Q 01/05

Keats is counted among which generation of English Romantic poets?

A) The second

B) The first

C) The third

D) The fourth

Answer · why

A) The second

The second generation were still children when the first launched the movement in 1798, yet its three leading poets all died young, years before the e...

Q 02/05

Of what disease did Keats die at the age of 25?

A) Pneumonia

B) Tuberculosis

C) Cholera

D) Scarlet fever

Answer · why

B) Tuberculosis

Tuberculosis had already killed his mother and a brother. Roman law treated it as contagious, so after he died the furniture in his room was burned.

Q 03/05

Which words complete the famous opening line of Keats's Endymion, 'A thing of beauty is…'?

A) A truth eternal

B) Its own reward

C) A joy for ever

D) A fleeting dream

Answer · why

C) A joy for ever

'A joy for ever' was an afterthought: a fellow medical student recalled Keats first trying 'a constant joy' on him, then rewriting the line when he se...

Q 04/05

What was Keats's father's job?

A) Curate of a country parish

B) Merchant in the wine trade

C) Master at a grammar school

D) Ostler at a livery stable

Answer · why

D) Ostler at a livery stable

Ostler at a livery stable: Keats's father worked at the Swan and Hoop in London, married the owner's daughter and ended up managing the business himse...

Q 05/05

How did Keats's father die in 1804, when the boy was eight?

A) A fall from his horse

B) A drowning in the Thames

C) A fever caught at sea

D) An outbreak of cholera

Answer · why

A) A fall from his horse

A fall from his horse on a late ride home fractured his skull, and he died the next morning. Their mother died six years later, leaving the four child...