Keats in Italy Second leaf of MS Keats 4.3.27. Presented by
Arthur A. Houghton, Jr., 1970. John Keats. Letter to Charles
Armitage Brown, November 1, 1820. Transcribed by Charles Brown.
Brown wrote to Keats after receiving Keats’s November 1st
letter, urging Keats to “Keep your mind easy, my dear fellow, &
no fear of your body... If I have a right to guess, a certain
person next door is a little disappointed at not receiving a
letter from you, but not a word has dropped. She wrote to you
lately... ” Keats replied with this letter, which now exists
only in this transcription of Brown’s. The persuasion that I
shall see her no more will kill me... My dear Brown, I should
have had her when I was in health, and I should have remained
well. I can bear to die – I cannot bear to leave her. Oh, God!
God! God! Everything I have in my trunks that reminds me of her
goes through me like a spear. The silk lining she put in my
travelling cap scalds my head. My imagination is horribly vivid
about her – I hear her. There is no