John Keats

Highmindedness, a jealousy for good

II
Highmindedness, a jealousy for good,
A loving-kindness for the great man's fame,
Dwells here and there with people of no name,

Noisome alley

"Noisome" means foul-smelling, not just noisy. Keats places nobility in stinking slums and wilderness—places polite society ignores.

In noisome alley, and in pathless wood:
And where we think the truth least understood,
Oft may be found a 'singleness of aim,'
That ought to frighten into hooded shame

Hooded shame

The hood references monks or executioners. The money-grubbers should hide their faces like criminals or hypocrites.

A money-mong'ring, pitiable brood.
How glorious this affection for the cause
Of steadfast genius, toiling gallantly!
What when a stout unbending champion awes

Native sty

A sty is a pig pen. Envy and Malice aren't just defeated—they're driven back to their natural habitat: filth.

Envy, and Malice to their native sty?
Unnumber'd souls breathe out a still applause,

Still applause

"Still" means silent here. The unnumbered souls applaud without sound—a spiritual rather than public recognition.

Proud to behold him in his country's eye.
Source Wikipedia Poetry Foundation

Reading Notes

The Sonnet as Class Warfare

This is Keats fighting back. By 1818, critics had savaged him as a "Cockney" poet—working-class, uneducated, presumptuous. The *Blackwood's Magazine* review told him to go back to his apothecary's shop. This sonnet answers: nobility has nothing to do with birth.

The octave builds a geography of virtue: "noisome alley" and "pathless wood" harbor "highmindedness" and "singleness of aim." These aren't metaphors—Keats means literal poor people and hermits possess what the "money-mong'ring, pitiable brood" lack. The word "pitiable" is vicious: the rich aren't threatening, they're pathetic.

The sestet shifts to the "stout unbending champion"—probably Keats himself, though he's careful not to say so. When genius refuses to bend, Envy and Malice retreat to their "native sty." The pig imagery is deliberate: critics are swine. But notice who witnesses this victory: "Unnumber'd souls" who "breathe out a still applause." Not the literary establishment—the invisible many. Keats is building a counter-public, an audience of nobodies who recognize greatness the elites miss.

What "Highmindedness" Actually Means

The title word is Keats's coinage from Aristotle's megalopsychia—often translated as "greatness of soul." It's not snobbery. In Aristotle, it means deserving honor and knowing you deserve it, combined with indifference to what lesser people think.

Keats adds "a jealousy for good"—an aggressive protectiveness of excellence. And "a loving-kindness for the great man's fame"—caring about reputation not from vanity but from love of achievement itself. This is the psychology of the true fan, the person who defends genius because they recognize it.

The poem's turn comes at "How glorious this affection for the cause / Of steadfast genius, toiling gallantly!" The exclamation marks are rare for Keats. He's genuinely moved by the idea that somewhere, people care about art for the right reasons—not for profit ("money-mong'ring") or social climbing, but for "the cause." The military language—champion, awes, gallantly—treats poetry as combat. Which, for Keats in 1818, it was.