Lord Byron, one of the most significant poets during the Romantic Era, influenced literature by impacting not only poetry at the time, but also by changing the opinions and values in society and how they viewed the meaning of love, life and death. Lord Byron and his poems reflected the time period and were transformed from his struggles and challenges during his childhood. Each one of Lord Byron’s poem’s link to not only his life but also the Romantic Era. Three of his most inspiring poems are “The Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage”, “Darkness” and “On This Day I Complete My Thirty Sixth Year”.
Lord Byron’s life from the beginning was unlike most other childhoods growing up. He was born on the 22nd of January 1788 in London. Born with a unique clubfoot he moved with his mother to Scotland. Having this disability made Lord Byron view himself as different resulting him to have a fragile self-esteem, making him sensitive to criticism (Noel). When he was 10, he was given an estate called Newstead Abbey and decided to go to Trinity College, but this quickly led him to debt. That summer, he fell in love with his distant cousin Mary Chaworth but she grew tired of him. Byron was greatly affected by the breakup and it led to him writing melancholy poetry with her as a symbol of idealized and unattainable love for him (Moore). He quickly became one of the most well known English Romantic poets gaining friends with other poets e.g. Percy Shelley and John Keats. Lord Byron was a satirist and was able to use poetry and his personality to capture the imagination of Europe (Sherwood). Some of his most famous work includes “Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage” (1812-18) and “Don Juan” (1819-24) (Poetry Foundation). After a successful life writing literature a...
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Priestman, Martin. Romantic Atheism: Poetry and Freethought, 1780-1830. Cambridge, England: Cambridge UP, 1999. Questia School. Sun. 23 Mar. 2014.
Moore, Thomas, and George Gordon Byron. The Works of Lord Byron: With His Letters and Journals, and His Life. Vol. 1. London: John Murray, 1835. Questia School. Web. 6 Apr. 2014.
Noel, Roden. Life of Lord Byron. London: Walter Scott, 1890. Questia School. Sun. 23 Mar. 2014
Rutherford, Andrew. Byron: A Critical Study. Stanford, CA: Stanford UP, 1961. Questia School. Sun. 23 Mar. 2014.
Sherwood, Margaret. Undercurrents of Influence in English Romantic Poetry. Cambridge, MA: Harvard UP, 1934. Questia School. Sat. 1 Mar. 2014.
Tobin, James E. Eighteenth Century English Literature and Its Cultural Background: A Bibliography. New York: Biblo and Tannen, 1967. Questia School. Sun. 23 Mar 2014.
He was the leader or the romantic revolution and was celebrity in his time. His poem that made him well know was Childe Harold's Pilgrimage.
Poems, Poets, Poetry: An Introduction and Anthology. 3rd ed. Ed. Helen Vendler. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s,
The poem I have chosen to compare with “ Valentine” is “ She walks in beauty” by Lord Byron. I chose SWIB because it is very different to valentine as it is about Byron expressing his love and celebrating his love for his cousin.
History is the story and knowledge of the past. There are individuals that are interested by history and wish to study it by learning more. It is very informative to know what has happened in the past for self-knowledge. An individual cannot be naïve to the past including but not limited to how literature came to. One can understand literature more when they understand the time period the author wrote during and the way they wrote. There are several time periods different authors have been through with each period having specific beliefs. Romanticism is the time period that interests me the most; it was a time during the eighteenth century and focused on nature along with the individual’s expression of imagination and emotion.
“Nothing beside remains. Round the decay / Of that colossal Wreck,” wrote Percy Bysshe Shelly in his poem, “Ozymandias.” This theme of destruction also forms the basis of Lord Byron’s poem, “Darkness.” Although each poem has a very different narrative, tone and plot, they reflect fears about the legacy of human influence and the destruction of civilization. The common theme of destruction, found in Percy Bysshe Shelly’s poem “Ozymandias” and Lord Byron’s poem, “Darkness” reflects the poets’ shared fears about the future by writing about ideas of civilization, the fall of mankind due to nature and natural instincts, life and death.
