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'{{for|the author and journalist|John Clare (journalist)}} {{EngvarB|date=September 2013}} {{Infobox writer <!-- for more information see [[:Template:Infobox writer/doc]] --> | name = John Clare| image = John Clare.jpg | birth_date = {{birth-date|df=yes|13 July 1793}} | birth_place = [[Helpston]], [[Soke of Peterborough]], Northamptonshire, England | death_date = {{death-date and age|20 May 1864|13 July 1793}} | death_place = [[St Andrew's Hospital|Northampton General Lunatic Asylum]], [[Northampton]], England | notableworks = ''Poems Descriptive of Rural Life and Scenery'' | genre = Rural |James Thomson]], [[Lord Byron]], [[William Shakespeare]] | signature = John Clare signature.svg }} '''John Clare''' (13 July 1793 – 20 May 1864) was an English poet, the son of a farm labourer, who came to be known for his celebratory representations of the English countryside and his lamentation of its disruption.<ref>Geoffrey Summerfield, in introduction to ''John Clare: Selected Poems'', Penguin Books 1990, pp 13–22. ISBN 0-14-043724-X</ref> His poetry underwent a major re-evaluation in the late 20th century and he is often now considered to be among the most important 19th-century poets.<ref>Sales, Roger (2002) ''John Clare: A Literary Life''; Palgrave Macmillian ISBN 0-333-65270-3</ref> His biographer [[Jonathan Bate]] states that Clare was "the greatest labouring-class poet that England has ever produced. No one has ever written more powerfully of nature, of a rural childhood, and of the alienated and unstable self".<ref>Bate, Jonathan (2003) John Clare: A biography; Farrar, Straus and Giroux</ref> ==Life== ===Early life=== Clare was born in [[Helpston]], six miles to the north of the city of [[Peterborough]]. In his lifetime, the village was in the [[Soke of Peterborough]] in Northamptonshire and his memorial calls him "The Northamptonshire Peasant Poet". Helpston now lies in the Peterborough unitary authority of Cambridgeshire. He became an agricultural labourer while still a child; however, he attended school in [[Glinton, Cambridgeshire|Glinton]] church until he was twelve. In his early adult years, Clare became a [http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/potboy pot boy] in the ''Blue Bell'' [[public house]] and fell in love with Mary Joyce; but her father, a prosperous farmer, forbade her to meet him. Subsequently he was a gardener at [[Burghley House]]. He enlisted in the [[Militia (United Kingdom)|militia]], tried camp life with Gypsies, and worked in [[Pickworth, Rutland|Pickworth]] as a [[Lime kiln#Early kilns|lime burner]] in 1817. In the following year he was obliged to accept [[Poor relief|parish relief]].<ref>Louis Untermeyer, in "A Treasury of Great Poems, English and American, from the Foundations of the English Spirit to the Outstanding Poetry of our Own Time with Lives of the Poets and Historical Settings Selected and Integrated", Simon and Schuster 1942, p.709</ref> Malnutrition stemming from childhood may be the main culprit behind his 5-foot stature and may have contributed to his poor physical health in later life. ===Early poems=== Clare had bought a copy of [[James Thomson (poet)|Thomson]]'s ''[[The Seasons (Thomson poem)|The Seasons]]'' and began to write poems and sonnets. In an attempt to hold off his parents' eviction from their home, Clare offered his poems to a local bookseller named Edward Drury. Drury sent Clare's poetry to his cousin [[John Taylor (English publisher)|John Taylor]] of the publishing firm of Taylor & Hessey, who had published the work of [[John Keats]]. Taylor published Clare's ''Poems Descriptive of Rural Life and Scenery'' in 1820. This book was highly praised, and in the next year his ''Village Minstrel and other Poems'' were published. ===Midlife=== [[File:John Clare's birthplace, Helpston, Peterborough - geograph.org.uk - 217344.jpg|thumb|right|Clare's birthplace, [[Helpston]], [[Peterborough]]. The cottage was subdivided with his family renting a part.]] He had married Martha ("Patty") Turner in 1820. An annuity of 15 [[guineas]] from the [[Brownlow Cecil, 2nd Marquess of Exeter|Marquess of Exeter]], in whose service he had been, was supplemented by subscription, so that Clare became possessed of £45 annually, a sum far beyond what he had ever earned. Soon, however, his income became insufficient, and in 1823 he was nearly penniless. ''The Shepherd's Calendar'' (1827) met