Reliable friend, less reliable consul

The twin graves lie side-by-side in the Protestant cemetery in Rome, much visited, much photographed; one decorated with the lyre of the poet, the other with the palette of the painter. Beneath the first lie the remains of one of England’s greatest poets, who died at the age of 25. Beneath the second lies a minor artist and consular official who survived into old age, and whose stone is inscribed: ‘Joseph Severn, devoted friend and death-bed companion of JOHN KEATS.’ Severn’s grave would be forgotten and unvisited if it were not for the pilgrims who come to venerate Keats. In the same way, his life would be forgotten and unvisited if it had not been for his association with the poet. This friendship, tested to extremes at Keats’s agonising death-bed in the stuffy little room overlooking the Spanish Steps, has become Severn’s only claim to fame. His is the one voice to speak to us of those last days:

At half-past-four the approaches of death came on — ‘Severn… S… lift me up for I am dying — I shall die easy — don’t be frightened — thank God it has come.’ — I lifted him up in my arms —– and the phlegm seemed boiling in his throat — this increased until 11 at night, when he gradually sunk into death — so quiet I thought he slept.

Severn’s sketch of the dying Keats, done to pass the long night vigils, has become an icon of the Romantic movement. But what happened afterwards, when he had been buried and the contents of his contaminated room thrown on the bonfire? The journey to Rome with Keats occupied less than six months of Severn’s life. He was to survive for another 58 years, and much new light is thrown on this long life by Grant Scott’s excellent new collection of Severn’s letters and memoirs — the last of which is rather touchingly titled My Tedious Life.