British poet, 1795-1821. Died at the age of 26. Considered one of the great six Romantic poets, who are William Wordsworth, Percy Bysshe Shelley, Lord Byron, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, William Blake, and Keats himself. Usually, people place him and Wordsworth together as the top two of the group. His writing is considered to have matured remarkably quickly, especially for one so young. Tragically, tuberculosis claimed him in a house in Rome. Engraved on his gravestone is "Here lies one whose name was writ in water", a tribute to how worthless he thought his life was.