Sean Barrs 's Reviews > Major Works

John Clare is one of my favourite poets and I often feel that he is overlooked and relatively unheard of outside of academic circles. And this is a bit of a tragedy, just look how few ratings he has here on Goodreads!

Unlike the other romantics, he did not achieve much fame in his lifetime. He was relatively unknown and spent a large part of his life in a mental asylum. He wrote much of his poetry very close to where I live; he wondered the fields here almost two hundred years ago and was at a loss when he saw the landscape declining, to be replaced by enclosed agriculture. He captured the essence of nature in his words as he lamented the death of a rural England. He celebrated the natural world and the animals, writing passionately against a world undergoing great change as the populations grew and the landscape began to modernise.

One thing Clare did do better than the other romantics poets was really explore the animal kingdom. He didn’t just write about nightingales; he used so many birds and woodland life in his works. He was a real advocate of nature; you could tell he’d spent so much time observing it and admiring it. Had he been alive today he would have been an activist or an environmental campaigner or perhaps even a naturalist. His writing captures much of his intense interest and fixation on the lives of other creatures. His words give them a voice.

Notably, Clare taught himself how to read; he wasn’t educated like the rest of the romantics. He had a massive disadvantage. He learnt to write poetry by copying the style of his peers; he adapted it and made it his own, and eventually he developed his own poetic voice. Is this not something to admire? Clare was a shepherd, not a scholar or a literary critic or a pompous Lord. The early romantics advocated oneness with nature; surely, out of the crowd Clare is the one with the most experience. He lived the rural life from the beginning, and his poetry reflects it so blatantly. He did not need to imagine what it was to be one with landscape.

So consider this review a recommendation, a recommendation to pick up a volume of Clare’s poetry and to see exactly what he does so well. He writes politically against natural injustice and the corrupt taking control of the land; he captures the beauty of animals, of birds and foxes and badgers. His words are a literary monument which capture the essence of romanticism: he had a wonderful mind.

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