M. Murry, M. R. Ridley, Hyder Rollins, Robert Gittings, Aileen Ward, W.J. Bate, Ian Jack, John Jones and Jack Stillinger figure largely. I would also like to thank Mr O. A. Baker of Plymouth Public Library, Dr W. H. Bond of Harvard University Library, Dr David Fleeman, Geoffrey Hill, Mr D. I. Masson of the Brotherton Library in the University of Leeds, J. C. Maxwell and Dr E. T. Webb, who have generously given me their help on a number of points. Above all, I am indebted to the encouragement and detailed criticism given by Professor C. B. Ricks, the General Editor of this series.

In revising the text I have benefited very considerably from Professor Stillinger’s published work and from his scholarly and personal generosity in commenting on my work in detail. I am also grateful to Father Martin Jarrett-Kerr for pointing out several misprints.

For permission to publish copyright material, I am grateful to Harvard University Press for the extracts from The Letters of John Keats 1814–21, ed. H. E. Rollins (1958), The Keats Circle: Letters and Papers, ed. H. E. Rollins (1965), and W. J. Bate, John Keats (1963); to the Clarendon Press for the quotations from H. W. Garrod’s The Poetical Works of John Keats (rev.