The Complete Works of Lord Byron, 4 vol., 1835 edition

Description: In this year of the bicentenary of the death of Lord Byron, a new interest has arisen in the poet, adventurer, and notorious libertine. With any discussion of Lord Byron, there are two personages to consider: the man himself, versus his poetry. Even in his lifetime Byron was famous, or infamous, for his behavior, particularly a love affair he had with his half-sister. Byron never denied the rumors that circulated about his love affairs with married women or young boys. But It became much harder for Byron to ignore these rumors after 1812, when the first two cantos of Childe Harold's Pilgrimage were published. Byron said after the publication was released that "he woke to find himself famous." In creating his epic poem, Byron had relied on his tours of Portugal, Spain and Greece to craft a tale about a youth much like himself who was disillusioned, frustrated, and searching for relief from the feeling of devastation he experienced as a result of the Napoleonic Wars. In taking these tours, Byron was already reacting to the reputation he was earning as a reprobate. He was looking for answers on the continent, where there was much higher tolerance for his personal behavior. Byron did find some of the answers he was looking for, which convinced him that the Europeans were right and the British were wrong about his own behavior. Upon returning to the U.K. he continued to lead a dissolute life, at least by the standards of Georgian England. Eventually, however, the situation became intolerable for him, and he permanently exiled himself to Europe. He carried on writing, and remained a prolific poet throughout his short life (he only lived twelve more years after publishing Childe Harold's Pilgrimage). He was also a consummate letter-writer, and renowned for his satirical observations about his homeland. Toward the end of his life he took up the cause of Greek independence from Turkish rule. He joined a military brigade, and contacted a fever which brought about his death in April, 1824. Upon his death, Lord Byron was lauded in Greece as a national hero, and revered in the British literary world for his poetical accomplishments. He was, however, denied burial in Westminster Abbey, an obvious consequence of his questionable personal behavior, even though most of Britain's greatest literary figures, with the exception of Shakespeare, are buried or commemorated there. This did not prevent the public from clamoring for more of Byron's literary output, and within a year of his death a compendium of his work was published. Upon further research by scholars, it was understood that the compendium was incomplete. Revised and updated reprints of his poems, essays, and speeches were therefore issued from time to time. The 1835 complete works of Byron published by Baudry's European Library included more accurate versions of Byron's greatest works, such as Childe Harold's Pilgrimage, Manfred, and Don Juan. There was also a reason why Baudry's issued this collection out of Paris and not London. Baudry's specifically advertised the collection as including "the suppressed poems," - presumably the poetry British publishers did not dare release to a chaste British readership. This edition continues to be rated as one of the most correct printings of everything that Lord Byron published.

Price: 185 USD

Location: Morris, Illinois

End Time: 2024-12-03T03:31:02.000Z

Shipping Cost: 9.13 USD