To Autumn

Keats wrote “To Autumn” in the twilight of his life. In fact, it was the very last poem written before his death in 1821. “To Autumn” was the last of his “1819 Odes,” a collection of six pieces which would become the most renowned work of his short but brilliant career.

“To Autumn” was written on September 19, 1819, after Keats had returned from a walk near the river Itchen and delighted in the sights and sounds and smells of the season. At this point, the tuberculosis that had taken his mother and brother was beginning to make itself felt. Shortly after composing “To Autumn,” Keats would, at his doctor’s recommendation, move to Rome to live out the last days of his life. He may have been aware at this point that his time with the British landscape was coming to an end in one way or another and was viewing the world with fresh eyes.

The poem represents a season of death and decay, but the author presents it as something to be embraced rather than feared. In one stanza, the personified character of Autumn reaches back towards memories of Spring, but Keats gently admonishes: “Think not of them, thou hast thy music too” (Line 24).