Lord Byron - George Gordon Byron    (1788-1824)

uGeorge Gordon Byron, 6th Baron Byron (22 January 1788 – 19 April 1824), commonly known simply as Lord Byron, was an English poet and a leading figure in the Romantic movement. Among Byron's best-known works are the lengthy narrative poems Don Juan and Childe Harold's Pilgrimage and the short lyric She Walks in Beauty. He is regarded as one of the greatest British poets and remains widely read and influential.

uOften described as the most flamboyant and notorious of the major Romantics, Byron was celebrated in life for aristocratic excesses, including huge debts, numerous love affairs with both sexes, rumours of a scandalous incestuous liaison with his half-sister, and self-imposed exile.

2. A summary of his lifetime

  Byron spent his early years in Aberdeen, and was educated at Harrow School and Cambridge University. In 1809, he left for a two-year tour of a number of Mediterranean countries. He returned to England in 1811, and in 1812 the first two cantos of 'Childe Harold's Pilgrimage' were published. Byron became famous overnight.

  In 1814, Byron's half-sister Augusta gave birth to a daughter, almost certainly Byron's. The following year Byron married Annabella Milbanke, with whom he had a daughter, his only legitimate child. The couple separated in 1816.

   Facing mounting pressure as a result of his failed marriage, scandalous affairs and huge debts, Byron left England in April 1816 and never returned. He spent the summer of 1816 at Lake Geneva with Percy Bysshe Shelley, his wife Mary and Mary's half sister Claire Clairmont, with whom Byron had a daughter.

Facing mounting pressure as a result of his failed marriage, scandalous affairs and huge debts, Byron left England in April 1816 and never returned. He spent the summer of 1816 at Lake Geneva with Percy Bysshe Shelley, his wife Mary and Mary's half sister Claire Clairmont, with whom Byron had a daughter.

   Byron travelled on to Italy, where he was to live for more than six years. In 1819, while staying in Venice, he began an affair with Teresa Guiccioli, the wife of an Italian nobleman. It was in this period that Byron wrote some of his most famous works, including 'Don Juan' (1819-1824).

   In July 1823, Byron left Italy to join the Greek insurgents who were fighting a war of independence against the Ottoman Empire. On 19 April 1824 he died from fever at Missolonghi, in modern day Greece. His death was mourned throughout Britain. His body was brought back to England and buried at his ancestral home in Nottinghamshire.

3. About his poetry

The poetry of Lord Byron is varied, but it tends to address a few major themes. Byron looked upon love as free but unattainable in the ideal, an idea springing from his own multitude of affairs and ultimate lack of happiness in any of them. His characters and themes are highly autobiographical; most every poem by Byron finds as its inspiration some real person or place Byron had encountered. And although Bryon was a Romantic poet, much of his poetry follows traditional forms.

4. Most important poems

uThe First Kiss of Love (1806)

uLachin y Gair (1807)

uEpitaph to a Dog (1808)

uMaid of Athens, ere we part (1810) 

uAnd Thou Art Dead, as Young And Fair (1812)

uShe Walks in Beauty (1814)

uWhen We Two Parted (1817)

uSo, we'll go no more a-roving (1830)

References

uLord Byron. Available in http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lord_Byron. Accessed in July 01, 2014.

ufrom Don Juan: Canto 1, Stanzas 47-48. Available in http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poem/244642. Accessed in July 01, 2014.

uLord Byron's Poems Summary. Available in http://www.gradesaver.com/lord-byrons-poems/study-guide/short-summary/. Accessed in July 01, 2014.

uLord Byron (1788-1824). Available in http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/historic_figures/byron_lord.shtml. Accessed in July 01, 2014.

uByron's Don Juan: Summary, Quotes and Analysis. Available in http://education-portal.com/academy/lesson/byrons-don-juan-summary-quotes-and-analysis.html#lesson. Accessed in July 01, 2014.