with little success, which was not increased by his [[Hawker (trade)|hawking]] it himself. As he worked again in the fields his health temporarily improved; but he soon became seriously ill. [[William Fitzwilliam, 4th Earl Fitzwilliam|Earl FitzWilliam]] presented him with a new cottage and a piece of ground, but Clare could not settle in his new home. Clare was constantly torn between the two worlds of literary London and his often illiterate neighbours; between the need to write poetry and the need for money to feed and clothe his children. His health began to suffer, and he had bouts of severe depression, which became worse after his sixth child was born in 1830 and as his poetry sold less well. In 1832, his friends and his London patrons clubbed together to move the family to a larger cottage with a smallholding in the village of [[Northborough]], not far from Helpston. However, he felt only more alienated. His last work, the ''Rural Muse'' (1835), was noticed favourably by [[John Wilson (Scottish writer)|Christopher North]] and other reviewers, but this was not enough to support his wife and seven children. Clare's mental health began to worsen. As his alcohol consumption steadily increased along with his dissatisfaction with his own identity, Clare's behaviour became more erratic. A notable instance of this behaviour was demonstrated in his interruption of a performance of ''[[The Merchant of Venice]]'', in which Clare verbally assaulted [[Shylock]]. He was becoming a burden to Patty and his family, and in July 1837, on the recommendation of his publishing friend, John Taylor, Clare went of his own volition (accompanied by a friend of Taylor's) to Dr Matthew Allen's private asylum [[High Beach]] near [[Loughton]], in [[Epping Forest]]. Taylor had assured Clare that he would receive the best medical care. ===Later life and death=== During his first few asylum years in [[High Beach]], Essex (1837–1841),<ref>[http://www.bbc.co.uk/arts/romantics/clare.shtml BBC article] Retrieved 12 September 2013</ref> Clare re-wrote famous poems and sonnets by [[Lord Byron]]. His own version of ''Child Harold'' became a lament for past lost love, and ''Don Juan, A Poem'' became an acerbic, misogynistic, sexualised rant redolent of an ageing [[British Regency|Regency]] dandy. Clare also took credit for [[Shakespeare]]'s plays, claiming to be the [[Renaissance]] genius himself. "I'm John Clare now," the poet claimed to a newspaper editor, "I was Byron and Shakespeare formerly." In 1841, Clare absconded from the asylum in Essex, to walk home, believing that he was to meet his first love Mary Joyce; Clare was convinced that he was married with children to her and Martha as well. He did not believe her family when they told him she had died accidentally three years earlier in a house fire. He remained free, mostly at home in Northborough, for the five months following, but eventually Patty called the doctors in. Between Christmas and New Year in 1841, Clare was committed to the Northampton General Lunatic Asylum (now [[St Andrew's Hospital]]). Upon Clare's arrival at the asylum, the accompanying doctor, [[Fenwick Skrimshire]], who had treated Clare since 1820,<ref>Geoffrey Summerfield, Hugh Haughton, Adam Phillips, "John Clare in context", Cambridge University Press, 1994, ISBN 0-521-44547-7, p.263</ref> completed the admission papers. To the enquiry "Was the insanity preceded by any severe or long-continued mental emotion or exertion?", Dr Skrimshire entered: "After years of poetical prosing."<ref>Margaret Grainger (ed), "The natural history prose writings of John Clare", ''Oxford English Texts'', Oxford University Press, 1983, ISBN 0-19-818517-0, p.34</ref> He remained here for the rest of his life under the humane regime of Dr [[Thomas Octavius Prichard]], encouraged and helped to write. Here he wrote possibly his most famous poem, ''[[I Am (poem)|I Am]]''. He died on 20 May 1864, in his 71st year. His remains were returned to Helpston for burial in St Botolph’s churchyard. Today, children at the John Clare School, Helpston's primary, parade through the village and place their 'midsummer cushions' around Clare's gravestone (which has the inscriptions "To the Memory of John Clare The Northamptonshire Peasant Poet" and "A Poet is Born not Made") on his birthday, in honour of their most famous resident.