In his early adult years, Clare became a potboy in The Blue Bell public house and fell in love with Mary Joyce, but her father, a prosperous farmer, forbade them to meet.

[6][7] Malnutrition stemming from childhood may have been the main factor behind his five-foot (1.5 m) stature and contributed to his poor physical health in later life.

[6] "There was no limit to the applause bestowed upon Clare, unanimous in their admiration of a poetical genius coming before them in the humble garb of a farm labourer.

[9] An annuity of 15 guineas from the Marquess of Exeter, in whose service he had been, was supplemented by subscription, so that Clare gained £45 a year, a sum far beyond what he had ever earned.

As he worked again in the fields, his health temporarily improved; but he soon became seriously ill. Earl Fitzwilliam presented him with a new cottage and a piece of ground, but Clare could not settle down.

In 1832, his friends and London patrons clubbed together to move the family to a larger cottage with a smallholding in the village of Northborough, not far from Helpston.

Clare's last work, the Rural Muse (1835), was noticed favourably by Christopher North and other reviewers, but its sales were not enough to support his wife and seven children.

Allen wrote about Clare to The Times in 1840: It is most singular that ever since he came... the moment he gets pen or pencil in hand he begins to write most poetical effusions.

Yet he has never been able to obtain in conversation, nor even in writing prose, the appearance of sanity for two minutes or two lines together, and yet there is no indication of insanity in any of his poetry.

[11][12] Whatever he may have felt about liturgy and ministry, and however critical an eye he may have cast on parish life, Clare retained and replicated his father's loyalty to the Church of England.

[13] He dodged services in his youth and dawdled in the fields during the hours of worship, but he derived much help in later years from members of the clergy.

[15] During his early asylum years in High Beach, Essex (1837–1841),[16] Clare re-wrote poems and sonnets by Lord Byron.

"[17] In July 1841, Clare absconded from the asylum in Essex and walked some 80 miles (130 km) home, believing he was to meet his first love Mary Joyce, to whom he was convinced he was married.

[23] It was in this later poetry that Clare "developed a very distinctive voice, an unmistakable intensity and vibrance, such as the later pictures of Van Gogh" possessed.

[25] He wrote in Northamptonshire dialect, introducing local words to the literary canon such as "pooty" (snail), "lady-cow" (ladybird), "crizzle" (to crisp) and "throstle" (song thrush).

Many former agricultural and craft workers, including children, moved from the countryside to crowded cities, as factory work mechanized.

He refused even to complain of the subordinate position to which English society had placed him, swearing that "with the old dish that was served to my forefathers I am content.

Poems such as "Winter Evening", "Haymaking" and "Wood Pictures in Summer" mark the beauty of the world and the certainties of rural life, where animals must be fed and crops harvested.

[31] Clare was relatively forgotten in the later 19th century, but interest in his work was revived by Arthur Symons in 1908, Edmund Blunden in 1920 and John and Anne Tibble in their ground-breaking 1935 two-volume edition, while in 1949 Geoffrey Grigson edited Poems of John Clare's Madness (published by Routledge and Kegan Paul).

[35] The largest collection of original Clare manuscripts is held at Peterborough Museum and Art Gallery, where items are available to view by appointment.

Helen Gardner, for instance, amended both the punctuation and the spelling and grammar when editing the New Oxford Book of English Verse 1250–1950 (1972).

[36] In 2003 the scholar Jonathan Bate published the first major critical biography of Clare, which helped to keep up the revival in popular and academic interest.

In 2013, the John Clare Trust received a further grant from the Heritage Lottery Fund to help preserve the building and provide educational activities for youngsters visiting it.

[48] Regarding his fiddle playing ability, he described himself as "a decent scraper",[49] and collected over two-hundred folk tunes in two books, the Northampton Manuscripts Nos.

[48] Since Clare's death, many of his poems have been set to music by classical composers, and, more recently, by contemporary singer/songwriters working in the acoustic and folk genres.

The performance by singer Madame Vestris was at Drury Lane Theatre on 19 February 1820; the song was threaded into the pasticcio opera The Siege of Belgrade.

Clare wrote that 'on the night we got into London it was announcd [sic] in the Play Bills that a song of mine was to be sung at Covent Garden by Madam Vestris and we was to have gone but it was too late.

Directions for some of the country dances are given in abbreviated form, but the only words given are those for Black Ey'd Susan and Dibdin's The Sailors Journal.

The introduction begins: 'I commenced sometime ago with an intention of making a collection of old Ballads...', and contents include John Randall, The Maidens Welcome, The False Knights Tradegy, Loves Riddles, Banks of Ivory, etc.