The Poetry

Leigh Hunt was born in Southgate, London, where his parents had settled after leaving the United States. Educated at Christ's Hospital from 1791 to 1799 but a speech impediment, later cured, prevented his going to university. "For some time after I left school," he says, "I did nothing but visit my school-fellows, haunt the book-stalls and write verses." His first poems were published in 1801 under the title of Juvenilia, and introduced him into literary and theatrical society. He began to write