There are many different themes that can be used to make a poem both successful and memorable. Such is that of the universal theme of love. This theme can be developed throughout a poem through an authors use of form and content. “She Walks in Beauty,” by George Gordon, Lord Byron, is a poem that contains an intriguing form with captivating content. Lord Byron, a nineteenth-century poet, writes this poem through the use of similes and metaphors to describe a beautiful woman. His patterns and rhyme scheme enthrall the reader into the poem. Another poem with the theme of love is John Keats' “La Belle Dame sans Merci,” meaning “the beautiful lady without mercy.” Keats, another nineteenth-century writer, uses progression and compelling language throughout this poem to engage the reader. While both of these poems revolve around the theme of love, they are incongruous to each other in many ways.
Lord Byron had a variety of achievements during his time. Among these various achievements, he had a very significant and profound impact on the nineteenth century and it’s “conception of archetypal Romantic Sensibility. (Snyder 40). “What fascinates nineteenth century audiences about Byron was not simply the larger than life character of the man transmuted into...
Thorslev, Peter L., Jr. The Byronic Hero: Types and Prototypes. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. 1962. Print.
Two Romanticism poets that stand out are George Gordon, known as Lord Byron, and William Blake. According to The Norton Anthology Western Literature, Lord Byron cultivated the persona of the solitary sufferer as well as the dashing adventurer. These two concepts are seen in majority of his works. He did not limit himself to only poetry. Lord Byron wrote many lyrics, oriental tales, satires, and melancholy poems. In his lifetime he was able to attract many readers as he engaged in Romantic Ideology.
In his introduction to the Norton Anthology of English Literature M. H. Abrams attempts to overcome these difficulties by identifying the 'five cardinal elements' of Romantic poetry. According to Abrams, Romantic poetry is distinguished by the belief that poetry is not an "imitation of nature" but a "representation of the poet's internal emotions". Secondly, that the writing of poetry should be "an effortless expression" and not an "arduous exercise". The prevalence of nature in Romantic poetry and what Abrams calls "the glorification of the ordinary and the outcast" are identified as two further common elements, as is the sense of a "supernatural" or "satanic presence" (Abrams, 2000, pp. 7-11). It is with regard to this elemental understanding of Romantic poetry that I will conduct my close critical analysis of 'Frost at Midnight' to examine the extent to which the poem embodie...
Shelley, Percy. Selected poems found in The Norton Anthology of English Literature. Volume 2, 7Th edition (2000): 698-798.
When discussing the different aspects of New Criticism in Dylan Thomas’s poem “Do Not Go Gentle into The Good Night”, the impression that comes to mind is death. The use of imagery was a necessity for Dylan Thomas to express the different techniques of writing which involved a mixture of surrealistic and metaphysical tones. His ability to change a words meaning to incorporate symbolism is noticeable in circle of unity from life to death and renewed life.
Marshall, William H., ed. The Major English Romantic Poets. New York: Washington Square, Inc., 1966. Print.
Lord Byron’s works, such as Don Juan and other poems reflect not only the suave and charming characteristics of the Romantic Period, but they also reveal the nature of Byron’s uncommitted and scandalous life. Byron, like most Romantic era authors, was very unpredictable and opinionated in all of his writings. From the hatred of his upbringing, to the love of adventure, and also to the love of meaningless relationships with various women were majorly influenced and illustrated through all of his works and especially in “Don Juan.” Yet he still managed to infiltrate his poems with charm, romance, and heroism. Byron was a perfect fit for the Romantic Period and his poems and he was therefore known as a great contributor towards the era.
Works Cited Bergman, David, and Mark Epstein. The Heath Guide to Poetry. Lexington: D.C. Heath and Company, 1983. Print. The. Lancashire, Ian.