<ref>{{cite web|author=1|url=http://www.stamfordmercury.co.uk/news/Festival-celebrated-poet39s-life-and.4288056.jp |title=Festival celebrated poet's life and work; '&#39;Rutland and Stamford Mercury'&#39; |publisher=Stamfordmercury.co.uk |date=15 July 2008 |accessdate=15 August 2012}}</ref> ==Poetry== [[File:John Clare Memorial, Helpston, Peterborough - geograph.org.uk - 87487.jpg|thumb|right|John Clare memorial, Helpston]] In his time, Clare was commonly known as "the [[Northamptonshire]] Peasant Poet". His formal education was brief, his other employment and class-origins were lowly. Clare resisted the use of the increasingly standardised English grammar and [[orthography]] in his poetry and prose, alluding to political reasoning in comparing 'grammar' (in a wider sense of orthography) to tyrannical government and slavery, personifying it in jocular fashion as a 'bitch'.<ref>Asked by his cousin and publisher [[John Taylor (English publisher)|John Taylor]] to correct a passage for publication, he answered "I may alter but I cannot mend&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;grammer in learning is like tyranny in government--confound the bitch ill never be her slave & have a vast good mind not to alter the verse in question..." (Letter 133). See {{Cite book |editor1-last=Storey |editor1-first=Edward |title=The Letters of John Clare |location=Oxford |publisher=Clarendon Press |year=1985 |page=231 |isbn=9780198126690 |url=http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=lnRaAAAAMAAJ&q=bitch}}</ref> He wrote in his Northamptonshire dialect, introducing local words to the literary canon such as 'pooty' (snail), 'lady-cow' ([[Coccinellidae|ladybird]]), 'crizzle' (to crisp) and 'throstle' ([[song thrush]]). In his early life he struggled to find a place for his poetry in the changing literary fashions of the day. He also felt that he did not belong with other peasants. Clare once wrote <blockquote> "I live here among the ignorant like a lost man in fact like one whom the rest seemes careless of having anything to do with—they hardly dare talk in my company for fear I should mention them in my writings and I find more pleasure in wandering the fields than in musing among my silent neighbours who are insensible to everything but toiling and talking of it and that to no purpose." </blockquote> It is common to see an absence of punctuation in many of Clare's original writings, although many publishers felt the need to remedy this practice in the majority of his work. Clare argued with his editors about how it should be presented to the public. Clare grew up during a period of massive changes in both town and countryside as the [[Industrial Revolution]] swept Europe. Many former agricultural workers, including children, moved away from the countryside to over-crowded cities, following factory work. The [[British Agricultural Revolution|Agricultural Revolution]] saw pastures ploughed up, trees and hedges uprooted, the fens drained and the common land [[Enclosure|enclosed]]. This destruction of a centuries-old way of life distressed Clare deeply. His political and social views were predominantly conservative ("I am as far as my politics reaches 'King and Country'—no Innovations in Religion and Government say I."). He refused even to complain about the subordinate position to which English society relegated him, swearing that "with the old dish that was served to my forefathers I am content."<ref>{{cite web|last=Manjoo |first=Farhad |url=http://www.slate.com/id/2089950/ |title=Man Out of Time by Christopher Caldwell; Slate, 17 Oct., 2003 |publisher=Slate.com |date=4 August 2012 |accessdate=15 August 2012}}</ref> His early work delights both in nature and the cycle of the rural year. Poems such as ''Winter Evening'', ''Haymaking'' and ''Wood Pictures in Summer'' celebrate the beauty of the world and the certainties of rural life, where animals must be fed and crops harvested. Poems such as ''Little Trotty Wagtail'' show his sharp observation of wildlife, though ''The Badger'' shows his lack of sentiment about the place of animals in the countryside. At this time, he often used poetic forms such as the sonnet and the rhyming couplet. His later poetry tends to be more meditative and uses forms similar to the folk songs and ballads of his youth. An example of this is ''Evening''. His knowledge of the natural world went far beyond that of the major [[romantic poetry|Romantic]] poets. However, poems such as ''[[I Am (poem)|I Am]]'' show a [[metaphysics|metaphysical]] depth on a par with his contemporary poets and many of his pre-asylum poems deal with intricate play on the nature of linguistics. His 'bird's nest poems', it can be argued, illustrate the self-awareness, and obsession with the creative process that captivated the romantics. Clare was the most influential poet, aside from [[Wordsworth]], to practice in an older style.