Adonaïs Adonaïs Adonaïs: An Elegy on the Death of John Keats, Author of Endymion, Hyperion, etc. , also spelled Adonaies, is a pastoral elegy written by Percy Bysshe Shelley for John Keats in 1821, and widely regarded as one of Shelley's best and most well-known works. The poem, which is in 495 lines in 55 Spenserian stanzas, was composed in the spring of 1821 immediately after 11 April, when Shelley heard of Keats' death (seven weeks earlier). It is a pastoral elegy, in the English tradition of John Milton's "Lycidas". Shelley had studied and translated classical elegies. The title of the
Pastoral elegy first introduced by the Greek poet Theocritus in his Idylls. Set in the countryside, his poems reflect on folk traditions and involve dialogue between shepherds. This style of poetry was later adapted by the Roman poet Virgil, who frequently set his poems in Arcadia. Over time, the genre was adapted by a variety of different poets to include various themes, including romance, drama, courtship, seduction, and death. One of the most popular subgroups of pastoral poetry is the elegy, in which the poet mourns the death of a friend, often a fellow shepherd. Eventually, pastoral poetry became popular among English