John Clare’s Predictive Brain

I’ve long been interested in the brain, so much so that, at the last minute, I changed my mind from studying art to studying psychology at the University of Derby. That was a mistake for many reasons, which will take a lengthy essay to explore. But as someone who knows the ill effects of poor mental health in particular, I have maintained an interest in how the brain works.

One theory, which has been quite helpful for me, is predictive processing. Andy Clark explores this theory in his book The Experience Machine. In the book, he states:  

Instead of constantly expending large amounts of energy on processing incoming sensory signals, the bulk of what the brain does is learn and maintain a kind of model of body and world—a model that can then be used, moment by moment, to try to predict the sensory signal. These predictions help structure everything we see, hear, touch, and feel. They were at work when I heard nonexistent birdsong in the morning. (9) 

As I reread John Clare’s poem “[The Mouse’s Nest],” I realized that it was a clear example of the predictive processing theory at work. At the poem’s beginning, Clare’s speaker says, “I found a ball of grass among the hay / And proged it as I passed and went away / And when I looked I fancied something stirred / And turned agen and hoped to catch the bird / When out an old mouse bolted in the wheat” (263). Clare’s speaker is curious, exploring the countryside around him, just as Clare himself did. As Clark states, “We . . . feel positively driven toward life-enhancing activities such as play and exploration” (93). However, the poem was written after Clare’s move to Northborough, a place to which he never fully adjusted, although it was only about three miles away. In the village’s countryside, the speaker seems to be after what Clark calls the “Goldilocks zone,” a place that is “neither too predictable nor too unpredictable” to “good error dynamics” (93). In other words, humans will gravitate toward situations—staying on the edge of what we already know—in which we can make sense of things that don’t immediately match our expectations. Such a tendency allows us to play, learn, and explore because it helps us to grow and adapt. 

Clare’s curious speaker prods a ball of grass, wondering what it is, before walking away. Something stirs, though, and the speaker turns, expecting to see a bird. The speaker made a prediction based on a current model of his world: Clare wrote a lot of poems based on birds, given that they were (and are) an integral part of the natural world and common in his birthplace of Helpston. As Geoffrey Summerfield states, Clare “discovered a perfectly unforced affinity between his own songs and those of the birds . . .” (98). Indeed, Clare’s brain had “a kind of constantly running simulation of the world around [him]—or at least, the world as it matter[ed] to [him]” (Clark 9). But the speaker finds, instead, a mouse “[w]ith all her young ones hanging at her teats / She looked so odd and so grotesque to [him] / [He] ran and wondered what the thing could be” (263). Clare’s speaker makes a startling, surprising error in its predictive processing. He “push[es] the knapweed bunches where [he] stood / When the mouse hurried from the crawling brood” (263). Upon discovering that the creature is not a bird, the brain updates its model to register that the “grotesque” creature is just, in fact, a mouse.

Thinking the stirring comes from a bird, the brain makes a best guess based on what it already knows. However, given that the brain updates its model to reflect the actual animal, any upcoming similar experiences should result in more complex predictions—predictions beyond, “Hey, that’s a bird.” This seems reflected in the sonnet’s final line: “And broad old cesspools* glittered in the sun” (293). In the future, the brain should reflect its newfound knowledge. 

Ultimately, Clare’s poem shows how curiosity and surprise are at the heart of how we make sense of the world. Clare’s speaker prods at the unknown, makes a prediction, and then adjusts when something unexpected happens—just as our brains are supposed to do, according to Clark. This process is what keeps us exploring and learning. It’s a reminder of how the brain helps us adapt and grow, even when life is uncertain or surprising. Clare’s poem isn’t just about a mouse’s nest—it’s about how we make sense of the unexpected and use it to see the world differently.

—Iain Grinbergs

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* Certain scholars prefer using “sexpools,” which is a dialect variant of “cesspools,” to better reflect what was probably Clare’s actual meaning: water-filled holes left by turf-cutting.

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Works Cited

Clark, Andy. The Experience Machine: How Our Minds Predict and Shape Reality. Pantheon, 2023.

Robinson, Eric and David Powell, eds. John Clare: Major Works. Oxford, 2008.

Summerfield, Geoffrey, ed. John Clare: Selected Poems. Penguin, 2000.

Photo Credit: The Poetry Foundation