practice as an Apothecary” confirms the Romantic poet was a bright student star who passed his apothecary exam at the first attempt. According to a museum attendant, many pilgrims to Keats House are unfamiliar with his medical studies. Most are astonished to find out Keats dedicated more of his short, 25-year life to the lancet than he did to his lyrics. If my own recent trip to Keats House is anything to go by, that discovery is not necessarily accompanied by interest: visitors generally spent only a short time by the medical display, before moving on to the literary relics. Their indifference reminded me of the many Keats critics who dismiss the poet's medical training as a professional false start, before passing swiftly on to an analysis of the “exquisite”, “aesthetic” verse that secured him a plot on Parnassus.