This Grave of Keats summary begins in a Roman cemetery. Oscar Wilde visited the grave of John Keats in the Protestant Cemetery in Rome in 1877 and wrote this sonnet in tribute, treating the young Romantic poet as a martyr killed by the world’s cruelty. Read the full text of The Grave of Keats on Poetry Catalog.
The Grave of Keats Summary
Lines 1–5: the martyr at rest. “Rid of the world’s injustice, and his pain, / He rests at last beneath God’s veil of blue.” Keats was “Taken from life when life and love were new.” He is “The youngest of the martyrs,” “Fair as Sebastian, and as early slain.”
Lines 6–8: the grave. No mourning trees stand over him: “No cypress shades his grave, no funeral yew.” Instead, “gentle violets weeping with the dew / Weave on his bones an ever-blossoming chain.”
Lines 9–11: praise. Three cries: “O proudest heart that broke for misery! / O sweetest lips since those of Mitylene! / O poet-painter of our English Land!”
Lines 12–14: memory. Keats’s epitaph says his name was “writ in water.” Wilde answers: “Thy name was writ in water—it shall stand.” His tears will keep Keats’s memory green, “As Isabella did her Basil-tree.”
Key Facts
- Poet: Oscar Wilde (1854–1900)
- Written: after Wilde’s 1877 visit to Rome; published in Poems (1881)
- Subject: John Keats (1795–1821), who died in Rome aged 25
- Form: Petrarchan sonnet
- Speaker: a young poet mourning an older one
- Tone: reverent, grieving, defiant at the end
Themes
The poet as martyr. Wilde follows a Romantic legend that harsh reviews helped kill Keats. “The world’s injustice” becomes martyrdom.
Beauty in death. Violets, not cypress, mark the grave. Keats’s death is made beautiful.
Lasting fame. Keats feared he would be forgotten. Wilde insists his name “shall stand.”
Poet honoring poet. The poem ends with an image from Keats’s own work, so his poetry keeps him alive.
Key Lines Explained
Fair as Sebastian, and as early slain.
Saint Sebastian, a young martyr shot with arrows, was a favorite subject of painters and of Wilde.
But gentle violets weeping with the dew
Personification: the dew makes the flowers seem to cry. Violets did grow on Keats’s grave.
O sweetest lips since those of Mitylene!
Mitylene is on Lesbos, home of Sappho. Wilde ranks Keats with the greatest lyric poet of Greece.
Thy name was writ in water—it shall stand:
Keats’s gravestone reads “Here lies One Whose Name was writ in Water.” Wilde turns the epitaph around.
As Isabella did her Basil-tree.
From Keats’s “Isabella, or the Pot of Basil,” where Isabella keeps a pot of basil alive with her tears.
Form, Meter and Rhyme
A Petrarchan sonnet in iambic pentameter, rhyming ABBAABBA CDEEDC, with an octave about the grave and a sestet of praise. The sestet’s run of “O” exclamations raises the emotion before the calm, firm close.
The Grave of Keats FAQ
What is The Grave of Keats about?
Wilde’s tribute to John Keats, written after visiting his grave in Rome.
Why does Wilde call Keats a martyr?
He follows the legend that cruel critics broke Keats’s heart and hastened his death.
What does “writ in water” mean?
It quotes Keats’s epitaph, meaning a name that will vanish. Wilde says it will last.
Who is Isabella?
The heroine of Keats’s poem “Isabella, or the Pot of Basil.”