The Keats Foundation

Who are we?

The Keats Foundation is a Registered Charity (No. 1147589) that exists to encourage enjoyment and understanding of Keats’s poems, letters, life and times and to inspire new generations of young poets to fulfill their creative ambitions. Our objectives are to support educational initiatives, at Keats House Hampstead and more widely at festivals, readings, conferences and other Keats-related events.

For our current and forthcoming events and activities please see the News page on this website.

AIMS AND OBJECTIVES

John Keats – poet of youthful ambition, yearning beauty and joyous mirth – is a global presence, enjoyed by readers around the world and celebrated in Jane Campion’s movie, Bright Star. Keats is the poet of autumn “mists and mellow fruitfulness”, a poet who has inspired genius in other writers, from Thomas Hardy to Ted Hughes to Seamus Heaney – and he is the poet who can spark creativity in new generations of bright stars.

Founded in November 2010, The Keats Foundation is a registered charity (No. 1147589) that exists to encourage enjoyment and understanding of John Keats’s poems, letters, life and times and to inspire new generations of young poets, artists, students and readers of all ages to fulfil their creative ambitions.

Since its establishment, The Keats Foundation has created an outstanding record of inspiring lectures, readings, conferences and sponsorship focussed on Keats House in Hampstead, London, and reaching out across Britain. All Supporters receive a quarterly newsletter, The Keatsian, with news of activities of The Keats Foundation.

The patron of The Keats Foundation is the poet, Sir Andrew Motion, and Supporters include the actor, Dame Judi Dench, Sir Roger Gifford (Lord Mayor of London 2013-14), the actor, Dame Janet Suzman, and the human rights lawyer, Sir Geoffrey Bindman. As of January 2026, The Chair of the Board of Trustees of The Keats Foundation is Professor Richard Marggraf-Turley. Professor Nicholas Roe, biographer of John Keats, remains as the Foundation’s Treasurer.

The Keats Foundation intends to project its education and creative mission in exciting new directions, seeking fresh support and sponsorship through the bicentenaries of John Keats’s life.

The strategy of The Keats Foundation to date is to:

Consolidate the achievements of The Keats Foundation;
Increase the community of Supporters of The Keats Foundation;
Ensure that The Keats Foundation has a secure financial base from which to promote the life and works of John Keats to the public at large;
Develop The Keats Foundation’s calendar of supported events and activities (which currently include lectures, readings, festivals, conferences, birthday wreath-laying, Eve of St Agnes events);
Enhance The Keats Foundation website incrementally in order to establish a “one-stop shop” for matters relating to John Keats;
Support and encourage the charitable events and activities of Keats House;
Identify new opportunities and events for outreach and encouragement offered by The Keats Foundation;
Establish The Keats Foundation as an important resource, inspiration and encouragement for students working on Keats and English Romanticism.
As of 2026, the Keats Foundation will offer bursaries to unwaged postgraduate students attending the annual Keats Conference. Details will be included in conference-related correspondence.

ACTIVITIES AND PROPOSALS

The Keats Foundation has been steadily developing a programme of activities and proposals since 2016. The programme is subject to regular review and incorporates opportunities as they arise. An outline of the current programme is given below.

