Here is the uncropped photo, taken by me, with my cheapo camera, on the terrace, in the shade .... yeah, I know, I need to get it properly scanned.
To Autumn is one of my favourite Keats poems. We had to learn it by heart at school and it was no chore, I date my Keats obsession from then.
I got in the maturing sun, the bees that think warm days will never cease, the soft-dying day and the gathering swallows twittering in the skies...
No full-grown lambs, stubble plains, river sallows or cider-presses - well this IS Hampstead and not Winchester where it was written.
I have substituted a thrush for the redbreast of the poem too.
Keats, who lived in the left part of what was then known as Wentworth Place, referred to the thrush in the garden in some of his letters to his great love, Fanny Brawne, who lived on the right hand side of the house. In one letter to her he mentioned "your new black dress which I like so much", so I have given her exactly that.
This afternoon I am collecting a large batch of cards and prints of Virginia Woolf's house (Monk's House) to send off to the shop at ..... Monk's House. I will be delivering this picture for scanning at the same time and cards and prints of it will be in my online shop next month.