<ref>{{cite book | first=Alastair | last=Fowler | year=1989 | title= The History of English Literature | edition= | publisher=Harvard University Press | location=Cambridge, MA | page= 250 | isbn= 0-674-39664-2 }}</ref> ==Revival of interest in the twentieth century== Clare was relatively forgotten during the later nineteenth century, but interest in his work was revived by [[Arthur Symons]] in 1908, [[Edmund Blunden]] in 1920 and John and Anne Tibble in their ground-breaking 1935 2-volume edition. [[Benjamin Britten]] set some of 'May' from ''A Shepherd's Calendar'' in his ''[[Spring Symphony]]'' of 1948, and included a setting of ''The Evening Primrose'' in his [[List of compositions by Benjamin Britten|''Five Flower Songs'']]. Copyright to much of his work has been claimed since 1965 by the editor of the ''Complete Poetry'',<ref>[[Oxford University Press]], 9 vols., 1984–2003)</ref> Professor Eric Robinson, though these claims were contested. Recent publishers have refused to acknowledge the claim (especially in recent editions from Faber and Carcanet) and it seems the copyright is now defunct.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.johnclare.info |title=The John Clare Page website 'copyright' section: full list of recent reactions to the copyright dispute |publisher=Johnclare.info |date= |accessdate=15 August 2012}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|author=John Goodridge |url=http://www.guardianunlimited.co.uk/Archive/Article/0,4273,4042964,00.html |title=Poor Clare by John Goodridge, an article summarising the copyright issue |publisher=Guardianunlimited.co.uk |date= |accessdate=15 August 2012}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|url=http://books.guardian.co.uk/review/story/0,12084,885727,00.html |title=Letter to the Guardian: Robinson's most recent public declaration of ownership of copyright, February 2003 |publisher=Books.guardian.co.uk |date= 31 January 2003|accessdate=15 August 2012 |location=London}}</ref> The largest collection of original Clare manuscripts are housed at [[Peterborough Museum and Art Gallery]], where they are available to view by appointment. Altering what Clare actually wrote continued into the later twentieth century; for instance, [[Helen Gardner (critic)|Helen Gardner]] amended not only the punctuation but also the spelling and grammar in The [[New Oxford Book of English Verse 1250-1950]] (1972) which she edited. Since 1993, the John Clare Society of North America has organised an annual session of scholarly papers concerning John Clare at the annual Convention of the [[Modern Language Association|Modern Language Association of America]].<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.johnclare.org/ClareSessionMLA.htm |title=MLA Session organized by the John Clare Society of North America |publisher=Johnclare.org |date= |accessdate=15 August 2012}}</ref> ==John Clare Cottage== The thatched cottage where he was born was bought by the John Clare Trust in 2005.<ref>[http://www.clarecottage.org/ clarecottage.org]</ref> In May 2007 the Trust gained £1.27m of funding from the [[Heritage Lottery Fund]] and commissioned [[Jefferson Sheard Architects]] to create a new landscape design and Visitor Centre, including a cafe, shop and exhibition space. The Cottage at 12 Woodgate, Helpston has been restored using traditional building methods and is open to the public. In 2013 the John Clare Trust received a further grant from the Heritage Lottery Fund to help preserve the building and provide educational activities for youngsters visiting the cottage.<ref>[http://www.peterboroughtoday.co.uk/what-s-on/leisure-lifestyle/peterborough-heritage-sites-gets-big-lottery-boost-1-5185021 "Peterborough heritage sites gets big lottery boost" ''Peterborough Telegraph'' 13 June 2013]</ref> ==Poetry collections by Clare (chronological)== {{Expand section|date=February 2007}} *''Poems Descriptive of Rural Life and Scenery.'' London, 1820. *''The Village Minstrel, and Other Poems.'' London, 1821. *''The Shepherd's Calendar with Village Stories and Other Poems.'' London, 1827 *''The Rural Muse.'' London, 1835. *''Sonnet.'' London 1841 *''[[First Love (poem)|First Love]]'' *''Snow Storm.'' *''The Firetail.'' *''The Badger'' – Time unknown ==Works about Clare (chronological)== *Martin, Frederick. ''The Life of John Clare.' 