George Gordon, Lord Byron
1788-1824
Biography, 1
• Descended from 2 aristocratic families – both colorful and a bit dissolute
• Father dies when Byron is 3; raised by Scottish mother in Aberdeen; taught a right wing Calvinist Presbyterianism (all fun = sin)
• Inherits title from great uncle at 10 years old• Typical upper class education at Harrow and
Cambridge
Biography, 2
• Congenitally lame, made worse by botched surgery; overcomes through athletic prowess
• Published first vol of poetry in 1807 (19 years old); badly received by Edinburgh Review
• 1809-12, tours Portugal, Spain, Malta, Greece, Asia Minor; discovers cultures much more sexually liberated than the Protestant Britains; rumored to have had boy lovers
• 1812 – published first part of Childe Harold; instant bestseller
Biography, 3
• Sits in House of Lords as a Whig (liberal)• Invents literary “Byronic hero”: outsider; makes his own
code; adventurous; a tad misanthropic – public believes all this is true of him
• Series of sexual liasons with aristocratic women• Brief marriage to Annabella Millbanke ends with one
daughter and a legal separation• Incestuous affair with half sister Augusta Leigh (they did
not know one another before the affair)• Socially ostracized, leaves England 1816
Biography, 4
• Lives in Geneva with Percy and Mary Shelley, and Mary’s step sister Claire Clairmont (17 years old!)
• Claire and Byron have a daughter Allegra• 1817 – completely promiscuous in Venice– Enormously productive poetically – finishes Childe Harold,
Manfred, Beppo, and begins Don Juan• 1818 – rejoins the Shelleys in Pisa; writes• 1823 – fights for Greek independence from Ottoman
Empire (just like the Crusades, 800 years later – still “rescuing” Christian Europe from supposed “infidels.” Dies in Greece and becomes a national hero there.
Lady Caroline LambAnnabella, Lady Byron
Augusta Leigh
Countessa Teresa GuiccioliClaire Clairemont
When We Two Parted
Pages 613-4 in your textNote: short line form, ababcdcd, (A & C lines
longer; B & D lines shorter)Contrast version in text with this one <
http://dsteinbe.intrasun.tcnj.edu/Courses/Romant/When%20we%20two%20parted.htm>
What do you think of the extra stanza?
Childe HaroldOh, thou! in Hellas deem’d of heav’nly birth, a Muse, form’d or fabled at the minstrel's will! b Since sham’d full oft by later lyres on earth, a Mine dares not call thee from thy sacred hill: b Yet there I've wander’d by thy vaunted rill; b Yes! sighed o'er Delphi's long-deserted shrine c Where, save that feeble fountain, all is still; b Nor mote my shell awake the weary Nine cTo grace so plain a tale--this lowly lay of mine. c
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