	REGULAR EVENTS	OTHER ACTIVITIES
2026	St Agnes Eve – 22/01 Westminster Abbey wreath laying (31/10 birthday) KF Twelfth Conference at Keats House.	Offering bursaries to unwaged postgraduate students attending the annual Keats Conference.
2025	St Agnes Eve – 20/01 Westminster Abbey wreath laying (31/10 birthday) KF Eleventh Conference at Keats House.	Visions of Delight: Poems for The Eve of St Agnes event at Keats House, featuring T.S. Eliot poetry prize winner Helen Farish
2024	St Agnes Eve – 19/01 Westminster Abbey wreath laying (31/10 birthday) KF Eleventh Conference at Keats House.
2023	St Agnes Eve – 20/01 Westminster Abbey wreath laying (31/10 birthday) KF Tenth Conference at Keats House. KF Annual Lecture, 23^rd November, Professor Richard Marggraf-Turley	Romantic Localities talk featuring Professor Nicholas Roe and Dr Anna Mercer at Keats House, 18^th May An international reading of Christabel, 25^th July Partially funding the publication of Tamsine’s Diary, meticulously transcribed and splendidly illustrated by Christine and Rob Barnard Securing KF exclusive discounts for the audiobook edition of John Keats: Selected Poems, with the support of Carly Stevenson Sarah Hughes Lecture, jointly held with the Royal Society of Medicine, 1st December at the Royal Society of Medicine, 1 Wimpole St, Marylebone
2022	St Agnes Eve – 20/01 Westminster Abbey wreath laying (31/10 birthday) KF Nineth Conference at Keats House. KF Annual Lecture, 18^th October, Dr Lucasta Miller	Publishing the Introductory Essays to Keats’s Odes, featuring essays by Hrileena Ghosh, Seamus Perry, Nicholas Roe, Grant F. Scott, Heidi Thomson, R. S. White, and Susan Wolfson
2021	St Agnes Eve – 20/01 Westminster Abbey wreath laying (31/10 birthday) KF Eighth Conference at Keats House. KF Annual Lecture, 1^st November 2021, Professor Nicholas Roe	Collaboration with KSMA and the Keats houses re Keats200 anniversary. KF Anniversary talk and readings at the Athenaeum, London. Midwinter Keats symposium, featuring Professor Susan Wolfson and Professor Fiona Stafford, 8^th January Keats on Radio 3 ‘Words and Music’, 10^th October, featuring readings by Nicholas Shaw
2020	Westminster Abbey wreath laying (31/10 birthday) KF Seventh Conference at Keats House, 15-17 May. KF Annual Lecture, 7^th March, Professor Alexandra Harris	Collaboration with KSMA and the Keats houses re Keats200 anniversary. Keats and politics (Peterloo 16.08.1819) Italy (link with Keats-Shelley house in Rome) Curriculum issues. Possibility of bust of Keats in the City and commemorative stamp.
2019	St Agnes Eve – 20/01 – Guildhall, 14^th January Westminster Abbey wreath laying (31/10 birthday) KF Sixth Conference at Keats House, 17-19 May: “Keats in 1819: Cloudy Trophies, Quiet Power” KF Annual Lecture, 9^th February, Dr Matthew Scott, “How much did Keats really know?”	Collaboration with KSMA and the Keats houses re Keats200 anniversary. Conference on “Keats and Mythology (1819 – 2019)” hosted by the British School at Rome, 22 – 23 February and organised by the Keats-Shelley Memorial Association in collaboration with the Société d’Études du Romantisme Anglais. The Great Odes: Filming and recording of the great Odes (produced by Peter Phillips for The Keats Foundation in co-operation with Keats House). Ideas concerning Keats and politics. Curriculum issues. Lecture by Professor Nicholas Roe, Keats House, 6^th June: “Keats and the Sea” Possibility of bust of Keats in the City and commemorative stamp. Possibility of book arising from the 2019 Conference. Winchester – Keats200: Keats in Winchester exhibition and essay competitions.
2018	St Agnes Eve – 20/01 Westminster Abbey wreath laying (31/10 birthday) KF Fifth Conference at Keats House, 18-20 May: “Shadows, Magnitudes, Tests and Trials: John Keats in 1818” KF Annual Lecture to move to February	Collaboration with KSMA and the Keats houses re Keats200 anniversary. …..Notable locations, dates and ideas: Teignmouth, Lake District, Scotland Fanny Brawne Paintings and Keats Curriculum issues Possibility of bust of Keats in the City and commemorative stamp. Publication of ‘Keats’s Places’, ed. R. Marggraf Turley, arising from 2017 KF Conference. Publication of ‘John Keats and the Medical Imagination’, ed. N. Roe, arising from 2015 KF Conference. ‘Keats at Teignmouth’ lecture by Professor Nicholas Roe at Teignmouth Poetry Festival. KF Symposium, “John Keats and Romantic Scotland”, St Andrew’s University.
2017	St Agnes Eve – 20/01 Westminster Abbey wreath laying (31/10 birthday) KF Fourth Conference at Keats House, 19-21 May: “Moments, Meetings, and the Making of a Poet” KF Annual Lecture,26^th September, Dr Jane Darcy, “Primrose Island: Keats and the Isle of Wight”	Develop website Lectures and discussion on ‘Negative Capability’ by Dr Toni Griffiths and Dr Margot Waddell at Keats House, 17^th May Notable locations, dates and ideas: Keats’s first book of poems British Museum Curriculum issues Possibility of bust of Keats in the City and commemorative stamp. John Keats Bicentenary Diary produced by Peter Philips.
2016	St Agnes Eve – 20/01 – Guildhall, 20^th January Westminster Abbey wreath laying (31/10 birthday) KF Third Conference at Keats House, 20-22 May: “Keats in London; Keats out of Town” KF Annual Lecture, 26^th September, Professor RS White, “Ethereal Finger-Pointings. Associative Memories and Keats’s Shakespearean Quotations”	Develop website Ideas concerning Keats and politics. Curriculum issues. 28^th October 2016. Lecture at Charles Armitage Brown’s house at Plymouth by Professor Nicholas Roe: “John Keats, Charles Brown and Plymouth”