Celestial Variability and Keats's ‘Bright star’

• Published in: Romanticism (Edinburgh) Vol. 29; no. 3; pp. 253 - 266
• Main Author: Hasted, Meegan
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: UK Edinburgh University Press 01.10.2023
• Subjects: Literary Studies; Bright star; sonnets; love letters; Fanny Brawne; Keats; astronomy; variability

Early in his career the astronomer William Herschel argued that the appearance of ‘so many changes among the stars’ – stars materialising out of nowhere and stars gradually vanishing, stars fluctuating in brightness and stars changing position – ‘should cause a strong suspicion that most probably ev...