George Byron ( )

He was born in London. He attended Cambridge University. In 1809, he started a tour of Europe and the Levant. He married, but some years later he was charged with incest and was forced to leave England He became a supporter of the revolutionary Carbonari in Italy. He went to Greece to fight against the Turks. He died in Greece and was proclaimed a national hero. George Gordon, Lord Byron

It consists of four cantos. The first two were written on his first tour in Europe. A tale of love and adventures, set in exotic lands The plot is simple yet effective, based on contrasted love, forced separation, death and revenge. The heroes are proud and courageous They were thought to resemble their author Byronic hero Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage

He embodied aspirations to freedom and a hatred of social hypocrisy. As a typical Romantic hero: he was bold, impetuous, though at times melancholic; he loved solitude and was attracted by wild scenes nature; he seemed to be haunted by grief or remorse of some kind. The Byronic Hero

It consists of 16 cantos. It is written in ottava rima. Luigi Pulci’s Morgante Maggiore. It is a comic epic satire. Byron changes the Don Juan of the original Spanish legend. Byron uses this work to present the follies, tragedy and farce of his age without the restrictions imposed by the probability of the plot. The poem was criticised because it was thought to lack morals. Don Juan

The story is intentionally episodic and picaresque. It has an illicit love affair with a beautiful woman at the age of 16. The subsequent scandal forces him to flee Spain. He is shipwrecked on a Greek island, where he is looked after by a famous pirate’s daughter. When the pirate the love affair, he sends Juan away. After some adventures in Istanbul and Russia, Juan finally lands in England. Don Juan: the Story

It was begun in 1816, when he was living in the Swiss Alps. It is a ‘dramatic poem’  intended to be read rather than acted on the stage. Byron called it a ‘metaphysical drama’  a drama of ideas. Manfred is a nobleman living in his castle in the Alps. His great speeches are soliloquies expressing the Romantic ideas about man and his role in society and nature. The text is written in blank verse. Manfred