His Life and Poetical Works
George Gordon Byron , a great literary figure of his age , was born in London on January 22 , 1788. He belonged to a highly aristocratic family , of course with the notoriety for a wild , reckless and adventurous living . His father was particularly a heedless libertine , whereas his mother was an egoistic peevish lady of nature , not at all desirable . His childhood was passed at Abardan , amid the plentiful natural sights and sounds which definitely added to his impulsive love for the world of nature . He succeeded to the peerage of his family at the meagre age of ten only .
Byron was first educated at Harrow and then at the famous Trinity College , Cambridge . He shaped well in sports and athletic activities in his student days , despite the grim fact that he had been lame from his very birth , caused by an accident .
Byron started his poetical career during his Cambridge days and published a book of juvenile verse , Hours of Idleness . Despite its popularity in the circle dominated by him , it was severely criticised in the Edinburgh Review . Byron , however , did not succumb to the insult , but sharply retorted his critics in his next work English Birds and Scotch Reviewers . He was particularly found very critical here about the Edinburgh Review that had underrated his maiden poetical venture .
Thereafter , Byron went to travel the continents , continuing his poetical career . His great poetical works came next , one after another . The publication of Childe Harold's Pilgrimage made him at once an immensely popular figure in the English poetical world . His other remarkable works Don Juan , The Vision of Judgment , Beppo , Manfred , Cain , and many more followed smoothly one after another . Some of his later works happened to be his attempt at dramatic writings , but he did not attain much success there .
Byron was a member of the House of Lords , but he took his seat very rarely there . In fact , he had no serious interest in politics and preferred to devote himself to literature and a life of culture and fashion .
Like his predecessors , Byron , too , led a morally loose life . His affair with his wife Anna Isabella Barke was taken as heartless and immoral and made him , like Shelley , unpopular in the high English society . He left England for good in 1816 and settled in Venice . In 1823 , he went to join , with great enthusiasm , in the struggle of the Greeks for their freedom against Turkey . He died in a fever in 1824 in course of his earnest and hurried activities to organize the freedom fighters in Greece - to liberate the great ancient land from the savage inroad of the Turks .
Lord Byron as a Poet
Byron , the poet , just like Byron , the man , is found uneven . Naturally , no even standard of judgment or universal acclamation is found in his case . Nevertheless , the poet in Byron , born and bred in the great age of Romantic poetry , is no ignorable name . In his age , his popularity as a poet , was unique , unparalleled , though modern reception to his poetry is found much lessened .
In fact , Byron has his place , definitely a formidable one , in romantic poetical literature , although he might not be placed on the same plane with his great contemporaries like Wordsworth , Shelley and Keats . But he has his position , secured enough for him , in their company . Whereas Wordsworth is acclaimed as a poet of serenity and contemplation , Shelley , of love and humanity , Keats , of beauty and melody , their contemporary Byron stands out remarkably as a poet of vigour and derision . Of the romantic poets , he was the first to draw the attention of whole Europe and enjoyed an enormous reputation abroad . He became almost the idol not only of his own countrymen but also of the intellectuals all over civilized Europe . He was even admired unequivocally by such continental literary masters , like Goethe . Indeed , in his hands , English poetry became European for the first time . Of course , his poetical production is not very bulky and , what is more , as noted before , not of an even standard also . Some of his popular and remarkable works , such as Childe Harold's Pilgrimage , The Vision of Judgment , Don Juan and some shorter lyrics and sonnets on love and freedom are much complimented as the mighty creative specimens of a great poet . But there are some other poems from him , discarded as exaggerated , full of superfluities .
Byron is a poet of vigour and energy . This is particularly marked in his power of description . But his description is something more than the mere presentation of some scene or incident . He has put into this , something of a wonderful personality , which was his own . As a result , his lines become the graphic outlines of his own dynamic mind and impulsive imagination . But this is not all about Byron . His poetry is lit up by the fire of genuine passion . " He is , " in the language of Arnold , " the passionate and dauntless soldier of a forlorn hope , who , ignorant of the future and unconsoled by its promises , nevertheless waged against the conservation of the old impossible world , so fiery a battle . "
Byron's poetry has some definite marks of quality . He is a powerful poet of description . His descriptive power , as already asserted , is found wonderfully vivid and dynamic , and has made the very objects of his description living and pleasant . Much of Byron's poetic significance lies in his satiric art . Enlivened with wit and fun , his satire is found to splash derision with the characteristic Byronic vigour . With an uncommon zeal , he is found to satirize his own nation and make the most penetrating banter on English habits and characters . Here he seems to stand without an equal and remains outstanding as the last great name in the English verse - satire . Although Byron's own self is never absent , there lies behind most of his satires , a profound seriousness . His poetry echoes most strongly the passion for liberty . This is animated with a ' splendid and imperishable excellence of sincerity and strength .
Byron is , too , a powerful poet of Nature and seems to hold his pen and guide him to write in praise of her vastness and variety . Of course , he is no philosopher or spiritualist of Nature , like Wordsworth or Shelley . He is a passionate and sensuous lover of her beauty and grace . Here he is like - minded with Keats with great vigour .
" The position of Byron , as a poet , " as observed by Stopford A. Brooke , " is a very curious one . " He is partly of the past and partly of the present . There is something of the School of Pope , strongly present in him , yet there is a complete detachment in his poetry from old measures and old manners to make his poetry individual and singular , and not at all imitative . What is , however , particularly notable is that Byron is everywhere profoundly interested in himself . Subjectivity is the essence of his poetry .
Byron's poetry , however , suffers from some unfortunate limitations . He shouts and roars and laughs , but lacks what is truly consolatory and idealistic to enliven an age . Even in his serious poems , he has failed to treat his themes with lofty idealism and penetrative visions , and as such , he fails to attain the position of his great contemporaries- Wordsworth , Shelley and Keats . Moreover , he is often found disorderly , careless , and even negligent in his poetical composition .
What is , however , the most striking feature in Byronic poetry is the identification of the poet with his subject . His presence is felt in whatever he has written . He seems to have hardly touched anything seriously other than himself .
Byron , the man , however , had certain deficiencies in character . He was fond of posing and pretension , and remained often vain and pompous . At the same time , he was an uncompromising champion of liberty and democracy and also a strong hater of all cants and hypocrisi The divergent qualities in Byron , the man , is found to have affected his poetry that has the incarnation both of his poetic excellence and of his poetic deficiency .
Byron has not the vision or sublimity of Shelley or Milton . His poetry lacks the depth of Wordsworth or Coleridge . It has also not the charm and grace of Keats's poetic creation . But it has its own standard and its own magnificence . Its charms are delicately of the Byronic character , just as its drawbacks are the lapses of the Byronic man .
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