1865. *Cherry, J. L. ''Life and remains of John Clare.'' 1873. *[[Norman Gale|Gale, Norman]]. ''Clare's Poems.'' 1901. *Wilson, June. ''Green Shadows: The Life of John Clare.'' 1951. *[[Edward Bond|Bond, Edward]]. ''[[The Fool (Edward Bond play)|The Fool]]''. 1975. *Dendurent, H. O. ''John Clare: A Reference Guide.'' Boston: G. K. Hall, 1978. *[[Edward Storey|Storey, Edward]]. ''A Right to Song: The Life of John Clare.'' London: Methuen, 1982. *Brownlow, Timothy. ''John Clare and Picturesque Landscape.'' 1983. *MacKenna, John: ''Clare : a novel.'' – Belfast : The Blackstaff Press, 1993 ISBN 0-85640-467-5 (Fictional Biography) *[[Hugh Haughton|Haughton, Hugh]], Adam Phillips, and Geoffrey Summerfield. ''John Clare in Context.'' Cambridge University Press, 1994. ISBN 0-521-44547-7. *[[Alan Moore|Moore, Alan]], ''[[Voice of the Fire]]'' (Chapter 10 only), Great Britain: Victor Gollancz. *Goodridge, John, and Kovesi, Simon eds., ''John Clare: New Approaches'' John Clare Society, 2000. *[[Jonathan Bate|Bate, Jonathan]]. ''John Clare.'' London: Picador, 2003. *Vardy, Alan B. '' [[John Clare, Politics and Poetry]]'' London: Palgrave MacMillan, 2003. *[[Iain Sinclair|Sinclair, Iain]]. ''Edge of The Orison: In the Traces of John Clare's "Journey Out of Essex"'' Hamish Hamilton, 2005. *MacKay, John. ''Inscription and Modernity: From Wordsworth to Mandelstam.'' Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2006. ISBN 0-253-34749-1 *Powell, David, ''First Publications of John Clare’s Poems.'' John Clare Society of North America, 2009.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.johnclare.org/PowellBook.htm |title=David Powell, '&#39;First Publications of John Clare’s Poems'&#39;. 2009 |publisher=Johnclare.org |date= |accessdate=15 August 2012}}</ref> *Akroyd, Carry, '' 'Natures Powers & Spells': Landscape Change, John Clare and Me'', Langford Press, 2009 ISBN 978-1-904078-35-7 *Allnatt, Judith, ''The Poet's Wife'', Doubleday, 2010 (fiction) ISBN 0-385-61332-6 *[[Adam Foulds|Foulds, Adam]]. "The Quickening Maze", Penguin, 2010 *[[D. C. Moore|Moore, DC]], ''Town'' (Play)<ref>{{cite news|author=Michael Billington |url=http://www.guardian.co.uk/stage/2010/jun/22/town-review |title=22 June 2010 '&#39;Guardian'&#39; review of '&#39;Town'&#39; by D. C. Moore |publisher=Guardian |date=23 June 2010 |accessdate=15 August 2012 |location=London}}</ref> ==References== {{Reflist}}<!--added above External links/Sources by script-assisted edit--> == External links == {{wikisource author}} {{Commons category|John Clare}} * [https://archive.org/search.php?query=creator%3A%22John%20Clare%22%20AND%20mediatype%3Aaudio Works by John Clare] via [[LibriVox]] (audio recordings) * {{gutenberg author| id=Clare+John+(1793–1864) | name=John Clare}} (plain text and HTML) * [http://www.johnclare.org.uk/ The John Clare Society] * [http://www.johnclare.org/ The John Clare Society of North America] * [http://www.clarecottage.org/ Clare Cottage, Helpston] * [http://www.johnclare.info The John Clare Page] chronology, poems, images, essays, bibliography, press coverage, links etc. * [http://www.johnclare.info/birtwhistle.htm The 1824 essay "Popularity in Authorship"] introduced by the poet [[John Birtwhistle]]. * [http://www.johnclarepoetry.co.uk John Clare's family researching and challenging stigma] * {{NRA|P43653}} * [http://theotherpages.org/poems/poem-cd.html#clare Index entry for John Clare at Poets' Corner] {{Use dmy dates|date=September 2013}} {{Authority control|VIAF=51703338}} {{Persondata | NAME = Clare, John | ALTERNATIVE NAMES = | SHORT DESCRIPTION = British writer | DATE OF BIRTH = 13 July 1793 | PLACE OF BIRTH = [[Helpston]], [[Soke of Peterborough]], Northamptonshire, England | DATE OF DEATH = 20 May 1864 | PLACE OF DEATH = [[St Andrew's Hospital|Northampton General Lunatic Asylum]], [[Northampton]], England }} {{DEFAULTSORT:Clare, John}} [[Category:English poets]] [[Category:Victorian poets]] [[Category:Sonneteers]] [[Category:People from Peterborough]] [[Category:People from Northamptonshire]] [[Category:Romantic poets]] [[Category:Psychiatric patients]] [[Category:1793 births]] [[Category:1864 deaths]] {{Link FA|vls}}'