Byron, George Gordon. (1788 - 1824).
W o r k
- in his lifetime immensely popular as the prototype of literary Romanticism
- introduced the Byronic Hero = mysterious, gloomy, and rebellious; superior in his passions and powers to the common run of humanity, and pursuing his own ends according to his self-generated moral code
- associated with the ‘Satanic School’
- old-fashioned lyrics in neo-classic style: “She walks in beauty”
- political poems: on public life, politics, and revolution
Childe Harold (1812 – 1818):
- an account of his excursion through southern Europe and Asia Minor
- features a melancholic and misanthropic aristocratic exile as a protagonist
Beppo (1818):
- a short preview of the narrative style and stanza of Don Juan
Don Juan (1819 – 1824):
- a satire against modern civilisation
- deconstructs the myths of the supposed glory of war, of fidelity in love, of the Rousseauistic faith in human goodness, of the picturesque and educative journey across Europe, etc.
- describes and comments on Juan’s adventures
- in a neo-classic style and colloquial ‘ottava rima’
Manfred (1817):
- a poetic tragedy, features the Byronic hero at his best
Cain (1821), Sardanapalus (1821), and Marino Faliero (1820):
- poetic ‘closet tragedies’
Quote
"Think you, if Laura had been Petrarch's wife, / He would have written sonnets all his life?"
From Don Juan (1819 - 1824).
Basics
(Picture: Wikimedia Commons).
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Author
Lord George Gordon Byron. (1788 - 1824). British. -
Work
Poet. Playwright. Revolutionary. Author of Don Juan (1819 - 1824).
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Genres
Romanticism. Poetry and drama. Satire.
Literature
Abrams, Meyer Howard, ed. The Norton Anthology of English Literature. New York: W. W. Norton, 1993.
Barnard, Robert. Stručné dějiny anglické literatury. Praha: Brána, 1997.
Baugh, Albert C. ed. A Literary History of England. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1967.
Coote, Stephen. The Penguin Short History of English Literature. London: Penguin, 1993.
Sampson, George. The Concise Cambridge History of English Literature. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1946.
Sanders, Andrew. The Short Oxford History of English Literature. New York: Clarendon Press, 1994.