Lord Byron
- 22nd January 1788
† 19th April 1824
English writer associated with Romanticism and the Byronic hero.
Lord Byron was born on the 22nd January 1788 in London under the name George Gordon Byron and died on the 19th April in 1824 in Greece (Hirschfeld 24; Coleridge). He was the 6th Baron of his family. His mother´s name was Catherine Gordon was heiress of Gight in Aberdeenshire (Scotland) wherefore Lord Byron became later his title. The marriage of Catherine and Lord Byron´s father Captain John 'Mad Jack' Byron was unhappy, for which reason Catherine not only lost her whole money and land in order to pay all the debts but further Lord Byron had to grow up without father. Captain John Byron visited Catherine only ones after giving brith to their son but left her right away again and traveled back to France where he died on the 2nd of August 1791 (Coleridge).
Physically Lord Byron was disabled - his right leg was shorthened cause of an infantile paralysis. In 1799 he attended the Aberdeen Grammar School but when he got his title after the death of his great uncle he changed the school and went to a school at Dulwich, later to Harrow, and in the end attended Trinity College in Cambridge. From his poems it became clear that he felt in love with Mary Anne Chaworth who did not reply his feelings. He was devastated about her marrying someone else (Coleridge; Kalmer).
In Cambridge he found some good friends but also had his first love with a young student called Edleston. Edleston died quite early in 1811 and it is suggested that the following Thyrza poems by Lord Byron are dedicated to Edleston. In 1807 Lord Byron published his first poem collection under his own name called Hours of Idleness. The response on his collection was exceedingly well and the few critics were confronted by Lord Byron in public with mockery. In 1809 he took his seat in the House of Lords and started travelling with some friends to Europe which is adequately for a young Lord. During his travels he started his most famous work Childe Herold's Pilgrimage ().
When Lord Byron returned to England he found his mother dead and information reached him about the deaths of Edlington and another friend. His letters during this time point out his despair and grief. In 1812 he hold his first speech in the House of Lords and received a lot of sympathy and respect. In the same year he published Childe Herold's Pilgrimage which brought him famousness:
Just turned twenty-four he "found himself famous," a great poet, a rising statesman. (Coleridge)
Bibliography:
Hirschfeld, Georg. Lord Byron. Menschen, Völker, Zeiten. Eine Kulturgeschichte in Einzeldarstellungen. 14 vols. Ed. Max Kemmerich. Leipzig: Verlag Karl König, 1926.
The Encyclopedia Britannica. Ed. E. H. Coleridge. 1905. Scanned and edited by Jeffrey D. Hoeper. 1999. <http://engphil.astate.edu/gallery/BYRON11.HTML>.
Yolanthes Bibliothek. Ed. A. Kalmer. 2003. <http://www.yolanthe.de/vorw_frame1.htm>