Recently Recovered Stolen Keats Love Letters On Show Before Auction

The group of eight autograph letters signed by John Keats to his fiancée Fanny Brawne that were recently returned to their current owners after being stolen 40 years ago will be offered for sale at Sotheby’s in New York next month.

The letters have first travelled to London where they are on public exhibition at Sotheby’s New Bond Street until May 15. The occasion marks a homecoming as they were first sold by Sotheby’s London in 1885. They will be offered at auction with an estimate of $1.5m–$2.5m.

The letters, which were recovered in New York this year, form part of a larger body of approximately 37 written by Keats to Brawne between 1819 and 1820, composed during their courtship and engagement. Among them is the earliest known letter Keats wrote to Brawne dating from July 1819 in which he opens with the confession that “the morning is the only proper time for me to write to a beautiful Girl whom I love so much.” In the same letter, he pleads for reassurance in a way that captures the intensity of their bond, asking her to console him with words “rich as a draught of poppies.”

The relationship inspired the 2009 film Bright Star starring Ben Whishaw and Abbie Cornish, and directed by Jane Campion.

Originally preserved by Brawne herself, the correspondence remained in her possession until her death in 1865, after which it passed to her children. The letters were then sold at Sotheby’s in 1885, before eventually being acquired by Helen Hay. The initial sale was famously objected to by, among many others, Oscar Wilde who penned the poem On the Sale By Auction of Keats’ Love Letters to mark the occasion. The letters then descended through the Whitney family, and were kept at Greentree in Manhasset, Long Island.