Literary Birthday – 13 July – John Clare

John Clare was born on 13 July 1793 and died on 20 May 1864.

John Clare Quotes

1. If life had a second edition, how I would correct the proofs.
2. Still, I have been no one’s enemy but my own. My easy nature, either in drinking or anything else, was always ready to submit to persuasions of profligate companions, who often led me into snares.
3. I’m John Clare now. I was Byron and Shakespeare formerly.
4. The best way to avoid a bad action is by doing a good one, for there is no difficulty in the world like that of trying to do nothing.
5. Ah, words are poor receipts for what time hath stole away…

John Clare was an English peasant poet of the Romantic school. Although he was the son of illiterate parents and earned money as a manual labourer, he published several volumes of poetry, including Poems: Descriptive of Rural Life and Scenery. He spent the final 23 years of his life at St. Andrew’s Asylum, Northampton, writing, with strangely unquenched lyric impulse, some of his best poetry.

Image source: William Hilton, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:John_Clare.jpg

by Amanda Patterson
Please click here for our Literary Birthday Calendar