20 Giugno, 2011. Keats and Shelley House.

In an attempt to reconnect with some academic subjects other than religion and classical art and mythology, I decided to steer clear of churches today (most museums are closed on Mondays, and this fact was a contributing factor to my decision). Instead, I headed out on my own toward the Spanish Steps, a landmark in Rome. I knew that somewhere nearby the steps there is located the apartment in which John Keats died.

Now, Romanticism isn’t normally my thing. I’m not really against it as an entire genre; I love Poe, for instance; but there are aspects of the movement that I find, for lack of a better word, irritating. Some of it just bugs me. I don’t really have any strong feelings against it – it’s just not really for me.

That being said, I’m just so sick of looking at marble statues and old churches that I would have welcomed the chance to go see almost anything else. Of course, my options in Rome are limited, so I chose the one place I could find that would provide me with some level of education (so I could feel like I did something productive today) as well as give me a break from the rest of Rome: the Shelley-Keats House Museum.

It certainly was a breath of fresh air. Probably my favorite thing about it was that it was an English oasis in the Italian desert. The curator was British, and the lady I bought the ticket from spoke perfect American English (I’m gonna go out on a limb here and say that she was an American). I also happened to pick the right time to go, as I got to sit in on the majority of a lecture by the curator for a class of American students. I heard all kinds of cool stuff about the lives of Keats and Shelley for free.

After the lesson, I got to look around (pictures were allowed!) and saw the room where Keats died of tuberculosis and the urn that holds a piece of Shelley’s jawbone. I also saw Keats’ drawing of the Grecian urn, the subject of his famous “Ode to a Grecian Urn”. The collection also included an impressive number of letters written by the writers and their friends, and an official letter from Teddy Roosevelt (complete with White House letterhead and authentic signature) regarding the establishment of the house as a memorial/museum. My only complaint is that the entire museum only constituted about four rooms, but since it was a residence originally, I suppose it couldn’t be helped.