CLARE, JOHN

born July 13, 1793, Helpston, near Peterborough, Northamptonshire, Eng. died May 20, 1864, Northampton, Northamptonshire English peasant poet of the Romantic school. Clare grew up in extreme poverty and began work as a herder at the age of seven. Though he had little access to books, he had a prodigious memory, and his poetic gift, which revealed itself early, was nourished by his parents' store of folk ballads. The frail, dreamy, shy boy wrote his first verses, chiefly influenced by James Thomson, on his mother's sugar bags. An early disappointment in lovefor Mary Joyce, the daughter of a prosperous farmermade a lasting impression on him. In 1820 his first book, Poems Descriptive of Rural Life and Scenery, was published and created a stir. Clare visited London, where he enjoyed a brief season of celebrity in fashionable circles. He made some lasting friends, among them Charles Lamb and the poet Allan Cunningham, and was granted an annuity by wealthy patrons. That same year he married Martha Turner, the daughter of a neighbouring farmer, the Patty of the Vale of his poems. From then on he encountered increasing misfortune. His second volume of poems attracted little attention. His third, The Shepherd's Calendar; with Village Stories, and Other Poems (1827), though containing better poetry, met with the same fate. His annuity was not enough to support his family of seven children and his dependent father, so he supplemented his income as a field labourer and tenant farmer. Poverty, patronage, poetry, and drink took their toll of his health. His last book, The Rural Muse (1835), though praised by critics, again sold poorly. Clare began to suffer from fears and delusions. In 1837, through the agency of his publisher, he was placed in a private asylum at High Beech, Epping, where he remained for four years. Improved in health and driven by homesickness, he escaped in July 1841. He walked the 80 miles to Northborough, penniless, eating grass by the roadside to stay his hunger. He has left a moving account in prose of that extraordinary journey, addressed to his imaginary wife Mary Clare. He was home about seven months. At the end of 1841 he was certified insane. 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. Selected Poems and Prose, edited by Eric Robinson and Geoffrey Summerfield, was published in 1966.