John clare biography 1864 election

  • When John Clare died of a stroke on May 20 1864, aged 70, he was almost a forgotten figure.
  • The Fitzwilliam concern for Clare continued into the period of his confinement in Northampton.
  • John Clare taught himself to write poetry while a plough-boy in rural Northamptonshire.

    • •

    These desolate lines are from “I Am,” one of the great poems Clare wrote in the Northampton General Lunatic Asylum, the second asyl to which he was committed. In July, 1841, he had escaped from Dr. Allen’s asylum and walked the hundred-odd miles home, so hungry on the journey that he ate grass. When he arrived, he was devastated not to find his first love, Mary Joyce, and their (imaginary) children there: he had convinced himself that he was married to her as well as to Patty. Clare’s stay at home lasted fem months, before he was committed igen, this time to the public asyl in Northampton, “much the grandest building Clare ever lived in,” as Bate notes. Some of his best poetry dates from the early years in the asylum—poetry about whose existence his contemporaries had no idea. He remained there for the rest of his life, with the flow of poems and letters gradually dwindling, and lived in total obscurity until his death, from a stroke, in 1864, at the age of seventy.

    Poets nee

    •

    John Clare and ‘The Tragedy of the Enclosures’

    (John Clare 1793 – 1864)

    Poems

    The Mores

    Rememberances

    To a Fallen Elm

    Background to John Clare and the Inclosures by Dave Featherstone

     

    The Mores

     

    Far spread the moorey ground a level scene

    Bespread with rush and one eternal green

    That never felt the rage of blundering plough

    Though centurys wreathed spring’s blossoms on its brow

    Still meeting plains that stretched them far away

    In uncheckt shadows of green brown, and grey

    Unbounded freedom ruled the wandering scene

    Nor fence of ownership crept in between

    To hide the prospect of the following eye

    Its only bondage was the circling sky

    One mighty flat undwarfed by bush and tree

    Spread its faint shadow of immensity

    And lost itself, which seemed to eke its bounds

    In the blue mist the horizon’s edge surrounds

    Now this sweet vision of my boyish hours

    Free as spring clouds and wild as summer flowers

    Is faded all &

    •

    (Clare Day – Badger John Clare’s Birthday)

    I want to share with you a poem which follows on from George Monbiot’s commemoration a couple of days ago of the poet John Clare (he was born at this time of year 200 years ago, and poetically wrote about the destruction of the Natural World by Man).

    http://m.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/jul/09/john-clare-poetry

    George Montbiot’s piece is well worth reading, reminding us of the terrible effect we as a race have had on the countryside, not to mention our building of ever-expanding sterile cities.

    My friend Jane Evans (with thanks also to Bob Blizzard) sent me this – one of Clare’s most heart-breaking pieces … recounting how, even in those days, the poor badgers were being persecuted. How unutterably sad that this barbarity is still going on today. The human race has so much to be ashamed of.

    OK. The poem.

    Badger. by John Clare
    (13 July 1793 – 20 May 1864), the son of a farm

  • john clare biography 1864 election