Percy Bysshe Shelley

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On of the most influential romantic English poets of the 19th century was Percy Bysshe Shelley. He was born August 4th 1792 to Sir Timothy and Elizabeth Pilford Shelley in Field Place, Horsham, Sussex, England. (Crook) Shelley was the oldest of six children. He had one brother, John and four sisters, Mary, Elizabeth, Hellen, and Margaret. His family lived a very comfortable lifestyle, especially his dad’s father, Bysshe Shelley whom owned quite a few estates. Shelley’s father was also a member of parliament.

“The young Shelley was educated at Syon House academy from 1802 to 1804 and then attended Eton College from 1804 to 1810, where he resisted physical and mental bullying by indulging in imaginative escapism and literary pranks.” (Reiman) “His experiences at Syon House and Eton helped inspire his passionate hatred of oppressive power and these were also the years in which he developed his fascinations with science and literature.” (O’Conner)

He enrolled at the University College, Oxford, England after he left Eton, where he met his good friend and roommate Thomas Hefferson Hogg. They remained good friends for a long while, even after both were expelled for the writing and distribution of the pamphlet “The Necessity of Atheism” on March 25, 1811 (O’Conner). Sir Timothy, because of his position in parliament, had developed a way for the college to reinstate Shelley. All that was required for Shelley to be readmitted was for him to disown the pamphlet and proclaim that he was a Christian. Shelley refused to do this, which in return just “aggravated the difficulties that already existed between him and his father, and finding himself unwelcome at home, Shelley took up residence in London, where he became reacquainted with Harri...

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